The Sweetest Girl Ever

A few days after Justin's birthday was Kaybri's birthday. She turned 4 years old on the 10th. We ended up celebrating her birthday a few days later so daddy could make it. We still tried to make her day special though. She loves the birthday song and we sang it to her practically all day. She loved it! She was "chef of the day" at school that week and also had a valentine party, so she really ended up having more of a birthday week. I don't really know how much she comprehended it all, but I think she had a fun time.

On her actual birthday it snowed here in Arizona! Of course it only lasted an hour, which makes snow kinda fun and exciting. I tried to document it and snapped a picture of Kaybri outside before she left on the bus. You can't see much snow, but if you look really close it's all there behind Kaybri!

Remember how I said we were debating on taking her bike back because it was too big and she wouldn't get on it....well, we did and got her a dora tricycle instead. And since we got it at the same time as her birthday presents, we decided to wrap it up and re-give her her Christmas present :) I'm glad we took the other bike back, she's much more comfortable with trying to ride the tricycle. It also helped Paxton figure out how pedaling works and he can now ride his bike a little.

Kaybri carried this fake nail polish around all night. She loves to have her nails and toes clipped and painted.

Paxton trying out Kaybri's lipstick. (luckily fake too)

And here's the cute girl in front of her ice cream cake (request of Justin). I'm so glad she was in a good mood this day and actually participated in her birthday! She opened her presents on her own, played with them a little and gave us lots of kisses and smiles. It was a great day! She was afraid of blowing out her candles, but Pax gladly accepted the challenge.

We are so thankful for our sweet girl. Our life would definitely be boring with out her. She has taught us a lot the past few years. We are learning to be more patient and that we really aren't the ones in charge. Things can change literally in the blink of an eye. This past year we noticed a dramatic decrease in how fast she was learning and then she started losing some of her skills too. We are way excited that she was able to get funded through the state and that she will now be able to get some of the services she needs. It's work and no fun a lot of the time, but I know it's going to help her get back on track. We celebrate the smallest things with Kaybri, like when she says a new word, the return of an old word, she finished all of her dinner by herself, she tried to play with another kid (or at least said hi), she stayed in her bed all night, I didn't have to repeat her a million times, she followed a direction I gave her, etc...

Some of the things she's into now-a-days:

-painting/coloring

-watching movies (she has about 10-15 different ones that she'll sit through and watch)

-swinging, sliding, climbing (swingset)

-jumping on beds or trampolines

-manicures/pedicures

-putting on real makeup

-going to preschool

-screaming at Pax if he comes too close

-KISSING over and over again...does not matter who it is (and you must repeat "thanks" after she says it)

-loves to be tickled and has the cutest giggle to go with it

-playing with her hair (or mine) and sticking it in her ear

-singing popcorn popping, happy birthday, or itsy bitsy spider to her

If you know Kaybri, you know she's a little quirky, and WE LOVE IT!!

SO OLD!!!

As usual, last month was a crazy busy month for us. I was looking at my calendar/planner tonight and thought, "no wonder I haven't blogged...or feel like I will never catch up on everything. Something was marked on every single day of February (well, minus maybe a couple Sundays)." Now, a lot of things that we did were fun things, so I'm not complaining-I know I totally bring the craziness upon myself.

So, to start off the month we celebrated Justin's 30th Birthday!!! I've been teasing him for the past few months on how old he was getting. I know he doesn't look old or act old, but 30 just sounds OLD! :) I'm pretty sure it's more weird for me than him. Thank goodness I have a few years until I get "old". hahaha...I'm sure all my older friends/family are rolling their eyes thinking I have so much to learn and that it's so not a big deal.

