Dace is 4! Ye Ha!

(Yes, that is a bite out of the candle. Dace thought it was candy.)

Last week Dace celebrated his 4th birthday cowboy style. He was so cute about it. He was truly excited to see all of his friends. He really wanted to have a "SKUNK" party, but changed his mind last week. Taya worked hard getting all of the cute little Cowboy themed games and activities together. The morning of the party Dace was worried, because he could not find his cowboy hat. He said "I guess we will just have to have a skunk party after all." I reassured him we would find the cowboy hat, which we did. I was a little worried that his party would not be what he expected. All worries evaporated when that night when he thanked me for his "AWESOME" party. I love that little boy! He is growing so fast. I still remind him he is always going to be my little baby, no matter how big he gets.

He had giant cupcakes instead of a cake. Note to me: 3-4 year olds can't physically eat giant cupcakes. They barley got past the frosting.

Love the crumbs on those little "fingies"

Ride'm Cowboy

Classic: Pin the Tail on the Donkey.

Western Coloring pages. Taya thought of everything. Just wait until you see the plans for her Baptism!

Reese's Derby Days Are Done

This car is the last Pinewood Derby that Reese will race. I feel like time is going by so fast. It seems that just last week Reese made his first car, and now it is over. Reese was never concerned with how fast his cars were, as long as they looked good. He insisted on blue flames this year. I think he did a great job, with help from dad. Reese won "Best Paint Job" award.

The racing part didn't go so well. I think he had the slowest car there. He was a good sport about it. He even started racing it backwards (to tell the truth, I think it was faster backwards.)

Dace kept the crowd at the derby entertained between races. He has some killer dance moves.

It's a Round-up

Dace is going to have his first friend party to celebrate his 4th birthday. Because I am a slacker mom I am just getting the invites out today. Any of his sweet little cousins are invited to come. Just let me know so I can have enough cowboy gear, and grub. It will be this Saturday, from 10-11. It will be geared toward the younger 3-4 year old buckos. I have put Taya in charge so it should be quite the party.

The Ladies Man

Dace walks into the room, cocking his head to one side, a wink of his eye, in his best raspy voice says:

You make me want to kiss ya baby. (pronounced bebe.)

Me: What was that?

Dace: Oh that? That's my new one.

A few weeks shy of 4 years old, and he is working on his pick up lines? Should I be worried?

SNOWone Had More Fun

The new year stared with a day full of fun. The Johnsons spent the weekend with us. Uncle Eric had a superb idea to take the wheelers, tubes and sleds out to the reservoir. We had tons of fun. The snow was perfect for tubing. Not so great for building a snowman, but Met made it work. Thank you Johnsons and Pickerings for giving out new year a great start.

Christmas Time is Here (I Mean Over)

Christmas came and is almost over. It was a wonderful celebration at the Darrington home. We had plans to go to Jed and Annie's house, but at the last minute plans changed and we stayed home. We were lucky enough to have both grandmas stay at our house on Christmas Eve and Morning. We also had the treat of having Uncle Quincy. Dace said that Quincy is his "playground", and he was treated like one.

As always P.J the Elf came through for us again with some very fun Pajamas. Here are some highlights.



Reese was not happy with his pajamas. He was trying to convince Quade to trade. Quade was having none of it. So when Grandma offered he jumped at the opportunity. Don't worry he changed his mind and they traded back.Early in the evening we got a strange phone call. A man was on the phone taking a survey of how many people in Enterprise had a Wii gaming system, and wanted to know if we had one. I told him sadly we didn't have one. He said "Well you do now!" We won a Wii from a drawing at the local grocery store. The kids were totally stoked. All of our traditional Christmas Eve plans flew out the window, as the kids spent their evening playing away on their new toy, and yes even some of the adults were able to play.
Christmas morning came sooner than expected (thanks to Morgan Jeffery secretly setting the alarm on my phone to go off at 3am.) Luckily the kids were still sleeping. They didn't roll out of bed until 5:30am. Then they woke Grandma up to see if it was time to open presents. They lined up on the stairs and the celebration began.Lots of great homemade gifts this year. Dad got an awesome M&M machine from Reese. And I received a beautiful new desk Royd has been slaving over for weeks. It is perfect. I have a wonderful husband.

Rock Band was a hit at our house. Everyone had tons of fun rocking out.
Later on we had the Pickerings, Chafin, Mirinda, and Washington over for a yummy Christmas dinner. I am ready to call it a day. It was a good one!