Tonight Lulu is sleeping in her "big girl bed" for the very first time. We have been fixing up her room since we moved home and finally her bed is put together so she can sleep in it.
Here is Lulu last December 2008 in her crib that is in the same spot her new bed is now.
This picture is taken from out in the hall peeking into her room.
Here is the same picture a year ago taken from the hall. Just amazing how time flies and how quickly a year goes. I can't believe my baby is sleeping in an actual bed. I would love for time to slow down just a bit. Seeing this just helps remind me to enjoy each moment that the Lord has given me with my children. 
Here are Lulu and Levi Christmas morning. We had a nice relaxing morning and Lulu had so much fun opening up presents. This was Levi's first Christmas and he seemed to enjoy it. He rolled over for the very first time today, so that made it really memorable.
We opened up some presents from Mark's mom at our house. Lulu got an art bin with all sorts of supplies. She was so excited to have her very own pair of scissors......made me a bit nervous. Then we headed over to my parents house for the rest of the day.
Grandma holding Levi, Papa holding their dog Lucy and Lulu getting ready to open a gift.
Uncle Todd and Aunt Stephanie were there. We all sat around and opened up presents together.
My mom gave everyone stockings. When I was little the stocking was my favorite part about Christmas morning.
Here is my dad with Levi. The guys had fun together while us gals enjoyed looking at all the pretty things. 
Well, Mark searched high and low this year for our Christmas tree and he finally found it in our own back yard. This tree needed to be trimmed and it actually made a great Christmas tree. I love how my husband thinks. He's one of a kind and makes everything we do so fun. 
Mark made a stand from a bucket and put some rocks and water in it. Looks perfect!!
Lulu got to help decorate the tree. Our gold star is a bit to heavy for this years tree.
Yes, that's right, Levi got to take his first bath this morning. He's 3 1/2 months old and he's never had a bath. What I have been doing is giving him a really good wipe down daily and a nice sponge bath once or twice a week. He's never had soap on him until today. I feel that God has given babies nice natural oils to help them have that soft baby skin so why remove it? I even debated using soap today but the bubbles were just so fun for a first bath. Levi really enjoyed it and I had my amazing helper Lulu right there to pour nice warm water on him. I think this little guy just likes doing anything where he can see his big sister. He just LOVES Lulu so much and Lulu absolutely LOVES Levi and takes such good care of him. My heart feels like it's going to burst with joy. I love being a mom and I thank the Lord daily for our children. 
Mark's mom came to visit this past weekend. She lives in Oregon with Mark's step dad and for most of the year they are traveling in their motor home down south so this visit was really special for us all. The next time we will see Connie is probably in April or May of 2010. While she was here we did some Christmas things since she will be back home during Christmas. 
Here is Mark and his mom wrapping some presents......hmm, what's in there?
Lulu and Mema (what her grandchildren call her) baked sugar cookies and decorated them. 
Lulu was so excited about decorating the cookies. If you look closely there is frosting in her hair and all over her face because everytime some frosting would spill she had to lick it off and clean up.
Here is Lulu giving the Snow Princess a high five.
What is Mark pointing at? Oh, it's snowing!!!! Another cool thing about "Snowflake Lane" is that is snows every night while they are putting on the show. Lulu was in aww over this.
Levi and I got to say "hi" to Frosty the Snow Man......Levi's eyes were wide open the entire time we were there.
Once the production was finished we went out for some hot chocolate. Actually Mark and I got pumpkin spiced lattes and Lulu got the hot chocolate and Mema just enjoyed spending time with us.
Here is Lulu ignoring her hot chocolate and enjoying the candy that she got from the Snow Princess.
Once we got home Lulu wanted to be the Snow Princess so here she is all dressed up and looking just dazzling.
On our way home we drove around to see some Christmas lights. This was no joke the very first house we came across. Let me tell you, when driving around looking at Christmas lights this is not what you want to see right at the beginning. It makes all the rest seem sort of boring. So if you happen to come across a house like this look the other way and keep driving and then when you are ready to head home swing back by and enjoy.
The morning after the party we hit the road around 9:30am. Here is a picture of the town as we were leaving.
We decided to take a different way home and make a fun road trip out of it. We were driving along the Columbia river and needed to get to the other side when we saw a sign for a free ferry ride up ahead. So we decided to check it out and go for a ferry ride. This ferry was small and we were first in line with two cars behind us. We sat and watched the ferry bring a few cars to our side and then we got to load onto the ferry.
We let Lulu get out of her car seat and sit up front while Mark drove onto the boat. Lulu was so excited about going for a ride on a boat.
Even Levi got to get out and enjoy the 10min ride.
This is what our van looked liked after driving over the mountains and in the snow. 
Here we are getting ready for the boat to take off. The boats captain came down and said hello to us and asked us where we had been since our van was so dirty.....LOL.
After our fun ferry ride we drove over a small mountain pass and stopped to see the Grand Coulee Dam. A few facts about the dam: it's the largest concrete structure in the US, it's a hydroelectric dam giving power to most of the Northwest and it's the 3rd largest hydroelectric dam in the world. 
It was so cold and the wind was blowing. We really wanted to take pictures, so we bundled up the kids in their wool blankets and quickly took the pictures and jumped back into the van. This was Levi's first really cold moment.....look at that red little nose.
On our way home we were able to drive through some really cute towns. Here we stopped and I nursed Levi in the parking lot of this church. How beautiful is this? It just makes me want to attend a service here to see what the inside looks like. One thing we noticed on our trip is that in theses small towns the churches are so beautiful and well taken care of. We were talking about how it's too bad that people don't build like this anymore.
Before we had to go back over the pass we made one last stop for dinner. We wanted to do something quick and easy so we could keep driving while the kids slept. We decided on a burger. Mark said the first burger place we see we are going to.......and then this is the first place we saw, can you say meant to be? Lulu was still awake and asked if we were actually going to eat that burger on the roof. No, not going to eat the burger on the roof but the size of the burgers they served us were just about that size. They were so good and HUGE! That gave us the fuel we needed to make it the next few hours until we got home. 
