My little monkey...

When this kid wants fruit snacks, he really wants fruit snacks.

All wrapped up...

Kash very much enjoyed the packing process. Every time I turned around he was curled up in bubble wrap!

An Update

Well, we are pretty much settled into our new house. Of course there are still a million things to do, and more boxes to go through, but for the most part, we are settled. The main thing I haven't done is the decorating. Matt forbids me to put a single nail in one of his new walls! So, I am waiting for my mom and Whitney to come next weekend to decorate. Hopefully by then Matt will realize that eventually, we are going to have to hang things up!

But we couldn't be happier. I am totally in love with this place! It was definitely worth the wait.
And we would love visitors....we even have a guest room for anyone who needs to stay the night. So let me know, we would love to have people over. And if anyone needs my new address just leave me your email.

Today: It is official

We closed on our house! FINALLY. It has been a long, drawn out process, but we are now officially first time home owners! I still can't believe it.
And no one told me what a PAIN packing is. You don't realize how much stuff you have until you have to move. It has been overwhelming, but hopefully we will be moving in this weekend so it will be SOO worth it!

Dance Recital

Ella had her very first dance recital this past month. She just started taking dance a couple of months ago and she loves it. But I was a little nervous for the recital. I was fully prepared for her to not even want to go out on stage....cry....freak out....whatever. They had 2 songs and the first song she came out smiling, waving, and did the entire dance without any major problems. Yay! The last song she came out and I was actually impressed that she was following the moves and seemed to be really into it.........until about half way she suddenly stopped....and started crying! and crying and crying. She cried the entire 2nd half of the song! I have no idea what happened. I don't know if she got scared, thought she messed up, I don't know! Everyone in the audience thought it was hysterical and yes, we have it on video! Well at least she looked cute, right?

Here she is about to leave for the recital.

Dancing away...

Her cute class.

And here she is after the recital, all smiles again!

Dance starts up again this week so we will see how it goes! I guess we will stick with it for now....

Christmas morning...

Christmas was SO fun this year! Ella and Kash are at such a fun age. They were so excited, it was really hard to keep them in their room in the morning! Here are tons of pics of our crazy Christmas morning:

Ella loves her kitchen, and Kash actually likes playing with it too.

Kash's "main" gift was a disaster! We THOUGHT we had bought an activity table with a train set...but when we went to set it up we realized it was just the table and no trains! 11pm Christmas Eve there are NO stores open( believe me, we tried!) So I whipped out this other gift and he never knew the difference!

Cute Nikki showing off her new jacket:

Matt got this really nice croquet set (are we nerds that we like to play croquet?)

Kar was pretty excited about this one...

Us sisters all got aprons with different things embroidered on them.

Kash LOVES his golf clubs!

And Ella was lovin her tutu.

Hanging out on his new cars sleeping bag! And that is a candy necklace on his face...he got it in his stocking and never put it down.

Nana needed her Dr. Pepper before the presents were even over!

Kash immediately gathered his cars and took them to a safe place.

Nana and Papa helping Ella.

These faces make it so fun!

Hope everyone had a good Christmas!

Christmas Eve 2009

For Christmas Eve we once again went to my dad's cousins house in California. After dinner we always have the kids act out the nativity scene. Then it's performance time; piano solos, carols, etc. It's tons of fun...especially because the Roberts family is so talented and we Crafts enjoy sitting back and watching!:)

Ella was Mary again this year. I've never seen her be so quiet and listen so well as when she plays this role.

Kash was Joseph again..we were all laughing because his "turban" looked more like a "do-rag." sp?

Here is our little nativity: wise man, angel, mary, joseph, baby Jesus.
We even got all of the men to sing a song!

Papa and Ella....maybe this is where she gets her cheesy grin?

Kash entertained himself by jumping off of the staircase.

This was the only group shot I got:

Once we got home my mom decided to carry out my great-grandma's tradition. My great grandma Nona would always give all of her grandchildren their gifts on Christmas Eve. So this year my mom did this for Ella and Kash, and the rest of us got our matching Christmas pajamas.

