Christmas Time...

Ah, Christmas. The time we focus on Christ, Family & Friends, love - and presents. At least, that is what is most important to the kids. If I told my kids, "Sorry, we don't have money this year, but really, Christmas is about Christ, not presents", my kids would have me shot at dawn. :) Luckily, Jeremiah has a great boss who does great Christmas Parties (with great gifts) and we were able to get the kids some presents this year. Actually, I would say my kids were quite spoiled this year...

Archer reading a Thomas story with Grandpa Twitch

Tanion, Draysen, Archer, Aunt Jessa, and Robyn

Little Kaylee Belle

We decided with the wonderful weather (lots of snow) that it would be easier to do our "Heber Christmas" with my family and Miah's family on Christmas Eve (cuz we were already there). So, we opened the many wonderful presents from them the night before Christmas. Archer got trains - LOTS AND LOTS OF TRAINS. The kid is overly obsessed with Thomas the Train. Tanion got Transformers and some games. Robyn got girly presents (dolls, girly clothes, etc). Miah and I got money and gift cards (which is just what we wanted and needed). :)

Robyn liked the boxes the best...

Archer thought he got "kitty food" for Christmas! :)

Then on Christmas morning, we let the kids sleep until THEY woke up. They were all in clothes from the day before because it was almost midnight by the time we got home from Heber and they were all asleep. :) We let them all open their presents, which included more Thomas stuff, more girly things, and an XBOX 360. We hid the XBOX in my gifts, so when Tanion didn't get to open it (that's all he asked for), he was upset. We told him Santa must have decided that I should have it instead so he cried for about 10 minutes until we told him that it was his and DAD's gift but that it must have meant that MOM was the boss of when it could be played. Good Answer. :)

Archer's presents...

DarTanion was funny - we got the kids an MP3 player so that I could put all of their music on one for car trips and things so that I don't have to worry about "inappropriate" music coming on with them in the car....
He kept saying - "This is crazy! 5 Year Olds don't get IPODS! That's just nuts!"

Robyn and her Daddy with her Belle dolly and feather boa...

DarTanion - first thing in the morning - before presents...

Picture by DarTanion of MY Christmas Present... :)

Picture by DarTanion of Dad with his Present...

Robyn with all of her presents...

Christmas night after a day of fun and presents....

Since then at our house, it's been lots of XBOX 360 (and Lego Star Wars), lots of trains and lots of House Construction - which I will have a post about that will show up before this post.

We do hope that everyone had a fantastic, wonderful Christmas. We hope Christ was in your thoughts and presents were under your tree.

Love, The Hardman Family

Construction!!!

We are finishing the basement of our house and I have to say, I'm ecstatic about it! :) I will soon *hopefully* have 5 bedroom, 2 kitchen, 2 laundry room, 2 1/2 bathroom, 2 living room, 1 storage room, 2500 square foot house to live in!!! :) YAY!!!

Jeremiah's parents are helping us out (both with labor and financially) to finish it, and I have to say, it's wonderful. :) I am so thankful and blessed to be part of their family!!! :)

So, you will see some pictures posted on the blog as we make progress. Here are some for you:

Merry Christmas to all...

I just wanted to do a quick "MERRY CHRISTMAS" greeting to everyone and hopefully by tomorrow I can get my camera to download the 90 pictures / videos taken on Christmas (and Christmas Eve) for you to enjoy.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! :)

Family Photos 2008

I posted a blog in November (or maybe early December...) about how my family did pictures on Robyn's birthday. Well, we got them back yesterday. Here are the beautiful results... :)

My funny looking hubby, smug looking 5 year old,
cute other two kids and me and my shiney face!
YAY! Success! :)

The whole Barlow Clan! :)
Kaylee and Robyn's dresses are the same and we totally DIDN'T plan it that way! :)

My Mommy and Daddy

Keen (my sis) and Kaylee and Sean

Their picture turned out GREAT!

Robyn Dancing

Ok so the video is really short but it was cute. :) She was dancing in her crib so I grabbed my camera and started recording. And of course the batteries died when she started dancing... But there are a few seconds of super cute Robyn dancing for you. :)

The kiddies...

So I've had some fun moments with the kiddies this last week or so and I thought I would show a few cute pictures of them.

