Update

I cannot believe it has been so long since I have blogged. Life has been so busy and gone by so quickly. Let's so if I can list some of them. Gabe has been busy with work. The company that he works for had really slowed down on business at the beginning of the year, so they cut off bonuses and work time by 10%. Luckily things started to improve over the summer and they are crazy busy now. Which is good for the bank account, but not so much when we don't have him around as much. I have been really busy with the three kids, work, working out, and trying to keep the house somewhat in order. Jackson started kindergarten this year. At the beginning he was really excited but now he doesn't like it as much because he and his best friend are on different schedules and they don't get to play as much. He is getting so tall and grown up I can't believe how fast it goes by. Hailey started preschool and absolutely loves it. Jack is always asking if he has school today and when I say yes he groans, Hailey will then ask do I have school, usually it is no because she only goes 2 days a week and she groans because she doesn't get to go. Lately if you see Hailey she will likely be dressed up like Cinderella. I cannot get her out of that thing. We went to Disneyland during the Halloween season so I went to the Disney Store before we went to get her the Cinderella dress. They had them 40% off I was so excited because if you get them at Disneyland they are like $65. Anyway she has the dress, light up "glass slippers", and a bracelet. From the second she wakes up she wants to get the whole get up on. I usually have to compromise if I want her to wear regular clothes by letting her wear the "glass slipper" and bracelet, but the second we get home she has to put on the dress. Because she only has school 2 days a week, I do a play group with 3 of my friends and we alternate having it at our house every Wednesday. That has been really nice so that she is not having to sit around while I do my work. Addison had her 1st birthday in July. She didn't walk until she was about 15 months. At first I thought that she might have something wrong with her foot because when she crawled it would turn out and when she would stand on it it would curve weird. Luckily now that she is really getting around it normal. She is all over the place now and I am glad now that she didn't walk earlier because now she wants to walk all over by herself and doesn't want to be held. Addison is getting really tall and starting to look more like a toddler. Her hair is finally starting to thicken up and hopefully I'll be able to put a piggy in it soon. She says mom, dad, jack, and dog.

We went to Hawaii in early September with Gabe's parents. They have a time share in Kauai. It was so beautiful. We all had a good time, but Jack would live there if he could. He is an absolute water bug. From the second he woke up he wanted to go swimming or snorkeling. We got him a youth set for snorkeling and he loved to put it on when he was swimming in the pool, the ocean kind of freaked him out because he got taken down by a large wave. The resort that we went to was amazing, it was right on the beach so you could sit by the pool and see the beach at the same time. We can't wait to go back in the future.

Then a month later we went to Disneyland. My very favorite place. We went during the Halloween season so it was all decked out with the fall decorations. It was so pretty. We went with most of Gabe's family (Luke and Anna we missed you) and my Mom. My Dad also met up with us for one day before they had to go to my brother Ed's graduation (Ed we are so proud of you). It was so much fun to be able to have both sets of grandparents with us. We went to Mickey Mouse's Trick-or-Treat party and the Minney Mouse breakfast buffet as extras while we were there. I would recommend both.

We have been looking around for the last couple of months at some houses. With all of the good deals going on we figure now is the time. We had put our house up for sale by owner because we weren't in a huge rush and we didn't want to have to pay the 6% commission. We actually ended up finding a really good deal on a house in October. It was an okay house , but something that would have needed a lot of work. We were under contract for it but the financing ended up falling through. They had changed the guidelines for mortgage insurance the month before and our mortgage guy didn't now about it. They also couldn't use my income at all to qualify us because we do a lot of ride offs on our taxes and it looked like I only made like $200 last year. So even though we had no credit card debt and my credit score is over 800 they couldn't do anything for us. Anyway it is really good that didn't end up working out because now we have found a different house that we really love and is move in ready. It is still close to where we are now, just on the East side of the freeway now, so Hailey will still be able to go to the same preschool and we love being close to Thanksgiving Point. Hopefully everything will work out with this one. It was a bank owned property so we got a really good deal on it. It has 2 levels, with 3 bedrooms, laundry room, master bathroom, kids bathroom, and loft on the 2nd level. A living room, combined kitchen, dining and family room, and 1/2 bath on the main level. And an unfinished basement. Gabe's favorite feature is the 3 car garage. We will hopefully close on it the 2nd week of December, just in time for Christmas. Once we found this new house we listed ours with OneRateRealEstate where you pay a base fee to get an MLS number. We are hoping to be able to sell it soon but if not we will rent it out.

So that is a little of what is going on. Here are some pictures that we have taken since the last time I posted.

Our New House (hopefully)

Kitchen

Family Room

Upstairs Loft

Here are some pictures of the house we are under contract for.

Addison is 8 months old.

Here are a few of Addison's pictures that we just got taken. They turned out really cute. She got a little fussy toward the end but luckily we got were able to get some really good shots in before she decided she had had enough.

More fun with cousins

Here are the kids at the Dinosaur Museum. The are always so mesmerised by the huge shark mouth.

Here is Addison at Kangaroo Zoo. Grandma Lori was getting Addison to laugh by bouncing her on one of the flowers. The picture below is Addison with my sister-in-law Anna. This was on the day Addison turned 6 months.

Here is Gabe with his brother Luke. (Good thing for me that Gabe got the tall gene:) )

Jack is always doing funny poses for pictures.

Here are Jackson, Hailey, Erika, Elyse and Erin at the Dinosaur Museum.

