Aria turns TWO!

Our sweet little Aria turned two on Thursday! I can't believe it's already been two years since I snuggled her for the first time. Her little personality is really starting to blossom. She loves to be funny and silly and she is finally starting to talk up a storm. She'll eat almost anything, she adores all her siblings, and she loves baby dolls and dress up.

Yesterday, we had a little party for her with cousins and some cake and ice cream. She was in heaven with all her fun new things to play with!

Happy birthday, sweet girl!!

Resurrecting the blog.... again.

When we decided not to homeschool the boys his year, I hoped to start blogging regularly again. In fact, I've been documenting our lives with that purpose in mind, but I just keep putting it off. It's starting to make me sad to have all those pictures and videos sitting on my phone and computer without anyone seeing them, though! Today, on Aria's birthday, I just can't bear the thought of not documenting this cute little girl on her special day. It was just the push I needed! So, here I am resurrecting the blog. Again.

First, here is what we are up to these days......

Like I mentioned, the boys are going to public school this year and they are loving it. We got glowing reports from both their teachers at parent teacher conferences. We are glad that they are doing so well! Evan wanted to join orchestra and decided to play the violin. He's picking it up quickly and has even taught himself several songs!

Ellie started preschool! We are doing Joy School, like we did with the boys. We have a fun group of six kids (five girls and one boy), so I teach every six weeks. Ellie LOVES it!

We took a field trip with our Joy School group to the pumpkin patch in October. It was a lot of fun! There was a big maze made out of hay as well as a corn maze, a hay pit for jumping in, a big slide, and lots of animals. We also had a wagon ride out to the pumpkin patch to pick our pumpkins!

Ellie also just finished a ballet class and loved that as well. She's a little natural! :) She was super excited about having her hair in a "ballerina bun".

Here's a little clip of her on her first day. (Excuse the undies hanging out the sides of her leotard. We went and bought her a little skirt to cover them up immediately after class!)

The boys have been playing basketball and loving it! You can tell they haven't had much of a chance to practice shooting hoops, but they are both one of the best defenders on their team and they are both great at rebounding, too. (Evan is red number 4 and Asher is Blue number 6.)

Within the last month, we had our first ER visit when Aria fell and needed stitches on her lip.....

....and my first car accident. We were without our van for two weeks while they replaced the front suspension and left wheel, but luckily no one was hurt!

We enjoyed having Ben's sister and her family close by for Thanksgiving!

And now we are gearing up for Chrismas! Starting with our ward party, which had a Whoville theme.

Evan and Aria in the Whoville parade

 Asher in the parade.

 My Who hair.

 Aria-loo Who

And of course..... Aria turned 2!! But that's for a later post. :)