Giving

So I guess we have not done a very good job of explaining the real meaning of Christmas to our boys. I mean we really have been trying but I guess something has been lost in translation.
The other night Gary's brother came up and drop some presents off for the boys. Preston and I were talking and I told him that Uncle Paul was going to stop by. Preston said "Maybe he will bring us some presents." I said " I don't know, maybe he will." and Preston looked and me and said "Well isn't that the real meaning of Christmas to give presents." I had a good little laugh but tried to explain that he was the one getting the presents not giving them and maybe he needed to think of something that he could give to someone else. Too funny though how little kids take one thing that you tell them and completely turn it around.

The North Pole Express

This year my parents took our family on the North Pole Express that runs on the Heber Valley Rail Road. The kids had so much fun riding on the train and then seeing Santa. Here are a few pics of our fun time.
The whole Pace family. I think this is the first picture we have had with everyone now that we have all the new babies here.

Our family in front of the engine.

Gary and Boston on one of the old engines that doesn't run anymore.

Gary, Boston and Preston waiting to go. Boston and Preston enjoyed the ride so much. They starred out the window the whole time.

When we got to the "North Pole" a.k.a Santa standing out in some sage brush (kind of sad there was no snow yet) we picked up another passenger--SANTA!!
Here is Boston and Preston talking to Santa and telling them what they wanted.

Boston and Preston with their bells from Santa. Luckily we could all hear it ringing.

Our family on the train.

Taylor riding the train.

Tanna, Rylee, Boston and Preston.

I know this picture is kind of blurry but it was the only one I got of Braxtyn.

Boston

Me and Isaac

Kara and Sam

Preston

We all had so much fun. They had "Jack Frost" aboard our train and he did great at keeping us entertained. We sang songs, he told some stories and jokes. We had hot chocolate and cookies.
Thanks Grandma and Grandpa Pace for the wonderful time. It will be a great Christmas memory.

Early Christmas

We went and stayed with Grandma and Grandpa Knudsen this weekend. We will not see them at Christmas so Boston and Preston talked them into opening their presents a little early. Here is what they got.

They gave them some pretty fancy looking kites. They can't wait until we have a good kite flying day. I have a feeling it might not be until spring though because you won't catch me out in this cold weather. We will have to see.

They got a Hot Wheels wall tracks. They have had so much fun with this toy and have spent pretty much every minute since it got put up playing with it.

And then they got these really big coloring books.
Preston with his.

Boston with his.

Thank you Grandma and Grandpa Knudsen. We LOVE our new toys. We hope that you have a great Christmas.

Happy Halloween!!

We had a fun year again this year. We started off on the Saturday before Halloween with Grandma and Grandpa Pace's Annual Halloween Party. Sadly I have no pics right now from that because Gary had my camera and I could not get my mom's email to work to send the ones from her camera. I will try to get them later. Then Monday morning the boys got to wear their costumes to school. They were very excited to do this and had been waiting for weeks for Halloween to come. Then after that we went Trick-or-Treating at Gary's office. They let the kids come and go from cubicle to cubicle. Boston and Preston had a lot of fun doing this and got so much candy. They really could have been done then they had so much. But nope they wanted to go out and go Trick-or-Treating. Before they went out we carved a couple of pumpkins. They aren't the greatest but the two were stencils leftover from last year that I wanted to use up and then Gary of course had to do a San Francisco one. This year I didn't have to buy any costumes. My sister-in-law had sent a bag full of ones her boys had used in the past. Boston right away knew he wanted the Batman one. Preston had to try on all of them in the bag and then couldn't decide to be one which I am not sure what it was but he thought it was a "motorcycle man" so we went with that. He wore that one at my parents but then for school and trick-or-treating he chose another Batman costume. Thanks again Ty and Connor for sending all your great costumes.
Here they are in their Batman costumes.
Preston is the all black Batman and Boston is the grey Batman.

And here are the pumpkins that we carved. Boston and Preston were so excited to carve the pumpkins. We had them for about 3 weeks and everyday they would ask when we could carve them.

Birthday Boys!!

October 6, 2011
So today was Boston and Preston's birthday. They turned the BIG 5 years old today. I seriously can't believe my babies are 5 years old. Where does the time go? I wanted to post these pictures about their big day and hopefully sometime soon I can get a little post done about each of them at this time in their life. I just have to say that we love these little guys so much and can not imagine our lives without them. They are the best little boys parents could as for.
Boston and Preston we love you so much. Happy Birthday!!!

We started out by opening a couple of cards with money in them. What's a birthday anyway without a little cash?
Preston with his money.

Boston with his money.

When Gary came home for lunch that day we opened presents. The boys couldn't wait any longer.


They got a Razor Scooter.

And then this was their main request. They have been asking for this for months.
A GIANTS T-shirt. This is their favorite baseball team. They had also wanted a hat which we did get for them later with some of their b-day money.

Later that afternoon we had a little party for them and they invited a few of their friends. I am so mad at myself though I didn't really take any pictures during the party. They choose their theme to be batman. We played pin the bat logo on the batman and then a came called Mr. Freeze, we played a song for the kids to dance to and when the music stop they had to freeze. I think they all really enjoyed that one and they all had some really good dance moves to show off.
This year I decided not to buy a cake from the store. I thought I could do one good enough. But I really don't know what I was thinking. I suck at decorating cakes. Even just frosting them is bad with me. But I tried and I am glad I did because they ended up not wanting any of the cake and just enjoyed the batman cookies that we had made. They didn't turn out quite as good as I thought they would but you get the picture of what I was kind of going for.
Here is Boston with his b-day cake.

