Our Sweet Little Seth

On December 8th at 5:05 p.m. Seth Charles Wengreen joined our family! He has brought us more joy than we thought possible over the last 9 days! We are so excited to have him with us at this special time of year. It has been so sweet to think about the Saviors birth and reflect more on the true meaning of Christmas - the birth of a baby.

Leading up to his birth the boys could literally not wait for him to come, especially Adam and Matthew. Each day when they would wake up in the morning or come home from school they were disappointed that I was there - they had hoped I'd be at the hospital having the baby. When he was born they were at the hospital within a couple of hours and were ecstatic to see their new little brother, thanks to Nana, since she wanted to see him just as much! They ended up having to do 'rock, paper, scissors' to decide who got to hold him first, but the one who got to hold him first had the shorter turn. It's pretty much been like that ever since - when they get home from school it's the first thing they want to do. Adam wants to play the piano for Seth, Matthew wants to read him his books, and Nathan likes to dance for him.

The only problem is that I want to hold him just as much as they do! We're all just in awe at this sweet little one. I find myself just sitting and staring at him and wondering how I got to be so lucky to have this sweet boy join our family. I know that luck has very little to do with it, though. Most of our family and friends know that we had to go through in vitro to get this little guy. It felt like a very long time trying to figure out what was wrong and what we would need to do to have another baby. One of the reasons I love the name Seth is because it means "appointed." In Genesis 4:25 Eve calls her son Seth because she said God appointed her another seed because she had lost Abel. We have lost so many hopeful children early on in pregnancies and even with all we had to go through to get Seth, I always felt like we still had a child that was supposed to come or that was appointed to be a part of our family. To have him here and with us truly feels like a miracle. He is the sweetest and most precious baby and we simply can't get enough of him. He is our favorite Christmas gift!

Fabulous Fall!

Turns out the fall has been just as busy as the summer, so we're doing another summary! It all started with the first day of school for Adam and Matthew. Adam started 4th grade and Matthew is in 1st!

About a week later Nathan had his first day of preschool! He was so excited to go to school and be big like his brothers! He gets to go with lots of friends, which has been really fun too!

Another first for Nathan this fall was being on his first soccer team! We had all three boys in soccer, which was pretty crazy, especially on Saturdays trying to get everyone to their games!

We had a very fun visitor - Nana! My mom came and saved me while Brian was gone for 2 weeks to Asia. It was so great to have her - we went shopping in Leavenworth, got almost all my baby shopping done, played lots of games, and had a blast with the boys!

She even got to come with Nathan on his field trip to the pumpkin patch - this is the tractor ride!

This year for Adam's 'Night of the Notables' Adam was Harry Houdini! He got to learn all about him, make a timeline, autobiography, portrait, and for his extra activities he built a lego model of Houdini on stage and a power point quiz presentation - and he loved every minute!

We found a very fun Pumpkin Patch this year - the boys loved the giant slide, corn maze, bouncy house, big tricycles, the cow train, and especially the corn room (hours of fun)!

Boys and pumpkin guts - oh the joy!

They do end up with cute/scary pumpkins in the end!

We headed down to Boise for Halloween this year to spend it with the Ashtons! The boys were beyond excited to get to see their cousins and had a blast trunk-or-treating, too!

On the way home we got to stop at the Cooks and visit for a bit with Brian's grandparents. The boys favorite part is getting measured on their growth board and tracking how tall they are now!

In November Brian and Matthew got to take a very special trip to visit Brian's parents who are serving a mission in Chile! Matthew was so excited that it was his turn to take a trip with Dad, but a little nervous too about going to a country where they didn't speak English! He got comfortable with it all pretty quick and jumped right in to enjoy every minute!

Matthew loved getting to ride a horse for the first time! He got to ride twice while in Chile and it was a true highlight for him.

Future Elder Wengreen with current Elder Wengreen

Matthew had a very hard time saying goodbye to his Grammy and Grandpa! He loved his time with them - they went to the zoo, a Chilean birthday party, all around their area, met lots of great people, and made lots of wonderful memories!

We keep hearing about this hard winter we are going to have, and it's started with a bang! We got several inches of snow and school was cancelled for two days. The boys had a blast and loved that Brian couldn't get to work and played with them on his lunch hours!

For Thanksgiving we got to have the Mitchells and Anna come share the day with us! We started it with the kids making 'apple turkeys' - a tradition from when I was a kid that I've never outgrown! The kids love it!

Just two weeks till the baby, I was surprised at how fun it was to be up and cooking! I love making the rolls and the pies the best - I still haven't had to touch a turkey thanks to Amy!

Brian got to carve the bird while I sang my Thanksgiving day song!

The kids loved having their cousins here! Nothing like spending the holidays with family!

It really was a fabulous fall and we are looking forward to a wonderful winter with our new little guy! We are all so beyond excited - we just can't wait to have him here!

Summer Summary!

