Christmas Letter 2012

Merry Christmas! We hope that you are enjoying the spirit of the Holidays and surviving the hustle and bustle of this time of year. 2012 has brought great times and memories at our home. We enjoy the happy chaos that can always be found here. We find ourselves constantly moving, running errands, working on projects, or going to the park to play.

Gage comes home late most nights. It feels likes he always makes it home right after I’ve completed the bedtime routine and have the kids nestled away. Of course, that is just in time for them to jump out of bed and get all riled up. (I wouldn’t have it any other way!)

I love staying home with the kids. I’ve tried to be more organized; it’s a work in progress. Through it, I’ve managed to complete a couple of bucket list projects. One was a quilt, which went together a lot easier than I had anticipated. I was almost done and thinking that I might do another, when I sewed through my thumb. Ouch, maybe I’ll wait a few years!

Trevin loves to be active and outside. After a few very comical falls during the summer, he has become an expert bike rider. Images of him hitting the back end of a parked car, trying to go up a curb, and trying to go off the curb will be lasting memories. He also learned that you can’t look behind you while riding if you want to stay upright! All of that along with his first season of soccer has really toughened him up.  Did you know that soccer players are not allowed to cry? It’s fantastic! This year Trevin also discovered that he loves demolition derbies, pie and football!

Cheyenne is our little trouble maker and we deserve every bit of what she dishes out! After all, we did start calling her “Cheyennigan” before she even started crawling. In 2012, she cut her own hair, stuck a small ball up her nose and decided to “just throw away” all of the house rules! “If we throw them away we can do whatever we want.” We are not sure what kind of animal lives in our basement, but we keep finding empty milk and juice boxes tucked away in various places in our storage room.  We love her and she truly makes us laugh everyday! Cheyenne has surprised us with how fast she can memorize lyrics for songs and she deploys incredibly creative problem solving techniques.

Levi is the best baby. He sleeps great, he eats great, and he only cries when he is hungry. He just mastered the stairs.  He can go up, down and turn around at the top! He now has full run of the house!  Grandma recently showed him how to play the piano, and now if anyone tickles the ivory, Levi is there within seconds to pound out his own tune. If at any time we haven’t seen him crawling around, it means he has planted himself in his room playing with matchbox cars. He loves those little cars.  It’s fun to see his personality develop.

We are grateful for our Savior, Jesus Christ, who made the ultimate sacrifice so we can correct the many mistakes we make. We know that life is a journey that is meant to be enjoyed. We strive everyday to express our gratitude for our many blessings. We are very blessed. We hope that you feel the love of the Savior in your lives this season! Merry Christmas!

Love, The Crabtrees

THANKSGIVING WEEKEND

Happy thanksgiving, I am so thankful for the life that I have. For my amazing Husband, who is my best friend and a wonderful father. For my kids that can be a handful, but make my life wonderfully busy. I am grateful for a Savior that died for me, so that I can repent as a strive daily to become a better person. I am grrateful for all the family I have that are always willing to help out!

 I hope your day was as wonderful as ours! Wednesday I spent ALL DAY baking. I made 5 pies and over 100 rolls. Yikes, our house smelled so fantastic. Levi helped me by standing guard by the flour and the sugar! Trevin has been learnign Thanksgiving songs at preschool which he come home and teaches to Chey and they love to sing them! It's pretty cute. 

 Thursday Gage spent the morning playing in the ward turkey bowl and came home just in time to help me get the kids ready. I lounged in the morning and watch the Thanksgivings Day Parade on TV with the kids. They loved the big balloons  especially Hello Kitty and Spider Man. We ate lunch with my side of the family and it was delicious. Around 4 we headed to the Crabtrees and played a couple games before calling it a night. Well, some of us called it a night. Cassidy, Lindsay, Janae and I actually left home around 9 pm and hit the stores. It's been years since I've done black Friday shopping with the crowds because I always worked Thanksgiving night. We had so much fun and didn't make it home until 5:30 am. I hope we do it again next year.