Preston with his cake

Here is the table set up with the treats, the cake and the batman sugar cookies.

Boston and Preston with all their goodies.

Then this was the only picture I got. This was after all the other kids had left and then I thought to get out the camera.
This is Boston and Preston with their good buddy Nash who was in their class last year. They were so bummed that he decided to do afternoon this year so he is not in their class again. They are all too cute together though. While Nash was still eating his snacks Preston came in and Nash was talking to him and said "I sure missed you guys" too sweet. I will definitely have to do better at having him over to play.

And even though he is a big 5 year old he wanted a picture with his favorite animal.

My mom and dad came up on the weekend to help them celebrate their birthday. They got to go golfing with Gary and my dad and be spoiled by grandma and grandpa. On Sunday the boys looked so handsome together. They had on almost matching ties. So we had to get a picture of them together.

Grandpa Pace

So the next weekend after we had gone to Vegas we had to head back to my parents house. My Grandpa Pace passed away on September 21 and his funeral was that next Monday. I know I have a picture of him somewhere but some of our pics are on another hard drive that Gary needs to transfer over so this was the best I could do. It is a great picture though of my grandpa in his cowboy hat, which he never went out without it on.
Sadly I wasn't the best about going over to visit with grandpa. It had actually been a couple of years since I had been in to talk to him. He was 85 years old and the past few months he had been really sick. So it was actually a blessing that he passed away when he did. My dad was thinking they would have to be him in the care center which grandpa did not want to do. So this way they did not have to force him to do that. He peacefully passed away in the hospital. My mom was there and said it was so neat. When he passed away he just had this aura about him and all his wrinkles just kind of faded away. My grandpa was not the most talkative man and he didn't always know how to show us that he loved us by giving hugs and things like that but we always knew he cared. When we were growing up he was always there to support us in whatever we were doing. Sometimes him and my grandma would sit at the baseball fields for hours to catch all the different grand kids games. He would come to the basketball and football games so he could watch me dance with the Tri-Dels at halftime. One thing that I thought was so nice was that even after my grandma died he continued to make sure each of us grand kids got a little Christmas money each year. It was just a little thing but grandma always did it and I really thought it would just stop but he kept it up. I did not know this story but my mom had written it down as one of her memories. When my mom and dad were doing the adoption process and had found out they were going to get me, they were down talking to grandpa about how much money it was going to cost and how they didn't know how they were going to do it. And by the time they left he handed them a check for the full amount.
My grandpa had not gone to church in a long time and I think he was very confused by a lot of things out in the world. Hopefully now he will accept the gospel and him and my grandma can finally be sealed together. With the passing of my grandpa it has made me really think about how grateful I am for our eternal family. I am so thankful for my parents and for their example. I am thankful they were married in the temple so our family will always be sealed together. I am thankful for mine and Gary's temple marriage and the knowledge we have that we will be together forever as well.
Grandpa you will definitely be missed. I am so thankful for all of your love and support that you have given me over the years. We all love you so much.

So Tired

One night when we were at grandma and grandpa's house Boston was so tired he fell asleep like this.

New Nephew

On our was back from Las Vegas we were able to stop in to my parents house. My brother Marcus, his wife Maria and their new baby Braxtyn were there. We were so glad that we were able to see our new nephew and cousin. He is too cute.

Las Vegas

Me and Boston and Preston took a little trip to Las Vegas a few weeks ago to check on our rental house there. We also got to get in visit with a few of our good friends. The first night we stayed with Mike and Heidi. I totally forgot to get any pictures with them though. The second night we stayed at the Bagwells. Boston and Preston love their boys Trevor and Mark and had so much fun hanging out with them. They were nice enough to come with us up to the Strip to check out a few water shows and the flower garden and the Bellagio and then the fish at Caesar's Palace.
It was a little hard to get a picture with all of them looking. The tree behind them was talking so they were a little preoccupied by that.

Checking out the scare crow. Poor Mark and Trevor, Boston and Preston wanted to walk holding their hands all night long. We were quite the sight trying to walk through all the crowds with them all holding hands.

Here are a few more pics of what we saw in the flower gardens.



Waiting for a water show.

This is what they looked like from the other side.


Looking at the fish tanks.

Thanks to our friends who are always so good to open their homes to us. We sure miss all of you guys. We sure had a fun time aside from the long drive. Boston and Preston had been asking for the last 18 months since we moved to Utah when we could go back and see the water show. Now that we have done it though they are not satisfied. They keep asking when we are going to go see it as a family. Hopefully the next time Gary can join us when we go down.

Back to Pre-School

Boston and Preston have started another year of preschool. They went back to Peak-A-Boo Preschool where they were last year. They loved it last year and were very excited to start again this year until I told them they probably wouldn't have the same teachers again. Then everything changed. My boys do not handle change well and thought they were going back to Miss Cris and Miss Wendy. So when people would ask if they were excited for school they would basically start crying and tell them no. So we went to the back to school day to find out who there teachers were and sure enough it was not the same teacher. They now have Miss Kym and Miss Michelle. We had a little bit of a hard time at first because they still wanted the other teachers. But now they are doing great and loving their new teachers just like I knew they would. Here are a few pictures from the first day of school.
Boston

Preston

Preston showing off his back pack.

Boston with his back pack.

I just though this picture that I got was kind of funny. I was trying to get a good one of their back packs and they turned like this. It kind of looks like they are lined up to get patted down by a police officer like when you get arrested. I think that might be how they were feeling that day as I dropped them off for their first day of school.