I'll be home for Christmas?

We were on our way to California for Christmas when Ella needed to go potty. We had just got to Vegas so it was a good time to pull over. As we were pulling into the parking lot, Matt had to turn sharply to avoid a car. We immediately noticed our NEW car did NOT sound good. It was making a weird noise and we knew right away something was really wrong. Luckily, the next store over was a repair shop so we had them check it out. Well, they had to order parts and it wouldnt be done until MONDAY! My kids were running around the shop like crazy, Matt was telling me it was going to cost $1500 to fix, and I was crying. It was not fun. Here are my kids playing...they had to entertain themselves seeing that we were there for a couple of hours.
We had to rent a car if we wanted to get home for Christmas but the rental place was across town and we had no way of getting there. Chris, the mechanic, who is from Boston with a strong accent, bald head, and a total BIKER guy, offered to drive us in his truck. We had to unload the entire car, which was packed full of Christmas stuff, and put it in his truck, drive a half hour, and unload it again into the rental truck. It was quite the ordeal.
Matt had to keep reminding me that we were actually really lucky. We could have broke down in the middle of the desert instead of next door to the shop. We might not have met the nicest guy who offered to drive us across town so we could be home for Christmas with our family. We might not have been in a repair shop where the guys offered our kids cookies, toys, and constantly told us to not worry about them running around. It was really frustrating, especially because this was our first trip in our new car and it had a freakish problem!!! but it was our little christmas miracle at the same time! can you say cheesy? :)

Family Pictures

My dear friend Krista took our family pictures. It was quite the event; dealing with Ella who does NOT smile for the camera, and poor Kash who had JUST got up from a nap. But we still got a few good shots!

The Ben Craft Family

The Sisters

All of the girls

All of the boys, they are a bit outnumbered!

MY darling boys

And the entire family!

Weird?

Yes, this is a trail of red rose petals that leads to my bedroom. No, it was not left in an attempt at a romantic gesture by my husband. Ella got a Hawaiian lei from her room, tore it up, and spread the petals like this. Umm? I'm not sure what to think about this. I'm going to go with she was just making a mess!

Dickens Festival and Santa

We went to the Dicken's Festival and as soon as we got there Matt got these deadly weapons for the kids. So for the entire stroll through the crowded festival my kids were stabbing everyone that passed by.
While we were waiting in line to see Santa, we were right next to this ride that spins you upside down. Even though we could hear all of the teenagers screaming their head off, Ella insisted that she wanted to go on it, and she wanted to go on it by HERSELF. So, we let her, not knowing how she would handle it. She thought it was awesome and the second she got off she wanted to do it again!

Ella is a little obsessed with Santa this year, and Kash is a little terrified. At the Dicken's Festival Ella is smiling sweetly (which doesnt happen very often) and Kash is screaming and lunging off of Santa's lap. So at our ward party while we were in line once again to see Santa, I asked Kash if he wanted to go and he kept saying, "nooooo!" So we didn't make him go through the traumatic experience again. But as you can see, Ella could NOT wait!

Over the HILL!

I really cannot believe that I am old enough to be married to someone in their THIRTIES! haha yes it's true, Matt just turned 30. I think it's crazy but Matt could care less. I am already starting to not particularly like getting older but it is just not a big deal to him. So, for this monumental birthday I planned a little surprise. He thought we were going out to eat to Red Lobster (he always chooses to go here because it is the only time I will go....I want to vomit the second I walk through those fishy doors..yuck). But instead we went with a bunch of friends to Mesquite. I know it sounds ghetto, who wants to go to Mesquite? But we went bowling which we had not done FOREVER, and it was so much fun! I always forget how much I like bowling. So we bowled a couple of games and then played Bingo. I think my old man of a husband had a pretty good time so I am happy!

Here is the birthday boy in all of his glory: bowling with his tongue out!

And yes I made everyone pose for a cheesy bowling ball picture!

Happy Birthday Matty! I love you.