Year In Review

Answering these questions each year is a great way to keep track of your life a year at a time.

What did you do in 2008 that you'd never done before? Gave birth to a baby girl (surprisingly enough, it's not much different than giving birth to a baby boy).

Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I don't think I made any except for the "want to be skinnier" wishful thinking. Probably won't make any resolutions this year either.

Did anyone close to you give birth? Oh my, yes! Julie had a girl, Diana had a girl, Amy had a girl, Cynthia P. had a boy, Patti had a girl, Allison had a girl, Whitney had a boy, Ilenia had a boy, Cindy had a girl, shoot - who am I missing?

Did anyone close to you die? Clint's three remaining grandparents all died this year within 5 months of each other.

What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008? More patience. More energy. More fun.

What date from 2008 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? December 5, 2008 - the day Allison was born.

What was your biggest achievement of the year? Surviving.

What was your biggest failure? Letting my temper get the better of me more times than I care to admit.

What was the best thing you bought? Um...we finally bought an MP3 player.

Whose behavior merited celebration? Hayden's behavior improved dramatically when we removed artificial color from his diet. That was definitely worth celebrating.

Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? Hayden's, before altering his diet. He was having multiple tantrums and meltdowns every day that would leave us both in tears.

Where did most of your money go? Just the day to day stuff - nothing big.

What did you get really, really, really excited about? All the new baby girls in our family.

What song will always remind you of 2008? *Twinkle, twinkle, hippopotamus. How I love your big, gray bottomus.* Oh, do you mean a song on the radio? I have no idea! I'm so out of touch with current music.

What do you wish you'd done more of? Go to the Temple.

What do you wish you'd done less of? Being frustrated with the kids.

How did you spend Christmas? At home with my family. We learned pretty quickly that it's too much hassle to travel for Christmas.

What was your favorite TV program? We discovered The Office this year and watched all the previous seasons before the current season started. Hilarious!

What was the best book you read this year? To Kill A Mockingbird.

What did you want and get? A swing set for the backyard.

What was your favorite film of this year? I don't think I saw a single movie in the theater. That's right, I'm the only female in this country who has yet to see Twilight!

What did you do on your birthday? Is it bad that I can't remember and it was only last month?

How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008? Stretchy pants and tent shirts - otherwise known as maternity clothes.

What kept you sane? Getting together with my friends at Book Club once a month.

Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? I don't get too excited about celebrities.

Who did you miss? Everyone who doesn't live in my vicinity.

Who was the best new person you met? My new sister-in-law, Courtney.

Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008? That time is going by way too quickly and I need to do a better job of living in the moment.

I am excited for a great 2009!

Feel free to tag yourself and answer these questions if you feel so inclined.

Three Weeks Old

Here is our little angel in her Christmas dress. She had a lacy headband on at one point, but it kept slipping down over her eyes. She's still such a little squirt...her tights came up to her armpits and her shoes were the smallest ones we have and they kept falling off.

And here she is earlier in the day getting a little tummy time.

Merry Christmas (better late than never)

After weeks of searching, debating, deciding, spending, wrapping, and finally opening...Christmas is now over. And after all that work I think their favorite gifts were the 88 cent whoopi cushions we got from the cheap section of toys at Walmart. Makes me wonder why I even bother. :-)

Merry Christmas from the Kobers!!

More Haydenisms

We had some Whoppers malted milk balls amongst all of our holiday candy and Hayden let us know that Whoppers are good for you because they clean your teeth. *ha*ha*ha* The other night he said he needed to eat some because his teeth were dirty. So we let him eat some and then sent him to the bathroom to brush his teeth.

And tonight we went to Uncle David's night-before-the-wedding "rehearsal" (don't know what we were rehearsing) dinner. After they had eaten, all of the kids and a few of the dads went into the cultural hall to play basketball. Hayden was in there with them and having a good time. But when more of the grown-ups joined in the game, he came to the sidelines and said, "This is a hard level! There are too many grown-ups playing." Hard level?!? If that's not proof that he plays too many video games, I don't know what is.

Christmas Gingerbread Houses

We went to Clint's sister's house last night to decorate gingerbread houses. Well, actually they were made out of graham crackers, but they were just as fun to decorate.
Jared did more eating than decorating, but he did manage to get a few things on his house.
The boys graciously gave the parents plenty of time to decorate their own houses and quickly found another holiday activity to keep them occupied. I think they are a bit addicted to video games.Wonder where they get that from?
And since she's another week older, here are some more pictures of Princess Al (as Clint calls her). Here she is with her cousin Daphne, who is exactly 3 months older.

We had a onesie on her earlier that had bright pink letters that read "I Am Not A Boy!" on the front. Kyle said she's needs that shirt because she looks like a boy. Okay, I'll admit she could use a little more hair, but I think she's pretty enough to pass for a girl. She was only awake for a little while and then spent the rest of evening like this. She's such a great sleeper, thank heavens!

Haydenism

Hayden just cracks me up. He is the funniest kid ever, and the funniest part is that he isn't trying to be funny.

The other day I was playing a game on Yahoo called Dynomite. He was pronouncing it DyMONite. I tried correcting him and he said, "I know Mom. I'm saying it in Spanish." He thinks that just because he once watched all of "Cars" in Spanish, he's now fluent in the language.

She's One Week Old

I finally figured out the problem with my camera. Here are a few more pictures of Allison. We're thinking she's going to have red hair afterall. It looked blond at first, but (depending on the light) it's looking more red now.

Jared LOVES his baby sister. Maybe a little too much. He tries to pick her up all the time. "I hold it?" He loves to give her kisses, especially when she's sleeping. He even crawled on top of her in her car seat to give her a kiss. And he always has to give me updates on how she's doing. "Baby's sleeping!" "Baby's still sleeping!" "Baby's awake!" "Baby happened!" - that one means she's crying. It's really sweet and hopefully they'll stay close like that as they grow up.

Technical Difficulties

I know she's more than a week old and I haven't posted any new pictures yet, but I'm experiencing technical difficulties with my camera and can't get the pics uploaded to my computer. Please stand by.

Family Wordle

That was fun. You can make your own at Wordle.net.

She's Finally Here!!!

Wednesday Way Back

Lest you think "no news is good news" I suppose I should check in and report that we're still waiting for this little one to make her grand entrance. Four days over due and counting...

In the meantime, here's a fun Wednesday Way Back Machine photo. I like to call it "Life is Just a Bowl Full of Jared."