We took the kids to Kangaroo Zoo. The kids love that place. It is nice because they have the entrance blocked off so your kids can just run around and have fun while you relax. It was funny, while we were sitting there letting the kids play we heard this popping sound that sounded like fire crackers going off, we were all startled and looked around to see that Gabe was falling back over his chair because the back of the seat that he had been sitting on had totally cracked and while he was leaning on it it broke off. Anyone who knows me knows I was totally laughing when I saw what was going on. We also took the kids to the Dinosaur Museum, we have a pass there so it is a nice activity to do, especially when it is so cold out.

This is Gabe holding Addison a couple of minutes before the chair breaking. Luckily I had taken Addison from him to put her in her seat so that she could sleep. Doesn't Gabe look so thrilled to be there :)

Happy New Year

Here is Addison on New Year's Eve.

Here are Elyse, Erin, Erika, and Jackson using there own little fondue pots.

Waiting for the count down.

We had a New Year's Eve party at Ron and Lori's house. We have had the tradition of doing a fondue party on New Year's Eve with Gabe's family. We didn't do it last year because Luke and Anna had just left for Boston, so it was fun to get to do it again this year. We did the count down with the kids early so that we could put them to bed. The kids had a good time blowing horns and popping the confetti poppers.

Christmas Season 2008

Addison got this Bumbo seat from Lori and Ron, it is so nice to have so that she can sit up on her own and play, or eat her toys.

Hailey's favorite present was "Tigress". Her cousin Elyse had gotten one for her birthday and brought it with her from Boston. Hailey would not put it down. Luckily there was time to let Santa know how much she loved this toy and she was lucky enough to get one too.

Here is Jackson in front of all of his presents on Christmas morning. "Santa"(Gabe) had been really obsessed about getting this machine gun for Jackson, unfortunately when "Santa" was testing it out the night before he found out it was a dud. The elves left a note for Jackson saying that they had to much fun playing with it and had accidentally broken it so he would have to take it to the store to exchange it for a different one. We went a couple of days later and exchanged it for a more age appropriate one.

We had such a great Christmas this year. It seemed like it lasted a long time though because we started celebrating early. My brother-in-law and sister-in-law, Luke and Anna, and their family came out from Boston. They came out on the 16th because my niece Erika was getting baptized. Gabe and I were able to go out with Luke and Anna twice, the first time to a really nice restaurant in Salt Lake and then to Carrabas, it was nice to get out without all the kids. Then Tauni and Jared came out from Rosevelt on that weekend, so that's when the parties started. We had the Reichert Christmas party at Thanksgiving Point. It was a lot of fun but very cold. We ate at the Deli there and then went on a carriage ride to see the Christmas lights. After that we went back over to Ron and Lori's to open the sibling gifts and have hot chocolate and donuts. We went to the movie Bolt with Gabe's family on Christmas eve and then over to my sister Amy's house that night for our usual hor d'ourves and letting the kids act out the nativity scene. Then we went over to Ron and Lori's to spend the night. It was so much fun that morning to have most of the family there(we missed Rick and Carly). The kids loved all of there presents. Then Lori and Ron had their yummy Christmas breakfast (that's when Rick and Carly came over). After that we got ready and went over to my Mom and Dad's house. It is my Mom's birthday on Christmas, so she always says we don't need to get her a Christmas present but not to forget her birthday. We stayed over there for awhile and had Christmas dinner. Luckily my brother Sterling had made it in really early Christmas morning, after driving all the way from Kentucky with his truck full of furniture. Then we went back to Ron and Lori's for some games. We ended up sleeping over again that night (we kept really late hours while Luke and Anna were in town because we were always over there hanging out). My brother and sister-in-law, Ed and Noelle came into town right after Christmas. So we hung out with them on Sunday. We went over to my parents house to have dinner and then we played games. Tauni had taught us this really fun game called Ripple, you play it with Phase 10 cards, so we taught it to my family and then we played this other fun game that my brother Sterling taught us. We had such a fun time hanging out with all of our families. We also had a fun New Year's Eve party eating a ton of Fondue and playing more games.

I am so thankful to have the families that Gabe and I have. The kids all took their turns being sick. On New Year's Day we were going to go out to dinner with my family, Hailey was not feeling well at all and we ended up having to leave early. My parents and Ed and Noelle brought Jack back after and saw how sick Hailey was ( she would not stop crying for like 5 hours because of her ear pain ) so my brother-in-law Ken called in some antibiotics and then Ed and Noelle went all the way to Provo and back to get the medicine for us. We really appreciated them doing that for us.

Hailey and Elyse both got makeup and loved showing off how pretty they looked.

We had a white Christmas. We woke up to a few more inches of snow on Christmas morning, so Gabe and Jackson went out and used the four wheeler to plow all of the snow off the drive way.

Brown Hair

Here I am with my brown hair. I had dark hair when Jackson was little but it had a real red tone to it that didn't look that great with my skin tone, anyway it has been pretty fun to try something new for a little while. I haven't shown my family yet and I know my parents will hate it, they love me blonde, but like I said it is fun to try something new. I don't know if anybody else feels this way but I was looking at some of the pictures we have been taking lately and I wanted to erase all of the ones that I am in. So with the start of the new year I am making the New Years resolution to get in shape I have not been very good lately with my eating and have not been able to find the time to work out. I haven't gotten back to the gym yet because I don't want to put Addison into the day care until the end of the cold season.