Anyway...Justin's parents came down to AZ to visit, so the pretty much the whole family (we missed you Shawn!) got together and celebrated all the January and February birthdays (6 total birthdays I think). It was a fairly quick trip to Mesa, and overall we had a good time. We spent some time at a nearby park and then we all went to Amazing Jake's; it's a pretty cool place that has tons of stuff for the whole family. Little Kaybri had a seizure right before we got there, so she was an emotional wreck, but we did get her to ride a couple rides that she did ok on. After a couple of hours of carrying her around the place I decided to just take her out to the car and let her have what she really needed- a nap! I felt so bad for her, you just never know when that's going to happen. Justin and Pax had a blast though and got some good bonding time. We are so grateful for what a loving family we have and that they all wanted to make Justin's 30th special for him. We love our family so much and more than anything it was fun to see everyone and spend some time together. Justin had a good birthday and not much has really changed, we're still living today like he's 29! ;) I love you babe! You're a good sport!


Here are all the cute girl cousins loving the goodies that Grandma is known to bring.

Justin getting some help from Pax on blowing out his 1 candle.

Justin got a gun for his birthday this year. I have no idea the technical name/info on it. My dad just said, "This is a good gun; Justin needs it." So that's what I decided to get him. It totally took Justin by surprise, and he was pretty excited about it. I didn't dare have him open it up and take a picture of it, because we were in Amazing Jake's at the time.

Justin and Britni, the 2 birthday adults

I have had the priviledge of watching my cute little niece once a week while Joni goes to work. She is so cute and my kids absolutely love her. When she arrives Kaybri is constantly saying "baby", "brother", "Paxton". I guess we totally brainwashed her when I was pregnant with Pax, because she thinks every little baby is called her baby brother Paxton. And Pax just can't get enough of her. He loves to hold her, talk to her in high-pitched baby talk, give her binkie to her, load her up with toys, kiss her, and make her smile. He does pretty good, but he is a rough and tough boy, so we are still working on being a little softer. Today Trista got to sit on Pax's couch with him and he thought it was great! He is turning into such a big boy and trying really hard to be my helper...some of the time.

Swing swing

We were so excited that the house we moved into came with a nice swingset in the backyard. Kaybri looks out the back window and begs and begs to "swing". Swinging and movies are the two things so asks to do each day. And I know movies are probably the worst choice to give into, but thats what she gets every single day. Why? Because it's safe and I don't have to worry about her so much while watching a movie. And with swinging, I feel like I need to be right there in case she has a seizure. Her seizures have been shorter and little more mild lately, but she still has them pretty frequently. And if she's jumping, running, or getting really worked up it's almost inevitable that she'll have a seizure. I'm not really worried about the seizure itself, just the fact that if she had a seizure while on top of the swingset, she could really get hurt. Anyway, I need to just devote some time each day to going out and playing with them on the swingset, especially since it's been so sunny and nice these days. Ahhh...still not missing the Utah snow!

On this particular day we piled up all the leaves and made a soft landing for the kids to slide into. They thought it was pretty fun. They started getting really brave and going down head first.

A whole lotta rambling and pics

Before school got out for Christmas break Kaybri's class went on a field trip to the tree festival in town. They made decorations in class, and they went to go see their tree all decorated. Pax and I also went to go see the trees and meet up with Kaybri.

My good friend, Amber, took some pictures for us. Some of my favorites are included on our Christmas card below. I'm surprised with what turned out because there was of course no cooperation with the kids and then Kaybri had a seizure, so our time was cut short. Amber also took some pics of my family when they came for Christmas, she's awesome!

The weekend before Christmas we had a wedding to go to in Mesa. Justin got sick with the flu the day before, so we missed the wedding but made it later to the reception. We got to visit all of Justin's family and do a mini-Christmas together. A couple of days later we made it home and Kaybri and Pax started in throwing up. I was a little stressed because my entire family was supposed to come the next day and stay until after Christmas. Thank goodness none of them got sick. I was cloroxing everything and taking a ton of vitamins, and after a few days of not getting sick I thought I was in the clear. I was wrong. I got sick Christmas Eve and Christmas day. I was bummed, but glad it was me and not one of the kids.

Even through the sickness, we still had a great time. We attempted to act out the nativity, but ended up just playing dress up with the kids and reading the Christmas story later.