Friday morning Gage and I dropped kids off at Grandmas house and we headed of on a weekend get-away!  We went to Island Park with Justin and Heather and stayed for 3 days. We rented an awesome cabin that had a private hot tub. It was a fun couples get away. Gage brought up the projector which made for great movie nights. We played games, ate great food, talked lots, explored the lake, went shooting, and discovered that rocks make an awesome chirping noise if you skip them across a frozen lake! We even woke up to snow Sunday morning. The picture above is what the roads looked like on the way to church. We had a great, relaxing weekend away from the kids and the kids had a great time at Sugar's and Grandma's and didn't miss us at all.  I'll add pics if I ever get them off of Gage's phone. 

10 months

 Ten months old. It is amazing how much they change in a month. Levi is a pro at crawling and has just started to walk along the furniture. He is always on the go and is fast! He has started to "run" away from you if you chase him, which is funny because he gets so excited. No matter where you leave him in the house he eventually always makes his way back to the same spot. In his room playing with the cars! He loves them! He says DADADA now but not as consistently as Gage would like, BABABA just started and usually means bottle. His newest.... AHHDAA, translation is "ALL DONE". 

He is getting harder to manage at church sand we very rarely make it through all 3 hrs. I have resorted to tying him to the bench in sacrament meeting a couple of times because it makes him happier. I think he doesn't like being held in one spot, but if he thinks he is sitting on his own then it's ok. He has done great with sleeping and this is his favorite position! 

Oh I think that looks so uncomfortable, and I always pull his legs out from under him, but he always curls right back up. It is so funny the places this kid will fall asleep. Like at the top of the stairs, Or laying his head on the bottom stair, under his crib, when he decides he is tired, he just gives in. He already has 3 teeth, which he likes to grind! erg. Hopefully he'll grow out of that quick. He eats everything we eat, just blended up. I haven't bought any baby food with Levi, I did have about a weeks worth given to me. But other than that I have made all of his food. It was way easier than I expected and I think he has gotten a better variety, plus the food doesn't stink.  His favorite foods right now are oatmeal (instant), noodles, french toast, yogurt, cheese, and his bottle. 

SNOW DAY

Our first big snow fall of the year on a Saturday! SNOW DAY!!! We all slept in and when we finally got around to eating breakfast we decide that we would skip all the Saturday chores and go play in the snow. We all got bundled up and headed out with the goal of making a snow man, unfortunately the snow was too powdery to build anything. So we buried each other instead. The kids thought that was awesome. One of my favorite things about kids is that everything seem liek a new adventure. I know that we made snow angels last year, but when Gage showed them how this year it was a brand new to them. We had snow ball fights, played follow the leader, ate snow, and stuck our faces in the snow! Levi was a champ and played outside in he saucer the whole time. He never complained! 

  

When we were finally all snowed out we layed out our snow clothes to dry then jumped in the car and stopped by all of our families houses to see if anyone wanted to go sledding that afternoon!!! The Heslops and Crawfords joined us and we had so much fun! The kids were flying down the hill and they were all big enough to get themselves and the sleds back to the top! Levi seemed to like his first time sledding, and Trevin and Chey we could hardly convince them it was time to go home!   

FALL FUN

Football season is well under way and my boys are loving it. Trevin loves to go with Gage to Papa's hose to watch the games we don't get at home. And when Gage is home to watch the game Levi loves to lounge on his lap. One weekend we took all the kids to watch one of the local high school football games. They had so much fun. Gage had told Cheyenne all about cheerleaders and she couldn't wait to see them. Trevin was very interested in the game and had all kinds of questions. Like... "where are the lines? You know the yellow lines like on tv? (haha) Gage had fun explaining the orange flags on the sidelines and other such things. 

Fall at out house means pie. Well not usually but I think it will for the rest of my life. Trevin discovered pie this year and LOVES it. Well that might be an understatement. REALLY, REALLY, REALLY LOVES IT! Grandma brought over an apple pie one Sunday and we all had a piece. Trevin was in heaven. On Monday there were 2 pieces left, Trevin asked if he could eat one. I told him he should wait until dad was home (dad really loves pie too). Well we forgot, Tuesday T asked again, same answer, same outcome. Wednesday he asked again. Then he ended up sleeping over at Sugar's house. Well Gage came home that night and ate BOTH pieces of pie. Thursday morning Trevin came home opened the fridge and said... "AHH Where's the pie?" Oh I knew I was in trouble.  Here's the rest of our conversation...

Trevin : Where's the pie?

Me: Dad ate it all last night?

T: Why did he do that?! I really wanted pie!

Me: I know, I guess he didn't know.