FIRST: ARCHER

Jeremiah was home on Friday and decided that we needed to rake our leaves out front (because there were millions of them and all of our neighbors already had theirs done so we were the bad neighbor!) Archer HAD to get in on that. :) He went inside, put on his Lightning McQueen crocks and his big puffy red jacket and says: "Dad needs my help outside". :) So I let him go play with Jeremiah in the leaves. Except he thought it was fun to grab leaves and throw them over his head and let them rain down on him. :) SO CUTE! And the "tree needs some of it's leaves" as per Archer, so he put a little pile around the trunk. :) HOW CAN YOU NOT THINK THIS KID IS CUTE!?! :)

SECOND: ROBYNSON

My little girl has a boyfriend. Yep. And he's handsome and everyone loves him and he's "handy" around the house and totally cute and he has an accent. What's his name? Manny. Handy Manny to be exact. :) For her birthday I wanted to get her a big Minnie Mouse from Walmart, but they were all sold out, so I got her Handy Manny. :) She loves watching the show and I think she can even say his name because it sounds like she says Manny to him... But yeah, she loves him. :) We let him lay in her crib with her and I'll come in and she'll be laying on his stomach or whatever. :) It's cute. :) The other day were were in her room and she was kissing him and hugging him and playing with him - it was SO cute! :)

(NOTE: Remind me that I thought this was cute when she is like 13-18 yrs old and wants to do the same with REAL boys!) :)

Making out with Manny...

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST, DARTANION!:

There haven't been any particular super cute, wonderful moments with DarTanion but he is still pretty darn Super Cute and Wonderful! :)

Rock on, little dude!
He says - "Don't I look SO cool like this?" :)
Yeah - he does.

Yeah, this is the face of the devil.

DarTanion, Carter and Archer playing Star Wars while Robyn looks on...

Robynson's New Boots

This post is totally for my friend Jennifer. :)

When we went to the New Kids concert last month, we had a little time to kill before the show started, so we went shopping. We checked out Mervyns (I am SO sad they are going out of business! I LOVE THEM!!!) and found some SUPER cute little shoes for my SUPER cute little Robynson. :) I had a budget (which I went over anyways) so I couldn't get these super cute little boots. Well, Jenn, being the most wonderful person that she is, said that Robyn HAD to have them and she bought them for her. They were an early birthday present. :) I told her I would take some pictures of her in them and send them to her or post on my blog, so here you go people - Robyn's SUPER cute little boots from the SUPER wonderful, Ms. Jenn! :)

A beautiful book made by ME! :)

So I seriously spent most of the day working on a project for my mom... She bought "book credits" over a year ago and they expire tomorrow. So, yeah, I'm a procrastinator but I FINALLY sat down and took the whole day to make this beautiful book.

**BIG THANK YOU to my wonderful husband who was nice enough to watch not only OUR children, but Angie's as well so that I could work on and finally finish this book! :) **

So to view my masterpiece, copy the below code, open another window and paste the code in the browser line. It's wonderful and I'm sure you will all want your very own copy because I am truly that amazing. :)

http://www.heritagemakers.com/?event=projectBrowse&projectId=ca81361d-d214-4e13-ae63-2452fc2a1b45&productId=5&projectSponsor=167665

Family Pictures

We had family pictures done at the Heber High School on Robyn's birthday. They have a fundraiser where a guy comes and does pictures and it's only $10 for an 11 X 14. The others are extra. Well, we did the 11 X 14 but I won't have those til late December, so here are some pictures of my family waiting...

Aren't my guys HANDSOME!?!

Robyn's Birthday

Robynson's birthday cake (from Walmart!)

My baby is one. I am sad but excited. I can't wait until she can walk (better) but that scares me too. I can't wait until her hair is longer so that we can use the cute hair things that I have bought. But I am sad. My baby is one. She toddles all over my house. She likes to feed herself. She has a LOUD scream. She's big. And probably my last baby... And I am sad.

But, she is beautiful and healthy and happy and great. I've got to stay home with her for her whole little life. I've got to watch her grow and change and do new exciting things. I didn't get to stay home with the boys and I was never really been sad about it (because we have had some of the BEST sitters in the world) but this last year, I sort of was. But, I did what I felt was right at the time.

OK, so enough of my feeling sorry for myself (because my baby is ONE!) - I know you want to see some adorable pictures. :) We had 2 little parties (well, really, just cake and ice cream) for her. One with Jeremiah's family (and extended family) on Thanksgiving and one with my family and the Smith and Bolinder families. I'm just going to show pictures of Robyn with cake, though... Thanks to everyone who gave her presents!

PICTURES FROM HARDMAN FAMILY BIRTHDAY

i LOVE this one!

PICTURES FROM BARLOW BIRTHDAY PARTY

she grabbed her candle instead of blowing it out!

my Mandy put her hair in pigtails and i LOVE it!!!!

My adorable little girl is now one.