Go, Hotshots!

Kyrie asked to be signed up for soccer this season, and she's been anxiously waiting for the season to start ever since! Her coach (Coach Jessica) finally called last week and set up the first practice for today. Practice was scheduled for 4:30, and Kyrie just couldn't imagine having to wait all day before it was time to go. ;-)

I can't believe how much bigger she looks from her time as a Raptor.

So far, she's much more coordinated than she was back then. She had a hard time back then because she wanted to do a lot more than her gangly body would let her do. :-) So this year, she's really excited because she's grown into herself a lot more and is a lot more coordinated and capable. She did excellent at all the different exercises Coach Jessica had them do and is actually one of the best on the team!

Her coach is great! She's coaching 4 teams this season and is fabulous with the kids -- she keeps them engaged the whole time, her exercises are super fun and helpful, she's a wonderful motivator and tells the kids often how great they're doing, and she gives them a lot of one-on-one attention and instruction. We are just so excited for this season and to see how Kyrie develops over the next few months!

Here's a video of Kyrie doing one of the exercises. This was her first time doing this particular one, and Coach Jessica told everyone to watch how Kyrie was doing it because she was doing so well! Kyrie was so cute and proud of herself. :-) You can hear Coach Jessica in the background giving Kyrie tons of feedback and encouragement.

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

While Kyrie was at practice, Derk took the kids over to the park. They came back and told me I had to come see Asher's new trick! :-)

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

Her first game is Thursday, January 6th, and she is beside herself with excitement! :-) We're so proud of our little Hotshot and are excited for a fun season!

Christmas 2010

Merry Christmas!!!

Our day started out bright and early, just like last year! Thankfully Kyrie gave us an extra hour to sleep in this year, coming in at 4am. And luckily we were able to give her a laptop and put her on a few shows to keep her occupied for a few hours. She came back in at 7, so we got everyone up at that point.

The kids were super excited to see that Santa had come and had set their stockings and some presents out by the tree (Santa doesn't wrap!). Kyrie got a hair crimper, Asher got 2 costumes (Optimus Prime and a fireman), and Cambria got a pink shopping cart. Then of course they had their stockings full of fun, random stuff.

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

But that wasn't all! A few minutes later, we realized Santa had brought us some other fun things that had been set up in the family room!

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

After the stockings and such were opened, then we moved on to the other presents. We decided to take it nice and slow this year. Derk handed one person a gift, then we all watched them open that gift. It was so great doing it that way, and we all really enjoyed seeing what everyone got. The kiddos all did so great at waiting their turn for presents!

They got such fun things this year! My mom sent the kids a lot of stuff, but my favorite things were these darling towels and the gorgeous clothes for the girlies. Kyrie thought the penpal set from her Aunt Rebecca was awesome and cannot wait to write her first letter! And Asher was just beyond ecstatic about the video games from Derk. He kept thanking us and hugging us over and over. :-)

I was really ambitious this year and planned on making the kids quite a few things. Unfortunately time got in my way, and I wasn't able to make everything. I did make the girls both aprons, I made all us girls towel head wraps, and then I made Bri a really cute chef set (hat, oven mitts, and pot holders).

The kids each picked out a gift for each of their siblings. They were SO cute watching each other open their gifts. And then they were all so sweet and hugged each other and said thank you. It was so precious. Cambria was hysterical and kept holding out her arms and would say, "I'm WAITING for my hug!!" Here's a picture of her doing just that! :-)

A few months ago, Derk told me about this cookbook that had just come out. It was full of recipes from all sorts of bands/singers. It combined his love for food AND music, so I knew I had to get it for him.

The fact that he not only let me take a video AND a picture of him but told me to take several videos was enough proof to me that it was a huge hit! :-) Bri is hysterical in the background of this video! Derk was taking a bit too long admiring his cookbook, and she was getting a wee bit impatient. ;-)

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

The kiddos got an awesome karaoke machine from Derk's parents!