T: starting to cry

Me: Should we make you a new pie? Mom know how to make a yummy pie that has red berries in it.

T: I just like the pie that Grandma Goo makes.

Me: Trevin, I don't know how to make apple pie.

T: I have a good idea, you can get the "receipt" from Grandma!

And we did... Here is the outcome, obviously Gage has always rolled out my pie crusts, this was my first solo attempt and as horrible as they look the still tasted great. 

Since the apple pie incident we have had A LOT of pie at our house. Apple, razzle berry, lemon meringue, pumpkin, chocolate, banana cream. And next Trevin wants to try blueberry! (and my pie crust have improved immensely.)

We bought a tree. We decided that when J&J did their fall sale, we would add another tree to our yard. Well the kids and I went to scope out the trees and the sales person informed us that all of their mature trees were $99 (we were looking at buying a very young tree for $70). The sale person also said it would just cost a little more to plant because you needed to hire someone to haul it/ plant it. I passed that info on to Gage and he said. Pick one out. We did then went back a couple days later to pick it up. Trevin and Chey were very interested in the forklift that pulled our tree out of the ground and hauled it out to the truck. We covered the tree with a tarp in the truck which I think was a great idea to keep it from getting wind damaged.  (Well it was a great idea until the wind hit the tarp and it shredded into a million little pieces! oops, old tarp) When we got it home Gage just tilted the bed of the truck up until the tree came barreling down to the ground. Luckily it landed on the root ball and didn't take out the fence. Trevin had lots of fun playing in the hole we dug for the tree.  As far as the need to hire someone with heavy equipment to bury the tree. No need for that we have a jeep. We hooked tie down from the tree to the jeep bumper and stuck a piece of cardboard under the tree, then pulled! I wish I would have taken video of that!

 

 The next day we finished burying it. And the kids loved getting to help.  We love the new addition!

Harvest Moon Festival was so much fun. This was our first year going and we will definitely be going back! Lots of fun, free activities for the kids and a great family atmosphere. We had a great ttime riding the trains at the Union Station, shopping at the farmer's market, rock climbing, painting, eating with family, gettign balloon animals and getting our faces painted! 

 The pumpkins the kids picked out from J&J's hay ride were huge. What a fun, free way to spend a Saturday afternoon... and we made it home in time to watch the Utes play!

Happy FALL!!!

9 months

On Levi's 9 months birthday I forgot to take a picture. The next day he ended up sick and stayed that way for a couple of days. Fever, throwing up, not sleeping, not eating... the whole nine yards.  I was just gunna put an envelope next to him but I decided that would make for a sad picture, so we waited.  

 Doesn't he look much happier? He actually looks a lot skinnier that normal in these pictures. Maybe because he is getting taller... or maybe because he is always on the move... or maybe it's because he was sick, who knows.

 Levi is officially a crawler. He still gives in and army crawls on occasion  (because it is faster). He just learned how to crawl UP the stairs and he is pretty good at it too. Cheyenne and Trevin like to stand at the top of the stairs and cheer him on.

Levi pulls himself to stand next to EVERYTHING! He loves to stand in his crib and he also loves to sit in his crib and watch the kids play, occasionally he'll even stick his feet our through the bars, which I think is pretty cute. 

Levi also learned how to wave hi/bye this month. He also stick his tongue out and says "hhh" but I'm not sure that quite counts as a word. There is one word that he says very well, (his first word) MOM! Not mama, MOMOMOMOMOM! All the time. Which I absolutely love!

We have a doctors appointment on Tuesday so I'll add his stats on here when I get them. Levi's nick name is Chunka Chunk, Thanks to JR. (What we decided to call Janae's James, since we already have an uncle James on the Crabtree side.)  We love this little guy and are excited that he is feeling better, even though he is still waking up multiple times a night. Hopefully he will get back to his normal routine soon.

Finally made it to his 9 month appt. Here are his statistics.
Head: 47.9cm = 97%Weight: 23.3 lbs = 84%Height: 30.5 inches = 97%

GO SILVERWOLVES!

 We signed Trevin up for soccer with the city league  this fall. He has loved it and it's done wonders for my boy that would cry just a little too easily. Well... that all changed because "Soccer players are tough."

