Family Party..

Just wanted to post one of the pictures of Michael, his parents and siblings. It's a rarity that all the brothers and sisters are at a family function with Laura living out of state and now moving to Texas. Yeeehaa. I hope that I get some of the better pictures that the others took. Laura, Tammy, Mom & Dad we'd love to see your pictures from the party. The boys love playing with their cousins and we think that it's good for them to be able to spend time with them. Looking forward to the next family party.

Build a Bear...again!

My boys and I have the best aunt in the world. After we went to the Build-a-Bear Workshop the first time we called Aunt Carol and told her how much fun this place was. She said that at Christmas we could take a trip down there. So Friday morning after Christmas we headed down to Gilbert San Tan village. Aunt Carol, Aunt Donna, all 4 boys, Papa, Daddy & Mommy went. The boys really wanted a new animal and Aunt Carol said that was fine. What ever they wanted. COOL!! Ammon picked out a ragged dog,(and Aunt Carol did too) Talmage picked out a brown bear, Garrett a black bear, Michael picked out the Velvet bear for me and for Spencer we weren't going to get him one but then he woke up. So he got a soft bunny.
Ammon is great at naming the animals. So he was very helpful with Spencer's bunny's name Hoppy. His dog is Raggs, Talmage picked out a Batman outfit for his bear so he became Batman Chocolate, I like to call him Bruce when it's off, Garrett's bear got a great winter vest; we named his Blackie. And Michael named my teddy bear Cuddles. It was busy at the BABW, but fun. Gotta remember to leave the baby at home. He is the hard one to deal with. But in the end it was fun. Afterwards, we said goodbye to our aunts and Papa took Spencer back to the house so that the 3 boys, Michael & I could go see "Bedtime Stories". It was funny and we all enjoyed it.

Christams Day!

I would love to have one Christmas when I felt 100%. But alas, I am still waiting. I'm going to start celebrating Christmas either 1. in July no one gets sick in July or 2. In Australia. Plus no snow to deal with. Who really wants a white Christmas anyway? Just means the hubby has to shovel so the family can get in the house. That's one reason we go to Mesa, even though it was kinda rainy and chilly. So enough bad stuff let's get on to the fun.

Each one of us has our own special stocking. The boys all have ones with animal heads on them. And their birth year. Nana has Minnie, Michael has Spidey. Papa has a Santa fisherman. I just got my Aunt Carol a Kokopeli one. Still trying to find either Superman or a golf one for Aunt Donna. And me I have one with my name hand stitched by my mom. I keep looking for another one for me but have yet to find one to jump out and say THIS IS YOU AMY KING. So I wait another year and see.
Santa (and family) were very good to the boys this year. Talmage got exactally what he wanted. Even though he opened it sooner than I wanted him to. Got a little anal on Christmas morning. I blame hormones. But like I said Talmage got what he asked Santa for.
This picture of him with the Bakugan was too pricless. He got that from Spencer.

His Nintendo DS was his big gift from Santa. His response was "I knew I would get it" Very faithful kid.

Ammon asked for some DVD's and a lot of new games for his DS. And he got quite a few. After 7 years of smiling for pictures with presents he's gotten really good. Funny how when you get something educational, the smile fades...


Garrett hadn't really asked Santa for anything specific but he got some fun stuff. He really liked his Little Einsteins ornament.
Have to teach him to move the gift out from in front of his face.
Best picture was after he opened his very own scooter. Granted Spencer took it over, but it is for Garrett.
When you're number 4 of 4 boys it's hard to know what exactly you could need. Poor Spencer. He did get into unwrapping though.

Christmas was a nice day. Both my aunts and Michael's aunt Marilynn & Karen were able to be there to enjoy the day. Everything turned out nicely. Even though I was all stressed out. But my wonderful hubby kept taking care of me and for that I am very grateful. And for the beautiful pearl in hibuscus necklace and earrings he gave me.

Christmas Eve Traditions

Some people go caroling, some read Luke 2, some gather with friends and family but the King-Stiles-Reich do something else to start off our Christmas celebration.

