Why men are never depressed..

Men are just happier people -- your last name stays put
The garage is all yours
Wedding plans take care of themselves
chocolate is just another snack.
You can never be pregnant.
Car mechanics tell you the truth.
The world is your urinal.
You never have to drive to another gas station, because this one is too yucky.
You dont have to stop and think of which way to turn a nut on a bolt.
Same work, more pay.
Wrinkles add character.
People never stare at your chest when you're talking to them (ok not a problem for me obviously, but i hear some women have this problem, gotta look at the positive :)
New shoes dont cut, blister or mangle your feet.
One mood all the time.
Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.
You know stuff about tanks and engines.
A ten day vacation requires ONE suitcase.
You can open all your own jars.
You get extra credit for the slightest act of thoughtfulness.
Your underwear is 8.95 for a three-pack.
Three pairs of shoes is more than enough.
You never have strap problems in public.
you are unable to see wrinkles in your clothes.
Everything on your face stays its original color.
One hairstyle lasts years, if not decades.
You only have to shave your face and neck.
You play with toys all your life.
One wallet and one pair of shoes-- one color for all seasons.
You can wear shorts no matter how your legs look.
You can "do" your nails with a pocket knife.
You can do christmas shopping for 25 relatives all on december 24th in 25 minutes.
No wonder men are happier!

Thanksgiving and a Christmas Kick off!

we have had a good holiday season so far. We

started it out with "pie day" all wednesday, and

sweet nicole let us tear apart her house (and some

of her appliances, but it was nice to be one with the

pioneers.) And it was our year with the "petersen" side..

along with everyone else's.

so we had quite the crowd to celebrate

with. we had a yummy thanksgiving dinner,

accompanied with football and ad searching. Then

Lexi had her first sleepover, so that cody and i could

go shopping at 5 am. i kept warning him that he didn't

want to come (for both of our sakes) since he

doesn't even like normal shopping, let alone black

friday shopping. But he was awesome! i had to have had

the best hubby out there. he was so good at grabbing

anything i pointed out, when i told him i needed a

size he would grab every boot in that size throughout

the store to see which i would prefer, and any toy

we wanted for lexi he was grabbing anything similar

to it. I got myself a new shopping partner WOO WOO!

and later that day we had the petersen christmas party,

since jen's family wouldn't be back out til after christmas.

santa even came to put the fear into all the toddlers, and

joy to the rest of the kids... the pictures are all

out of order, and i'm not organizing them, so enjoy!

this is lexi new favorite place to play.. nana's pantry's.

If you see her in one, you should run because she

will beg anyone to go in with her and assign seats to

whoever obeyed, and then she does not let you leave.

she found bumpa's head light, and also

found that the faster she ran to chase that

wierd red light on the wall, the faster the

red light on the wall moved... crazy!

santa really put the fear in lexi.. she must have really

been naughtier than even we thought if she was so scared.

and he gave issy quite a bit to think about

cole just wanted "CARS" and made that

pretty clear since thats all he would say to him

our newly adopted kiwi has nothing to be

worried about, she'll always be on the nice list

looks like someone really can scare brookie, who knew!?

jackson wasn't really scared, jacque just really wanted

to sit on santa's lap!

And ayla hated to even look at santa, it was quite

devastating.

Andy whispering all his wishes

Nana pulled out the bells ...apparently it wasn't loud

enough already

lexi loves playing with her bumpa! and maddy couldn't

miss the photo op once she saw the camera out! :)

The little girls sharing thanksgiving dinner.

Cody and brookie just watching some football.

What are little girls made of?

i dunno about yours, but our little girl is made

of lots of sugar and a little salt! i was planning

on a soccer player, however i think i

have a dancer on my hands! first i was a little

"unsupportive" of all the dress ups and dancing,

however while we were setting up our christmas

tree and listening to the forgotten carols (one of my

favorite times during christmas) i looked over to her

spinning in circles in front of the tree, trying

to watch herself in the ornaments and i couldn't

help but think a "princess" is just what we need!

she loves dancing with her daddy

dress up gets more and more interesting

everyday. she loves her cowgirl boots with any

of her dress ups! She also has a tote in her bedroom

that i throw her outgrown clothes into as we come

across them and just wait til it gets full.. well she

is pretty sure she always needs to wear a swimsuit,

with a snow hat and her boots, or any other odd

apparel she can throw together!