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

Kyrie had a great idea for a gift for Derk, and we just made it from all the kids since it was a bit more expensive. I love how she wrote on the tag that it was MOSTLY from her. ;-)

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

Here's a video of another gift of Derk's and then one of Kyrie's. How CUTE is that hair dryer?!

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

The most exciting gift was one we gave Kyrie. She's been saying for months that she wanted this, and we'd already had it purchased. But we kept on telling her she wasn't old enough, blah, blah, blah, to throw her off track so she'd be super surprised on Christmas. I just love how her smile gets bigger and bigger with each passing second! :-)

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

After presents, we made a delicious crepe breakfast, which is a tradition from my family growing up that I just can't let go. Even though it's a lot of work, it wouldn't be Christmas without crepes! We all stuffed ourselves, and then we just relaxed for a bit. In the afternoon, we went to our friend's the Wilhites for dinner, which was super fun. It was great being around friends since we couldn't be with our family, and we have a blast hanging out with them. Plus, they have a little baby, so I got to hog him for an hour or so. :-)

We hope you all had as wonderful a Christmas we did! We certainly love and miss all of our family and wish we'd been with you. But your wonderful cards and gifts and phone calls made it feel as though we weren't quite so far away. Thanks to everyone! And merry Christmas!!

Christmas Eve 2010

Derk and the kids have been on Christmas break for almost a week, and it's been so great spending so much time together! It's hard around the holidays because we feel like we have to make up for the fact that we live so far away from family. Derk used to have these huge family get-togethers for holidays when he was growing up, and he hates that our kids don't get to experience that. :-( We've been trying really hard to create our own fun traditions that our kids will look forward to while we live so far away (and then hopefully it won't be too many more years before we can celebrate with family!), and we also incorporate a few traditions from when we were growing up to help US feel connected to our families still.

So anyway, today we started the day off with a colorful pancake breakfast, which the kids thought was way cool. I had these grand ideas in my head to make fun Christmas tree pancakes, but that just didn't work out at all the way I'd planned. So I scrapped that idea and decided to just make some funky pancakes instead. Each kid got a pancake with the letter of their first name on it, and then I made some with different designs to (hopefully) look like ornaments (lol), different colors, etc.


Then we packed up the kids and our water bottles and went for our traditional Christmas Eve hike. We started this tradition a few years ago, and the kids really like it. Kyrie and Asher are pros now when it comes to hiking, but little Bri was still having some trouble not getting tired. I recently read her The Little Engine That Could, so I talked to her about that book on our hike and had her chant, "I think I can, I think I can!" over and over. I should have gotten a video of her saying it because it was so cute!

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

While hiking, Asher found me a pretty piece of quartz. :-) And I took some "scenery" shots. I say "scenery" in quotes because to me this isn't scenery. But I keep trying to find the beauty in the desert!

After our hike, we came home and just relaxed for a little while. Then we made a yummy dinner! Last year we ended up not wanting to do a huge meal on Christmas day since we make a huge breakfast. So we decided to do our big meal on Christmas Eve instead. I think that'll be our tradition because we did that again this year and really enjoyed it. Last year we made pepper steak and decided to do that again this year, too. Yummy!!!

Then it was time to open our Christmas Eve presents -- pajamas! It's so funny because we do this every year, but every year the kids always seem to forget that it's pajamas. They kept talking all day about what they were going to get for their present that night. Although, I was really glad to see Bri so excited about her pajamas! :-) After the video stopped rolling, Kyrie thought it was funny that I thanked myself for my pajamas. ;-)

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

After presents, we tried out my new tripod! Last year, taking our family picture was an adventure to say the least. I had to prop my camera up on the ottoman and then on top of several books to get it to the right height. So thanks again, Mom and Dad, for the birthday money!! :-)

Merry Christmas!

Asher's first lost tooth!