A few years ago we made sugar cookies for Christmas day. We had so much going on that we hadn't had time to frost and decorate them. Aunt Donna stepped in and along with Ammon & Talmage, Garrett was just a baby, started decorating them. We thought to ourselves this is alot of fun and the boys loved spending extra quality time with Aunt Donna. The next year we desided that we would do this as a Christmas Eve tradition. Some people read the Christmas Story, we decorate cookies. Don't worry I read the Christmas story to the boys earlier in the month and even sang songs to them. Anyway, now we have alot of fun on Christmas eve. There is always so much to do that night. Preparing for the next day and making sure the boys are clean and ready for Christmas morning. Every year I swear it's going to be less stressful. I'm still working on that. So we ate our Mexican food dinner early, because the resturant we go to used to close at 5 on Christmas eve. This year, they didn't close till 10, but still it was nice to have dinner at 5 and get to the cookies. It's a whole family thing. Aunt Carol, Aunt Donna, Papa, Daddy, Nana, Mommy and the boys.
Papa was helping Ammon to see how thick they could get the frosting on a single cookie!!
Aunt Carol helped Garrett this year.
Nana is great at decorating.



This is Aunt Donna with Talmage. She is the master of making new colors.

Michael is really starting to get into the decorting thing.

Spencer couldn't wait till Christmas; he chose to eat his cookie frosting first!

This year we think that our cookies were excellent.Very well decorated. Each year we have a cookie decorating contest....everyone wins. Last year Michael was the judge with catagories like "MOST LIKELY TO PUT SANTA IN DIABETIC COMA" That award went to Talmage. He puts enough frosting on to choke Santa and the sprinkles are piled high. This year, Michael picked the catagories like 'MOST LIKELY TO BE ON THE FOOD NETWORK" and my Dad picked the cookies. By the way I won that one. Take that Rachael Ray.

These were the cookies for Santa!Yummy!

Trapoline Christmas

Michael thought that a trapoline would be fun for the boys. They are always jumping around anyway. So when his boss was ready to get rid of his, he gave it to us. Merry Christmas boys. The good and bad thing is that it's at my parents. Not like they would be jumping on it right now with all the snow anyways. Enjoy boys. (and Daddy)

And here is the reason we don't send out Family pictures in our Christmas card.

How hard could it be to have my 4 boys all dressed in their suits for church on Sunday? Not hard at all. I got all prettied up. Michael was looking handsome as always, my boys all gorgeous in their suits and ties. I got great pictures of all of them before church. See....


I guess my real problem was waiting until after church. Talmage ran in the house and started stripping all his clothes off, got in trouble and was in a mood! Spencer had been running about out in front of the house and did not want us to hold him still while we had a picture. Needless to say this is my favorite of the bad pictures we took. Gotta love it!! I think I'll blow it up 11x14 for the wall.

Snow Days, snow days lalalala snow days.

As many of us have prayed for moisture to our city, many of the Mothers of Flagstaff were praying that their children would NOT have a week of snow days before the 2 weeks of Christmas vacation. Hence, we needed snow much more than we mothers needed our children to be in school and our sanity. And we were lucky enough to only have 3 full snow days and a late start on Friday. I took that too mean that we needed to make lots of cookies for Christmas together. It was funny in our house, because as much as the boys started to get on one anothers nerves, they had fun with mom. I had told them that we would be having Cookie making central. We kinda did. Probably not as much as they thought it would be. We all had a fun time.


Spencer included. He has a new nickname. COOKIE MONSTER!! He not only enjoys the cookies once they are baked and cooling on the wax paper but he very much likes stealing bites of cookie dough right out of the bowl.
And very unlike me I let the boys go out and play in the snow. It seems like every year when we have snow the boys have a cold or something. Not this time. And they were very excited. Spencer and Garrett included.
These pictures were from Tuesday. By Thursday there was much more snow in our driveway and Michael even got to come home early from work because it looked like it might get pretty hairy out on the interstate for him. He had a super fun time having a snowball fight with his boys. Even it Talmage didn't think so right at first when Michael put a snowball on his head. Poor T. I guess the point of this is never stand next to Dad for a picture when he has a snowball in his hand!! Now let's get on to Christmas.