There were 5 little kids to open presents, actually only 3 who know how to open a present. They sure are spoiled! It was so funny when they ran out there. Paxton ran to Lydi's kitchen, Lydi ran to Pax's bike, and Kaybri actually went to her bike. Everytime we went to wal-mart and went by the bike section my kids were glued to them, so we thought they were going to be a hit for sure. Well they liked them for about 10 minutes tops; we haven't been able to get the kids to ride the bikes much since. I'm sure part of the problem is that they don't actually know how to ride them, but even when we push them on the bikes it doesn't last long. They just want to go play on the swingset, especially Kaybri. So I'm debating on taking them back and getting something else, is that horrible? I think it was a little overwhelming for Kaybri and she didn't want to open more than one present while everyone else was. She had done the same thing last Christmas because she was super grouchy and knocked out from a seizure. And last year we made the mistake of pretty much opening everything up for her. This year we just waited until everything settled down and let her do it on her own. She did a lot better and enjoyed her presents this time around.

We all traveled down to Animas a couple days after Christmas. We were able to visit with my grandparents some and see a couple friends. The boys also went coyote hunting. Justin's gone several times with my dad before and never had much luck, but this time he saw and shot one! He was pretty excited. Jarom and Tristan also shot one or two, or maybe my dad got one too, I don't know. There's pictures to prove it too, so if you're against that kind of stuff...skip on by.

We went back home and then spent New Year's Eve with my mom, dad, Joni, Tristan, and Dawn and kids. We partied all night and then got on the road again, this time to go to Mesa. Justin had the rest of the week off so we did a little bit of shopping and hung out with Jarom and Mel. And these 2 little munchkins below...I don't think they've ever spent so much time with eachother. They fought over nearly every toy but also were caught giggling, chasing after eachother, and dancing together. Paxton has developed a new love from hanging out with his cuz, he knows all the princesses now and would love to watch those movies if we let him! I'm pretty sure Pax taught sweet Lydi some new tricks too...like how to be naughty, and yell and talk back...sorry Jarom and Mel.

Wayyy Past Due

HA! I bet you all are thinking I'm talking about Christmas, New Year's, or maybe even something last week, but nope...Thanksgiving...I know it's probably like "illegal" in the blog world to be posting about something so long ago, but... oh well. I mean I never even posted about Halloween, so I guess I could put you all through even more torture, but I won't. I don't know what my problem has been. I get behind blogging and then overwhelmed with all the fun things I had wanted to blog about and instead of just doing it, I forget about it and check out everyone else's instead! But my husband is away, again...and I'm bored so I figured I would catch up a little. For what it's worth, I did start these Thanksgiving and Christmas posts a few weeks ago (when Justin was gone on the "man" trip four-wheeling), I just never posted them because I was embarrassed of how incredibly past due they were, so now...they're even later but I decided I don't care-they're for journaling purpose so PLEASE JUST SKIP! :)

Thanksgiving was spent with Justin's family in AZ. Dawn and Cory hosted and did a fantastic job. The boys got up early and played in their Turkey Bowl even though it was rainy and muddy-they loved it. We then had a traditional Thanksgiving dinner with loads of yummy food, great company and of course lots of pies. Did I mention that the boys were amazing and did all the clean up?! Definitely needs to be a tradition. Some of us braved Wal-Mart early on Black Friday and then later that day we headed to the church to play games in the gym. It was so much fun and a great way to let the kids get out some of their energy that was being bottled up because it was too cold and rainy outside to play. We all played "line tag", a dress up relay, and kickball.

Pax loved being the center of attention during his turn of the dress up relay. He especially loved his daddy running super fast with him.
Jake was not a fan, but at least he did it.

Friday evening we had a surprise Birthday party for Vince and Marsha at El Charro. It was nice to have them visit. We need them to move back to AZ because we don't get to see them near enough.

All the Echols left on Saturday to go back home, but we did get some surprise visitors on Sunday evening. Jarom, Mel and the kids stopped by! They were traveling from El Paso and needed to take a break. So here's the Ellis grandkids in their jammies.

Need Addresses

I'm working on Christmas cards and I've realized I don't have many of your addresses. If you are interested in getting a card, please email me your mailing address. My email is cassandra_dee01@hotmail.com Hopefully I can get these done soon and FINALLY get Thanksgiving posted ;) Hope you are all having a great Christmas season.