For me, the first lost tooth is like the final entrance into being a big kid instead of a baby. I wasn't ready to reach this milestone yet with Asher, but it's here anyway! And he was sure excited!! When his tooth first became loose, he couldn't hardly wait for it to fall out so the Tooth Fairy would come. But then once it got really wiggly, he said, "This is NOT fun, Mom. I do NOT like this!" Poor kiddo didn't realize it's a literal pain there for awhile since you can't eat much until it falls out. We just told him to keep on wiggling it, and it finally came out today!

Here he is showing off his loose tooth!

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

And here he is after it fell out!

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

I never think it's possible for him to get any cuter, but he always proves me wrong! :-)

Sleeping Beauty

Santa crafts and Storybook Lane

Today we did a few really fun things! First up was a Santa craft, which was super fun! I've been browsing tons of different websites to get craft ideas for Christmas break, and I found some really neat ones. This was our first project, and the kids loved it. Unfortunately, my camera battery died right before I got a picture of Kyrie in action. :(

I decided recently that I was going to find a fun place for the kids to display their crafting creations. Usually I just hang them on the fridge, but that can get really cluttered really fast! Plus there's not much room, and the kids end up feeling left out sometimes. So today I had the idea to hang some string up to display their crafts. It might look kind of silly, but the kids love it! I need to hang it a bit higher so it's not drooping down so far below the cabinets, too.

Anyway, here are Asher and Bri and then their cutie finished Santas!

And here's a little video I took using my new camera (LOVE. IT!!!).

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

A few days ago, I also found out about this fun Christmas light display out here near our neighborhood. I don't know why we haven't heard of it before, but I'm glad I found out about it this year. It's called "Storybook Lane", and it's just a street in a random neighborhood where all the homeowners go CrAzY and put up insane light displays. We went and checked it out after dinner tonight, and the kids thought it was pretty cool! Derk just kept saying he couldn't imagine putting up (and taking down!) all those lights and decorations. It was really insane!

I saw this sign and knew I had to get a picture of the kids by it! Here are my 3 (crazy-looking!) Christmas blessings! :-)

And I got some video! Seriously, this new camera is so convenient and easy that I think my blog will now be overloaded with videos! :-)

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

Untitled from Hillary Stephens on Vimeo.

Stay tuned for several more crafts over the next few days!! :-)

My 28th birthday

Honestly, the day started out as any other. Derk woke up late and was rushing off to work, Asher threw a ginormous fit about not wanting to go to school (Kyrie has been home sick, and he wanted to stay home, too), Bri was mad because we were out of bread, and I woke up sick and with a completely hoarse voice. So I wasn't expecting the greatest of days. ;-) But it turned out to be a really nice evening.

Derk came home from work with some roses and lilies. Then he got to work making me a super yummy dinner. We had french bread and balsamic vinegar and oil to dip the bread in. Then he made sauteed shrimp. And then he made my very favorite stroganoff. Oh, and cheesecake for dessert, of course!

My birthday present from Derk was this totally awesome camera! It's a Flip UltraHD camcorder. There's a USB plug (you can see it on the right side at the top) that flips out, and then you plug that directly into the computer to upload the videos. It holds up to two hours of video at a time. Our old camcorder that we've had for several years broke, so I've been using my crappy point-and-shoot camera to take videos on. I was so excited to get this! Plus, it's pink! How cute is it?!


My mom sent me some awesome stuff, too. I got a delicious smelling candle, some super fun placemats, a gorgeous Portuguese-style hand-painted mug, and some Portuguese olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

I got a card with some money from Derk's parents. I was so excited about that because I've been dying to get a tripod for my camera for months now and decided this was the perfect opportunity to get it! And I even had some money left over to get myself a super comfy fleece jacket and pants set that I don't plan on ever taking off. :-)

And my best friend April sent me this sweet little plaque, but I forgot to get a picture of it.

Thanks for all the cards/packages, phone calls, and birthday wishes! 28 sounds old... ;-)