Bring on the Christmas Spirit!

We love Christmas! Waking up to the smell of a fresh Christmas Tree, having an excuse to drink hot chocolate every day/night, and being able to watch the Polar Express, Elf, and the Family Stone over and over:) We've had a great time kicking off the holiday season. We've gone down to San Clemente to enjoy Santa reading us "Twas the night before Christmas" and a Tree lighting, seeing REAL reindeer!, and going to the train station to enjoy a Christmas peformance on top of an amtrack train covered in christmas lights, starring Santa and Mrs. Claus. The boys got to sit on Santa's lap twice; once at our Ward Christmas party and once at the Mall. We've also enjoyed making a ton of Christmas crafts this year (even dad and ethan helped this year:) to add to our collection. We've definately been doing the Christmas "countdown" with the boys. James asks me every night "Mom, is Santa gonna be on our roof tonight?" it's priceless! Their favorite songs to sing are "Santa Claus is coming to town" and "Frosty the Snowman" (of course their rendition is a little different from the original) It's been a blast to enjoy this holiday season through the eyes of a 2 and 31/2 year old! Now it's just time for Santa to come!!!!

Turkey Trot 2009

Yes, mom did the Turkey Trot for the 3rd year in a row. I just did the 5k and only ran the first mile because I was more comfortable power walking it this year since I'm 4mnths pregnant. My sister Hether and I started doing this the year ethan was born and loved it so much that we've decided to make it a yearly tradition. So my girlfriend Liz and I and my Hethers sister in law Kim all did it together. It was fun as always and was so refreshing to wake up to a beautiful sunny day at the harbor in Dana Point. I went straight home afterwards baked my 3 dishes and then we headed over to my mom's house where we enjoyed a yummy Thanksgiving Lunch/dinner. Cameron and I spent our evening going over the good deals in the newspaper, marking the boys christmas items. After an hour and a half of sleep, I arrived at Toys R Us at 11:30 pm and got home at 4:30am and got ALL of the boys christmas shopping DONE!!! What a great savings you get on black friday...yes, it's a little nutty to stay up late and stand in crazy lines, but it's soooo worth it! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving and we hope all of you did too:)))

Every day fun raising these crazy cute boys!

The Churchill boys get more creative and more fun every day. Of course there are days where we feel crazy but we're pretty good at enjoying the moments of how hard they make us laugh by the new things they do:)))

Pumpkin Patch...a must every year of course:)

The Pumpkin Patch never seems to get old, right? We love going there and the boys do too. It kicks the start of the Holiday season. So here's some fun pics

Halloween 2009

So now we get to play catch up since our camera is finally working again. Halloween was a lot of fun this year...we're finding that each year just gets better because your kids get sooooo into it! We loved getting em dressed up this year. James decided he wanted to be Incredible Hulk and Ethan didn't want to be anything but I managed to trick him into putting on a Lion costume and used his long grown out hair to make a Lions mane out of it:) We went to Cameron's aunt Marna's house for our annual Halloween get together and enjoyed yummy food and trick or treating in Talega. We had a Halloween:)

It's a Girl!

Yes, that's right, a false alarm! We had an ultrasound about 3wks ago and were told it was a boy...only to find out for sure tonight that it's a girl!!! We got some "sure" shots of her female parts and are 100% certain. I'm in complete shock. I knew I felt different this pregnancy and thought I was having a girl until I was told differently a few weeks ago. Well I'm now almost 17wks pregnant and carrying different than I did with the boys. It definately explains my crazy mood swings and my skin breaking out! At least I know the reason behind it now...some moms say they couldn't tell the difference while being pregnant with a son or daughter, well I can! As you all probably know by now this is our last child. We are so thrilled to have this wonderful experience to raise a daughter. We are especially blessed to be able to experience both, having sons and a daughter in our family, I've heard they're night and day:) Well I'm excited to have a special pal since I've been outnumbered for a few years now. It's going to be so much fun doing her hair!!! Cameron and I were very emotional when we found out this wonderful unexpected surprise tonight and are looking forward to many memories to come!

It's A Boy!!!

We just found out a few days ago that we're expecting a Baby Boy! Can you believe it! 3 Churchill Boys!!! We're totally excited. I thought for sure I was pregnant with a girl because I feel so different this time, but every pregnancy is different they say. James and Ethan keep talking about their brother. It's so cute that James understands this time what's going on in my belly and that there's a baby brother waiting to meet and play with him. Ethan has been our "baby" so it's really cool to picture him as a big brother. We're going to have so much fun having an "all boy" family...I'm definately gonna be outnumbered but in a very cool way:)

We're Expecting another Baby!!!

We're so thrilled to share with everyone that baby #3 is coming next Spring! I'm super excited and very nauseous. I'm about 9wks pregnant and definately feel it. It's amazing how your body adapts and changes so much with each pregnancy. We are very hopeful that we will not lose this baby, as most of you know that we had a misscarriage at 8 wks last February. For those of you who don't know Cameron and I were sad to find out through our misscarriage earlier this year that they found a golf sized tumor on the only half ovary I have left and was advised to have a hysterectomy last June if I hadn't concieved by then. Cameron and I prayed so much to feel peace and comfort that we had completed our earthly family with James and Ethan. We attended the Temple often and felt strong in our decision to continue to concieve. What an amazing blessing it is to be expecting again. We feel that whatever Heavenly Father has planned for this for this pregnancy we are prepared for it. So...on that note, nausea is a good sign, even though every day feels like a million hours. I'm just so grateful to have this experience again, and most likely for our last time.
We're due next Mother's Day weekend~May 10th 2010~ What a wonderful gift!

Happy 30th to Cameron!