Well, now that school is back in session I've decided to give up on my plans to do a post about all of the summer activities individually and I'll just sum it up in one, so here it goes...

Camping at Lake Easton -
The weekend after school got out we took the boys for our first family camp out in our tent trailer. We had a great time, but we forgot the key to the tent trailer! We were able to get in and just prop up the door, but we've remembered the keys every since!

After breaking camp we went to Wenatchee to visit Brian's grandparents! It was good to see them again and the boys loved hiking Castlerock - the mountain behind their house.

Berry Picking -

This summer we picked our own strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries this year! The boys had a great time picking them and I had fun making jam, pie, sauces, and other yummy concoctions with them!

Lake Wilderness -

Another favorite this summer was going to Lake Wilderness - it's about 10 minutes from our house and it's got a great sandy beach that the boys love! This pic is Nathan making his own 'Wipeout' course! His favorite show is 'Wipeout' and he loves to make his own courses!

Family Reunion in Utah -

We got to go to Utah for Nana's birthday! We got to celebrate her birthday with a large family reunion at a park and then then next day we went up to Park City for several days. The kids decorated pillowcases and signed each others. They also did lots of swimming in the pool, one day we got to go boating on Jordanelle and play at the beach, they played at the park, did some fun crafts, and mostly just had a blast being together!

80th Birthday Party for Grandma Ginos -

We headed to Portland to celebrate with Grandma Ginos for her 80th birthday! It was fun to see so many of Brian's extended family and we had a fun weekend with the Mitchells! We ended up leaving Adam in Portland for a week with his cousins and we brought Josh (whose Matthew's age) home with us for the week!

Matthew, Josh, and Nathan at the Space Needle! We went to the Children's Museum, the movies, the parks, the water park, and ended the week meeting up with the Mitchells camping at Mount Rainer!

Camping at Rainier was fun, but on Saturday it was so foggy that we couldn't see 10 feet in front of us at the lodge - no mountain views at all!

After the lodge we went on a fun hike to see a part of the national park that is on an island so the trees are huge because they haven't had the forest fires reach them. It was a fun hike and the boys loved crossing the bridge - while most held on tight and carefully walked across Brian helped the boys learn the joys of making it sway and bounce!

Boating with the Hartmans -

The men decided that the best time to catch the smooth water for skiing was early morning, so they took the older boys with them camping and then hit the smooth water in the morning. The mom's and toddlers met up with them in time for lunch to enjoy the rest of the day together! The only problem was the weather - it was a bit chilly, but that didn't stop us from having a great time! The boys loved the tube and Adam even tried skiing!

This is the ski run that led to the cracked rib, which caused Brian to miss the triathlon he had been training for all summer. He was really bummed, but was able to do a shorter triathlon later on, so it wasn't too terrible!

To the zoo -

The boys had a great time going to the zoo with their friends toward the end of the summer. We hadn't gone last summer, so it was Nathan's first time since he was 1 1/2. It was really fun to see him get so excited about the different animals!

Labor Day Weekend -

We decided it'd be fun to take a longer camping trip over Labor Day weekend, which we've never done before. The longest we'd been camping was overnight, so this was completely new to us. Brian had his heart set on Lake Chelan. We stayed in an RV park, which wasn't my favorite (I love a camp fire and mountain setting for camping), but it ended up being really fun for a longer stay. Our first day was the only really warm day (about 90) so we hit the water slides! Well, the boys did - I got to watch, and read my book, which was really nice too!

Being in the apple capitol of the world (according to anyone from Wenatchee) we decided to make our own apple cider! The boys were nervous they wouldn't like it, but they were super excited to make it. They each got a turn cranking the wheel and turning the press - they just needed their expert grandparents to show them how it's done! It turned out really good!

That day we also went to the lake and played in the sand, went swimming, and played at the park. The weather wasn't super cooperative (mid-70's) so they didn't last too long. They really wanted to go bowling, so we did that and since I can't bowl (being 6 months pregnant) I got to sit and listen to the beginning of the BYU game on my phone! Brian was super jealous! We went to dinner after and Brian and I each had an ear bud in one ear - true fans! Good thing they won!

Without a fire we had a couple of BBQ meals at camp. This one was on Sunday evening - we had a great day Sunday! Brian has some friends that live nearby so we went to church with them, had a great drive up the coast of the lake, and then went to his friends for peach pie and homemade ice cream! We ended the day with a nice steak BBQ dinner and games with the boys!

We taught the older boys how to play Settlers and they're actually getting quite good! It's been fun being able to play games we really enjoy too! Nathan's too young, so he got to play his favorite game (Monkey Ball) on the ipad in his own little area. He loved it!

On the way home we left the tent trailer in Wenatchee for the winter at Brian's parents house and then had a nice lunch with his grandparents. It was great to spend time with them again!

It was a great summer overall with many fun adventures! The boys loved being together all day every day and even though the weather wasn't great most of the summer, we had a great time!