In fact Trevin can do anything because "He's a soccer player!" ....Can you eat all of your dinner?  "Yes, because I'm a soccer player." ....Wow you're smart. How did you know that?  "Just because I'm a soccer player!"
It has been so much fun to watch him and the rest of the silver wolves. He had great coaches, Coach Phillips and Travis. Trevin really looked up to these two and they taught him so much about soccer. Trevin played on Tuesdays and Thursdays officially and every day in between in the back yard. "Big 5" became his favorite store ever! And dad couldn't have been prouder.

It is always fun to watch little kids play soccer... "Herd ball" is what I heard it called and it totally fits. We loved watching all the games and appreciate everyone that came to support Trevin. He was always so excited to see family come.

They rotated the players every quarter into different positions. And even if they didn't stay in the right places I think they were learning. Trevin loved playing defender and goalie. And he did great at both. 

 I was amazed by the end of the season that Trevin wasn't afraid to dive on the ball when he was goalie even if there were still little feet around trying to kick it. On his second to last game T even scored his first GOAL! He was so excited and we were too! Go #8! (That's what Trevin told me I could yell.)

We can't wait til spring ball starts...

8 months

 Levi is 8 months old and I had a hard time getting a picture with the envelope. See the one I started out with crumpled and ripped in half. He was so excited that he had managed to destroy it I was able to sneak another one in a get a picture.  Levi still scoots every where but we have seen him get up on his hands and knees so I don't think we are very far off from crawling now.

We went over to swing at grandma goo's and Trevin and Cheyenne decided levi needed a turn so we hooked up the baby swing ... the end result... all laughs and smiles from Levi! 

This boy can eat and eat and eat. He even has two new teeth to help him out (the bottom two)! He got teeth way earlier than Trevin or Cheyenne. It seems weird to brush his teeth this little.

end of summer fun

We decided to go camping over Labor Day... the non traditional way! We set up Chief's tent in the basement. It took up the whole room. We had so much fun. The kids thought it was great and Gage thought I was crazy. We ate lots of snacks and listened to the stormy weather out side while we watched movies through the open door of our tent!

 

  Trevin loves to ride his bike. It used to be that Trevin was great to run with while he rode his bike. Now he is too fast for me to keep up with him running. So now we go on bike rides together. Usually Trevin rides and Cheyenne and Levi tag along in the bike trailer. But one evening while Dad was home Trevin and I decided to hit the road alone. It was so much fun, we rode about 4 miles total, half of that in the rain, and we saw an awesome double rainbow.

 Nikcole invited us over a couple of times this summer to swim in their pool! Not just us but the whole Canova/ Crabtree/ Hamblin/ Coombs crew. The kids loved it! I did too!  Gage didn't ever get to come with us, because we always went in the middle of the day. But we took lots of pictures and video of the kids new water skills. Cheyenne loved lounging around with her life jacket. She swam everywhere and it was fun to see her with a little bit of confidence in the water, she still refuses to jump in from the side or put her face in the water (maybe next year).  Trevin transitioned to the arm floaties from a life jacket with out a problem. He loves them. He thought the diving board was really cool but absolutely refuse to jump off it. I waked him to the edge a couple of times, then finally threw him in once... that didn't go over well at all!  The next time we jumped in together holding hands, then together not holding hands, then I "forgot" to jump and he went in alone. After that he was unstoppable. He loved jumping off the diving board and even let Nate and Trav throw him across the pool as far as they could (which was pretty far).

SCHOOL

Trevin started preschool and is loving every minute of it. He was so excited on his first day and not even a little bit nervous. That's my independent little boy. And he isn't independent in the "let me do!" kind of way. It's a mature for his age "Yeah Mom I can do this by myself." kind of thing. 

 I can't wait to see what he learns and hear about his new friends. He even has another Trevin in his class of 8 kids. What are the odds? Trevin is so excited to meet someone with his same name!

Cheyenne also started going to preschool at her aunts house. She loves it! She goes whenever Chersti is teaching which ends up being once ever 2-3 weeks. She too wasn't nervous to go, but apparently she is very quite while she's there. That is not the case when I pick her up, the girl talks non stop as soon as she is in the car.  On the other weeks we do preschool at home. This little girl is brilliant and can remember everything! She also like to let her attitude take over every now and then and she pretends she doesn't know how to write letters or count. On those days preschool is very short! That's my Cheyanigan!