We had an amazing day today celebrating Cameron's Big 30th! We woke up super early and went to the Temple, got into an early session and then joined friends in our ward for their sealing right after...so cool. After a wonderful morning we packed our car up and headed down to the clock tower, of course, our favorite beach spot. We invited friends and family to join in on a perfect beach day to celebrate Cameron's big day. Seriously I don't know which one was better the weather, the tide or the homemade fresh strawberry layered birthday cake:) We swam, played games, talked, bbq'd, and had so much fun with all the kiddos. Pictures soon to come, I'm too tired to upload tonight. Happy Birthday to an amazing Husband, Friend, and Father...my Cameron!

Memorial Weekend!

We started out with sleeping in, yummy pancakes, followed by watching my cute little niece Jade for a few hours. Next Cameron and I got an afternoon date in to see Terminator Salvation, awesome...then headed down to SC Pier to walk the pier with our boys, or should I say run the pier with our boys j/k. and enjoyed the beautiful sunny late afternoon, the best part was James and Ethan always looks for "papa" my dad in the water on the North side of the pier, where my dad surfs typically and papa was in the water! The boys were super excited to see him riding the waves and waving to him. My dad's pretty amazing, 65 and still out in the water every day the waves are descent, he's in such great shape and has a tan year round:) So after we got done with the pier, we walked up the hill to my sister hether's house and enjoyed a yummy pesto shrimp pasta dinner with her new hubby Brian and my nephew Scott. We couldn't have had a better Monday.

Ethan's first night in a big boy bed! (20 months already!)

Well, James couldn't be happier, Ethan is now out of the crib and right besides his partner in crime. The boys were so cute and excited to finally be next to eachother while they sleep:) We transitioned James into a toddler bed when he was 17 months, a couple of months before Ethan was born so that he would feel secure when the baby came...and it really worked well for him. Ethan really loved his crib more than James did, every babe is so different, but the time has come. The best advice I ever got from one of my clients was to switch your kids to a big boy/girl beds before they're old enough to know that they can get out of bed and try to sneak into yours! It totally worked with James...so now we'll give it a whirl with Ethan. So far so good. We've got wonderful boys, they love eachother so much. I had to post Ethan's first night in his big boy bed and of course them praying together in their beds. Awwww, we love our little munkins so much.

Spiritual Vacation

Yup, Cameron and I drove up for General Conferance a few weeks ago, it was wonderful!!! We were on the road literally the day after we got home from camping, and loaded up for our road trip to Salt Lake. We were super excited because we dropped the boys off at my sister Andreas house in Vegas, it was soooo cool that she and her family were able to watch the boys for us for 2 nights!!! This was the first time that we've ever been away from our boys OVERNIGHT! It was pretty incredible I have to admit, but was hard to take in at first (I shortly got over it because Cameron and I haven't had a weekend getaway since before we had babies and we knew they were with good loving care:) Anyhow, we got tickets for Saturday afternoon session, Cameron got a ticket for Priesthood, and Sunday Morning Session:) There's nothing better than the feeling you have when you are sitting in the Conferance Center with our Prophet, the 12 Apostles, and the Quorom of the seventy. The spirit was so strong, I had tears the whole time, especially when our prophet spoke and when Elder Jeffrey R. Holland spoke about the end of Jesus Christ's life, when he was utterly alone. The Holy Ghost truely testified to me that Jesus Christ, our Savior Lives. We were able to sustain our Prophet Thomas S. Monson, and the 12th Apostle Neil Anderson, and all of our other authorities, I felt especially lucky. We had an amazing time together walking Temple Square, and talking about how cool it is that we will be able to walk in Eternity together, with our family, we love the gospel so much.

Camping Doheny Style! (a yearly tradition now)

Last year we took the boys camping down at Doheny and we loved it so much we decided to do the same thing again this year. Ethan was just a baby last year so he definately enjoyed running around and keeping up with his brother this year. We camped with our friends Owen and Britni, who are moving, and their daughter Mia who is James's age. We had a blast together, taking walks to the beach, barbequing yummy steaks, and roasting smores of course. The kids all played soooo well together and James enjoyed climbing trees, gathering, sticks, and peeing in the sand...shhhhhh. My unborn sister, Rachee, joined us later with her friends to enjoy roasting hot dogs, smores, and having some good conversation, it was so fun!

Lag Nig 4th Ward Valentines Party

We absolutely LOVE our new/old ward. We had so much fun going to our wards little Valentines party get together on Sat night. Cameron and I got there late because I baked some yummy coconut butterscotch brownie bars...mmmmm they were so delicious, but by the time I got home from the salon, baked, and got ready we were like an hour late. Thanks to my marge, we had a kid free evening together :) We played the Newly/Oldy wed game and needless to say we did not win, haha, It was so fun though we enjoyed it anyway. Getting to know more people in our ward was awesome, they're so real! love it! We never go out for Valentines day because I feel like it's kinda corny...no offense to any of you who love it. I just think that Cameron does so much for me every day that I don't need an official holiday to show it. I love the idea of Valentines day, "love" and being someone's "valentine." I just know that I'm Cameron's and he's Mine..... Every day!

Time Outs work in our house! Ethan goes right to it, thanks to his big brother showing him how it's done!

We have always done time outs, it seems like they don't work at first...but if you start them at an appropriate age and are super consistant, they really do work. (FYI we feel like we started James too early, we were encouraged by some friends to start at only like 10-12 months and we regret it! We suggest just going with your parental gut feeling on what age to start it, there's no wrong or right) Ethan totally knows the drill now, it's great..and James has outgrown timeouts now (he has to have consequences), but he still dislikes timeout so much that all we have to do is threaten it and he apologizes within seconds. It works every time! I also had to share Ethan getting "pantsed" by James, well more like being "diapered!" lol! Seriously, it's so fun having boys so close in age at times like these, hahaha