We had our Ward Christmas Party on Sat. I was very impressed with the realistic looking Santa Clause. They did good. Malia wasn't scared for the first time, but of course Gunner was. Malia walked right up to Santa and sat on his lap and told him she wanted a bouncy ball. I think this year is going to be easy! 
These are Malia's 4 yr old pictures. I am testing to see if they will let me use them like this.
This is the first year that we have been to Zoo Lights at the Oregon Zoo. It was pretty fun. I think the kids enjoyed it. It was also the first time we went on the train ride. Gunner loves trains, but was a little hesitant at first. It turned out to be a good night, it was cold, but atleast it wasn't raining. Our friends Ben, Bethany and little Mackayla went with us.
So I have been tagged.
Here are the rules. If you get tagged you are supposed to list 6 facts/habits about yourself. Then at the end of the post I am supposed to tag 6 more people and then let them know they have been tagged, and thus the game goes on.
This might be a little hard, but here it goes.
1. I guess the number one thing I am addicted to right now is blogging. Not so much as posting on mine, but stalking other people's blogs. I like to try to find other people I know from other people's blogs. It is amazing in the LDS world how easy that is. Ian will come up to me and say who's blog are you reading, and I usually have to answer I don't know. I spend probably way too much time at the computer. But I am trying to limit it now for when Gunner is asleep or at night after the kids go to bed, because every time I sit down at the computer Gunner runs up to me and pulls my arm and says No, No, No.
2. I absolutely love to read. I think why I am so obsessed with other people's blogs is I haven't had a new book to read in quite some time. But sometimes I think other people's lives are almost as good as a book. And when I do get a good book, I have to find out what happens, so I spend every free second I have reading it. Ian finds it amazing that I can watch TV and read at the same time. Weird I know.
3. I love to play Volleyball. I don't get to play as much as I would like, and I miss the feeling of playing as part of a team, and working up a good sweat.
4. I love to eat! Well more importantly, I love to eat dessert. I am not a big cake fan, but I will eat any kind of cookie or candy. I love that Ian does too, so when he says he wishes he had some cookies (Which is usually the next day after the last one is gone), I can blame it on him that we eat too much junk! :) You can tell that by our kids. They have no hope. We have to lock the candy up and hide the cookies if Gunner is around or he won't eat anything else, and he is pretty stubborn when it comes to cookies!
5. So I guess it's a good thing that I like to do Pilates. I definately should do it a lot more, and I haven't been very good at doing it lately, which you can tell, but it is so fun to watch Malia and Gunner try to copy my. They motivate me to try to be even half as flexible as they are.
6. I love the medical field. Everything about it excites me. I think it goes back many, many years to before 911, when we had the old "red phone" where all emergency calls for the town of Enterprise came right to our house. It was exciting to be the first one to know that something was happening. And then with my Dad being an EMT ever since I remember. Even when we go visit there now, and the pager goes off, it is so exciting. :) (I just re-read that and it's probably a little demented that I would get so excited over that when someone else is having a problem). And then being able to hear about my brother's stories. But I am excited to be able to be back in it with my new job starting at St. Vincent Hospital in the ER admitting. It is turning out to be a perfect job so far. (Even though I haven't even finished my training). I get to choose my shifts because I am on-call, and they can use me as little or as much as I want right now. Their shifts work out just right so Ian just has them when I work.
Whew!! Now with that over with, I am going to tag Shemri, Dad, Dan and Adrianne (you can both do it since I don't know very many more people who haven't been tagged that blog) that is unless Kathryn, or if anyone else in my family will start their blog, hint, hint...this is a good starting entry! :)
We are receiving an abundance of rain right now, one forecast said we would get up to 7 inches this weekend. I believe it. It has been non-stop downpouring! With high winds. The news said the gusts here in Hillsboro were about 30-40 mph winds. But at the coast the were getting over 100 mph gusts! There is major flooding all over Portland. These are the days you just want to stay inside! Luckily we are in an area where there is only large puddles. So we can just look out the window and watch and be greatful we are in a nice warm home!
Also on Sat. morning it snowed for a couple of hours. It never stuck but it was fun to watch the big snowflakes. Malia and Gunner loved watching it snow and Malia was really disappointed that it wasn't a lot of snow to play in and make snow angels. One funny thing though, after watching it snow for an hour, I had the news on, and Malia came running up to me and very excitedly said "Mom, the news said it is snowing!"
Here is Gunner's latest owwie. We were at the mall getting Malia's pictures taken and of course it was raining. Ian unbuckled Gunner from his stroller so we could just run to the car and get in really fast. Well about 10 feet from the car, Gunner decided to dismount and jumped from the stroller. He landed on his head as you can see. He's a little trooper though, only cried for a few seconds, and I think it was more because his hands were wet. The pictures almost don't do it justice either. The bump stood out about a half inch off his forehead. But atleast so far he is doing just fine. 
Ian is such a good Dad. Malia and Gunner love playing with him! It's usually hide and seek. It seems to never get old, atleast for the kids. This time they were playing Little Red Riding Hood, the Hunter and the Wolf.
Malia came running to me almost hysterical. I told her to take a deep breath and tell me what was wrong. After almost a full minute later she proceeded to tell me. "I was brusing my teeth, and I was playing with my favorite elastic (don't know why it was her favorite at that moment, she has about a million other ones like it), and I dropped it in the sink, and it went down the THROAT!
I decided I need to do better at writing down the funny things that Malia says, because I know she will love hearing about them later. So since I am always blogging, I will just record them here until I actually get them in her baby book.
Ian and I were talking about cutting his hair on Sat. and trying to decide if we dared do it while the kids were still awake, or wait until they were asleep.
Malia: "Dad, don't cut all your hair off!"
Dad: "Why, won't I look good?"
Malia: "No!"
Dad: "Why not?"
Malia: "Because you will look like a...a...a...Style Freak!"
Don't ask...
Also, some of you may know, most of you don't, but I am starting a new job at St. Vincent Hospital ER in admitting. It's an on-call evening job. Just a way to earn a little extra cash. Well, I had to do a new employee orientation during the day. So Ian was going to have to get the kids up and Malia ready for Pre-school by himself this morning. I told Malia we were going to have to teach Daddy how to do her hair and show him where her pre-school was. So she went up to Ian and said "Dad you are going to take me to preschool and we are going to have to teach you how to do my hair. And if you do it crooked you are just going to have to do it again!"
Well, they all survived one day without. And thanks to my friend Rochelle who tended Malia and Gunner in the afternoon!
We had a good Thanksgiving. We ate at Ian's parents house. It was the last night we would see his sister Andree for 18 mos. She left Friday morning to go to Utah to the MTC. She will be serving in the Pitsburg, PA mission. We will miss her! But we know she is serving the Lord, and will be an awesome missionary! I also contributed a little to the dinner this time, makes me feel a little more grown up. :) I made these rolls, and they turned out actually pretty good, or atleast I thought so. I just need to work on shaping them, they don't quite look as perfectly formed as my mom's, but maybe one day! And these cups are Gunner's favorite thing to play with at Grandma's. He loves his uncles!
Malia got these dress up clothes for her birthday and keeps wanting to do a "show". I was trying to teach her how to pose, (since I am the expert), and she started strutting her stuff. Then she insisted on taking my picture too, definately not top model material. 
This is the nightly routine lately. Gunner loves to play horsie, and will just jump on you spontaneously saying hee, hee.
Malia inherited my stick straight hair so we decided to try something different. I was actually surprised that she left the braids in overnight because she usually wants her hair taken out to sleep on. It turned out a little more kinky than curly, but still looked pretty cute.