OUR LITTLE PUMPKIN!

guys... this is really confusing

Cody's Birthday

Cody has now graced the world with his presence

for 25 years! woo hoo, lucky us! we love daddy!

We had to re-light the candles on the cake

for lexi's pleasure!

Cody being in trouble for blowing out the candles
before we got a picture, or even finished the song.

taking cody his LAVENDER birthday cake

(he picked that himself, he was trying to pick a hard

color to make, clearly he hasn't made frosting

before to know lavender is one of the easiest :)

Tess' Soccer

tess was quite the good sport being crippled and still

cheering on her team, and boy was it thrilling to go

cheer her on for cheering on her team!

lexi loved that another soccer mom kept giving her

these cheese puff ball things that were the size

of her entire mouth!

Shawn's Miracle

hey guys, i am sure you all have heard about shawn's accident. Keep praying for him, he's not out of the woods yet! but here's the blogpage they set up to keep everyone updated.. leave them comments to keep pushing them through this! http://shawnsmiracle.blogspot.com

We love fall!

2 years!

2 years ago today we became "the winns"

and it still feels like it was just a couple days ago!

I'm so lucky to be sealed to my bestie forever!

and to someone who can calm me down so

easily when my worlds falling apart temporarily

because i burnt the dessert! He is my perfect

"other half"! i'm so excited to see where we are

in 20 years... but dont want to get there too fast,

i'm still enjoying every day with my love!

Sleepover with Ayla

Ayla came to have a sleepover with us last

week and lexi couldn't have been more thrilled!!

She loves having her cousins around. They played

lots of babies, taking their babies for walks, house,

dress ups, kitchen, etc. Lexi would sure appreciate

a baby brother or sister so she could always have a friend,

but thats not happening anytime soon... so if you guys

could keep donating your kids to "lexi time" we would

really appreciate it :)

Lava Hot Springs

we went to lava for the staple family reunion,

and had another weekend of four wheeling,

food and fun!

Lexi loved the slide off the side of the house

and susie's big human elastic thingy. dad did an

extraordinary job pulling us around

and since lexi got to go for a ride, there was

no telling scott no... so raymond jumped in to help out

now she's just showing off!

everytime cody would stop lexi would

do her cute sign language for "more" and cody

would give in, what a good dad!

what the elastic was really made for, if you haven't

seen one of these, you put 4 people in them and the 2 people

across from eachother run at the same time, then the next two...

shooting the others back across until someone flies out.

It's very entertaining to watch...

Lexi loved having madi and halli there. she loves

playing with them!!

COUNTY FAIR!!

this post is a little late... but oh well! we all had fun

at the fair this year... actually i think this year was

the most fun i have ever had at the fair! it is so

much fun to watch lexi doing things now, and loving them!

All the kids anxious for the parade to start!

everyone enjoyed the popsicles

andy was so funny, after anyone would

walk up and give him candy we would all say thanks,

and as they turned away andy would squirt him...

as ashley said its cute this year, annoying next year when

he's a little older.. or as in bumpas case almost 50 years older

and still squirting people in the parade!

our cowgirl

mom's pretty sure she's had enough candy...

so lets go to grandpa to open this taffy up!

the girls went on the train ride that we were sure they

would love... clearly we were wrong in both of their cases

lexi did love the carousel though, and went on it about 6

times! and she did later go on another kid ride with madi

and actually really loved it!

she liked the shades so dad just knew she "needed" them

our little family

lexi love love loves "yaya"

the barkers

nana helping the girls sing and dance with the bandstand

and yes this year was just WILD... we got some tat's!! :)

jacque and i did anyway, lexi picked her's out and once

we were up there she wasn't so hot on the idea of the

guy touching her!
i dont think that jacque has ever seen transformers...

but she sure got a decepticon on her ankle for andy's enjoyment!!

and we finished off the fun with daddy winning

lexi a stuffed animal!

Lake Powell #1

We had another super fun week at lake powell

with the winns... the pictures dont even reflect

half the party we had going on :) and this is just the

first half, i still need to get the other half...

but it was such a blast, thank you grandma and grandpa!

our water baby constantly wanted in the "pool"

so she was fashioning this saggy diaper quite often..

how cute are those buns?!

lex always wanted on the beach, to get

muddy and wash, get muddy and wash..

over and over. Nicole helped in the getting

muddy process this time :)

so one day they had to take the houseboat to

"unload" at the poop dock and left me, lexi, ray and

nicole to guard our spot. two hours later when they came

back, without any instruction, lexi bent over and mooned

the houseboat coming in with her bare buns (somewhat

like ray is doing in this picture.) well i didn't have the camera

so tried to get her to do it again, and ray was helping her too..

i think she finds it amusing what she can get adults to do..

thats what she's thinking in this picture...

BEACH BUMS

when lexi wasn't on the beach, this was

definately a favorite, smashing her face into the door

( in hopes of getting outside)

cody and grandpa. as they said when i was taking

the picture.. "is that a camera or a studfinder?"

cute lauren is the sweetest girl. and lexi

just loved her

for some reason lex liked to trap herself under the

captains chair

Lexi helping shelley with her throwing technique.

every year has to have one storm...

briggs and lexi giving cuddles. it was funny to watch

the kids together, trying to eat and feed eachother,

do kung fu panda moves with kregg, feed fish, build

sand castles etc..

brooklyn..who believe it or not is a JUNIOR...

in high school, not college ( i know its shocking)

was lexi's buddy on the trip. she even taught lexi

sign language in minutes... quite impressive.

some of the cousins wrestling...

as you can see brady just flipped over

laurens head and she put a stop to it by saying

"brady this is getting way out of hand, and you are

playing quite to rough, if you continu acting like this

we will all have to stop!" :)

kregg said he was just helping the kids build this castle...

really it was just entertainment for him. but still

quite impressive

lexi is famous for her "i wanna dance" or

"i NEED to dance" so katie had matt put some

"dancing" music on her ipod for lexi to breakdown

to. about ten at night they turned it on, she hopped

right up on the table and entertained for about half hour.

Lexi had tears down all our faces from laughing so hard.

and grandma was her dancing partner, lexi would

copy anything grandma did. we didn't get it recorded until

the end of her dancing, so we'll have to get a copy

of the beginning and let you see before the energy

began to fade.

Bear River's 24th

Since we moved in back in january, the first thing

anybody told us about when meeting them, was that

the 24th celebration was the biggest thing that

happens out in bear river all year long, and that there

is no way we could miss the celebrations! So we took

their word for it, and the nielsens are hick at heart

so they joined us! started with a parade early in

the morning that was two blocks long, and lasted

for maybe 15 minutes, but it was still fun! instead

of having floats of schools and teams etc, they just

have families on floats! its so funny! and since its

not such a huge parade, they were even throwing

full candy bars! Then we had fun the rest of the day

watching softball games, talent shows, baby contests,

and they had lots of races and dunking booths etc we'll

need to take part in next year.

Lexi and Ayla had fun together, and would attempt

to hold hands regularly..didn't really work out too well

for them to walk and hold hands though, but oh well.

Then they would change their mind about holding hands

"okay, sorry lets make up cousin"


ayla is done "making up" but lexi is loving the loves


"COME ON MOM THERE IS THINGS TO BE DOING!"

(dont worry, i introduced ashley to hairspray shortly

after this, so ayla should be able to enjoy playing

instead of getting her hair done so much :)

lexi loves getting into strollers, it was really hard
to keep her out of everyones at the park.
but ayla was less than thrilled when lexi climbed
in hers.


andy even did the mutton bust! it was so entertaining!

after deciding he was going to do it, they had him

practice on lexi's rocking horse while shaking it.

and ashley fretted about forgetting their "cowboy apparel"

because he looked like such a "city boy." but nothing

could stop andy after it was set in his mind...

the boys scouting out the competition..

after watching the first kid go out and get thrown

off, all the kids and parents waiting for their turn

got a little bit more nervous. and we were pretty sure

that andy was going to back out, so
they needed to bring over the professional (lexi)

to get her opinion.

and he did it, woo hoo! he didn't even cry! when

he came back over and we asked him if it was fun

he said "well i really didn't like falling off" when

ash said " you didn't even fall off andy" he said

"well i didn't like ALMOST falling off!"

he even did better than our friends little boy,

who we could hear screaming and crying from across

the arena when it was his turn! he made us proud!

if you listen close you can hear the announcer say

"this is andy nielsen, he's even got his hat on

backwards for the aerodynamics."

microwave magic

the microwave is still a thrill to lexi. and

while we are waiting to find the table to set the

microwave on, lex and daddy lay on the floor

and try to keep in all their excitement!

quite the photographer we have here

Boating

the cool co-pilot

jacque, kay and tommy

lex was thrilled to cheer for everyone.

when they fell off, she was pretty concerned

about where they went though! and when it

was mom or dad that fell off she was more

than concerned, her cheers turned to

screams in a hurry!

the boys hanging on as tight as possible, to avoid

skidding across the lake and being forgotten for a while.

tess, bumpa, issy and brew riding

me and lex brook and jen showin everyone

how its done. these girls didn't care if they stayed

on the tube, they just wanted to jump off and get in

the water

tommy, andy and ashley! we were all

very impressed with how daring and brave

andy was (condsidering lion king scares ashley)

but we missed the pictures of tommy issy and kiwi

on the tube, they were serious dare devils, getting more

air than anyone else out there did! after the first

five footer we were sure they would be crying, but

when they came down they just kept doing

the thumbs up for faster

too much cheering can be exhausting! lexi fell asleep

standing up on the back seat against the swim deck

jen and the brookster

Cleaning her "vroom"

Lexi gets pretty excited when we wash our car,

and especially when we wash the 4-wheeler.

she takes great pride in her work! and no

we did not show her how to do this. after

washing herself thoroughly in the

bucket of water, and then washing her stuffed

animal dog, she picked up a rag and got to work.

gotta take care of every inch of her ride!

swimming

so i finally got the pictures off my phone,

onto the computer... so here is an update

for months spread out...

Ayla and Lexi are actually enjoying

their ride on the pink bike at the mall...

they are just good at posing serious :)

cole and lexi takin a nap together

our little 33

The way we mow the lawn up here,

Lexi's awful kind to always want to

help daddy out.

her first swim at the pool

Lexi and her sponge, she likes to clean

the pool out more than she likes to play in it!

all smiles

"chEEEEse"

some of the pool buddies. Jen and brookie

Lexi loves her chips, since she figured

out how to get into the pantry she is

regularly found with some cheetos in her

lap just eatin away. And she wont

wear her glasses, but cant get enough of

the goggles!

Enjoying all the birthday presents,

she couldn't wait for the pool to get filled

up outside, so she hangs out in it with her

new teapot!

madi's birthday party and 4th of july

and the cowgirl getting the boots

great minds planning the "man date"

cowgirls

look at that face, thats determination

sweet ayla jane

the robison girls

cole on the 4 wheeler

ash and ayla

the spanking machine for the birthday girl

Happy fathers day to cody! he's so sweet

with lexi and she is lucky to have such a good dad!

she just loves him more than i know how

to explain, the day doesnt get any better

than when he gets home to wrestle!

The bug's first hair cut...

it was just the bangs, but still counts


Cody gets a little upset when birds
come and eat our garden, so he has set up camp
outside and takes care of the problem.
can you say "hick?"
(good thing his chair is camo, they'll
never see him that way)


Jenni and Janie!

Andy got to spend his birthday at

the hogle zoo, and we got to go with him!

look at him surrounded by girls!

he needs the "lock up your daughters"

shirt too, like cole!

this is lexi's attempt at being an elephant.

the long arm in the air is her "trunk"

lifting up while she makes a loud noise!

and all the kids loved nana's treat of

letting them go on the carousel

but it was pretty exhausting.



and i guess the first nap wasn't enough...

clearly lexi got the memo about nana's driving,

she is always hanging onto the inside of the seat :)

Our pineveiw camping trip got rained out and

turned into a causey trip, which was still

super fun ( for those of us not stuck inside

throwing up, sorry) While the weather

was good we did lots of 4-wheeling, and

the kids LOVED it!

the girls still like each other enough to give

kisses, despite their nice bed head.

lexi seems to be quite adventurous and

usually leading someone behind her.

after ayla following lexi into the water

in their clothes, ashley said they cant

be friends once they are teenagers, worried

about what lexi will lead ayla to by then :)

lexi doing her " it go?!" anytime anyone leaves

its pretty intense trying to figure out "where'd it go?"

and she flaps her arms out like that

multiple times, while trying to figure it out!