One of the activities we for sure wanted to get in while in Utah was sledding. We get snow in Pittsburgh but not like out in Utah. Plus, sledding was a big part of growing up for me in my family and it is so fun getting together with the siblings and nieces and nephews and goin' down the hill.
My mom, Me, and Stacey's son Kyle My sister Stacey's 2nd, Makenna
Stacey and Kyle (Twin)
Nicki with Stac's other twin Ashlyn
Chris's two girls, Lexi (back) and Emily (front)
MaKenna and Carter Hugging
Me with the Coolest dog ever, Scout. Scout loves to sled down the hill and would go with whoever would take him. (Kaylee, Stac's 3rd is to the side.)
Left to Right: Emi, Aubrey (Stac's oldest), Carter, Kaylee, and Sydney (Dan's oldest)
This was the favorite kind of sledding for the three and unders. Carter really flew down with his slick, red suit. He became our little red bullet.
Lexi is such a champ and tough girl. Here she is sledding it up.
My cousins Adrienne and Afton threw a Valentine Party while Carter and I were out in Utah. My cousin Adrienne aka "A" as you can see in the pictures and videos is the most adorable person. At home in Arlington, VA she does a music class where the kids sing, dance, and play with music. She gave us a little glimpse into her world with this so cute Valentine party. I thought I would share her talents with my blogging friends and family.
After shaking out all the wiggles with music, "A" read Valentine books to the kids.
At this point, I sadly stopped taking pictures but after storytime we congregated in the kitchen where Afton and Adrienne made FANTASTIC homemade waffles with homemade buttermilk syrup and strawberries on top (to die for). Then the kids were able to decorate a heart cookie and make them look all fancy. We had such a great time and is a party tradition that I hope to carry on. Adrienne said this was her fourth V-day party.
By the way, I am trying to convince Adrienne that she could sell her music class lesson plans (she has a ton of themed lessons) to people who wanted to start up their own classes in their area. If you are interested let me know, I will pass it on.
For Carter's 2nd Birthday he got a sled from Grandma Karen and Grandpa Craig. So when we finally got enough snow to go sledding we bundled up and headed out for Carter's first real sledding trip. He cracked me up decked out in his big ol snow suit. But I tell you what it is AWESOME for keeping a little guy all warm and cozy.
Our little family of three had such a nice Holiday break. We spent Christmas here in Pittsburgh since Matt was working the week of Christmas and had to go into the hospital for a bit on Christmas Day. So here is a journaling of our Christmas Events:
Christmas Eve we did Matt's family's traditional Chinese take out. Then we went with our friends Heather and Oliver to their church's Christmas Eve service. It was really nice and a great way to start our Christmas Celebration. My favorite part was when they turned out the lights and lit everyone's candle and we sang Silent Night. Then we came home and opened Grandma Bonnie's traditional pajama Christmas Eve presents.
I loved putting all the presents underneath the tree. This was our first time being in our own home for Christmas and it was kind of nice and fun. I loved organizing the presents and just seeing how pretty everything looked.
Christmas morning was really nice. Carter for one of the rare times in his life slept in late, along with Daddy. So while my boys slept I got up and finished getting things ready for our traditional breakfast from my family's side: sausage souffle, grapefruit, hot chocolate, and then Heather brought over a coffee U that is I think she said a Norwegian type of pastry (it was really delicious!) And to all you Mormons out there, don't worry it didn't have coffee in it. :) Once the boys woke up we opened presents. I didn't get a lot of pictures of us opening presents, but I did get some video for the sake of Carter's grandparents. I didn't think that everyone would want to see every video so I won't post all of them here, but if you are interested you can go to www.youtube.com/aynielsen and see all the videos I downloaded. I did want to share one of the videos though. What I love about this video is this captures the first day of which Carter started using "Yes Momma/Daddy" and "Thank You Momma/Daddy". Of all mornings Christmas morning is a great one to learn how to be polite. Since Christmas Carter has been using please and thank you like crazy and it has been so awesome as his Momma to hear it!!
Later that day, we went over to our friend's house for dinner (Richy, Marie, and Linus). Dinner was extremely delicious. Richy just got a smoker so he smoked a Turkey, we brought ham, the Hecks brought yummy sides, and the Nunnery's brought a huge spread of dessert. We all gained a few extra pounds that night on top of our already gains.
A couple weeks before Christmas when we were planning this dinner get together I was so excited because I thought we would have enough children to put on a Nativity Scene...not my brightest idea. It turned out to be somewhat of a disaster. We all brought items to contribute for the nativity and someone brought the cutest little duck bathrobe. Carter being obsessed with the show Little Bear that has a duck in it immediately was drawn to the duck robe and so instantly we had a very loud quacking duck in our nativity.
We also had a shepard-to-be decide he wanted nothing to do with our nativity. But my favorite mishap was adorable Linus who is obsessed with trucks and building things. He wanted nothing to do with being a shepard or wise man, he wanted to be a builder man in his builder man uniform. Marie (his mother) tried to explain to him that there weren't builder men back then that dressed like that, and he turned to his mother and said, "Then who built the stable?!?" So with that logic we decided to add a builder man to our nativity scene except at that point he decided that this pagent shouldn't even be happening so through at least half of Richy's scripture reading we had a little boy pleading for his daddy to stop reading. But in the midst of all the choas, our Joseph and sweet Mary remained stalwart and carried on as did some of the adult actors:
Oh yes, and I forgot that balls were flying at us from all directions.
This candy train was just one of our many delicious desserts! Isn't that so creative?!?
Kansas City, MO
The Saturday after Christmas Matt's work week ended and we got up at 2:30am and were off to Kansas City (a 13 hour drive). Our biggest concern with the drive was of course our 2 year old and to our pleasant surprise, he was a champ!! He either slept, watched Little Bear, sang songs, or read books. He never cried unless we weren't fast enough starting over his Little Bear movie. Well, I guess to be totally honest on our way home he did start to cry to get out of his seat when we were just 20 minutes away from our house!
We had a BLAST in Kansas City, I didn't take a lot of pictures or videos to document it. Here were some of my favorite things (in no particular order):
1. The train displays at Union Station and Crown Center.
I know you can't really see the trains here, but I just thought this was a sweet picture of me and my boy.
2. Watching the relationships grow stronger with his Aunt Whitney and Uncle Cory. Sometimes I think Carter is one of the luckiest kids in the world because he is surrounded by so many people who love him so much.
3. Arthur Bryant's, mine and Matt's favorite KC BBQ. (GT we got a few laughs remembering you with your big ole Arthur Bryant's cup.)
4. Carter realizing that he had Grandma wrapped around his little finger. One morning he was wanting me to go play down in the basement with him and I didn't want to so I said no and he automatically turned to Grandma and in his sweet pleading voice he said, "Grama!" And of course her heart melted.
5. Carter being so sweet and polite. Just about everytime someone did something for him he would say, "Thank you Grama" or whoever it was who helped him.
6. Watching Carter thrive being around his Aunt and Uncle and Grama and Pampa.
7. Farming it up several times (aka this means we played The Farming Game).
8. The Nielsen Family Band: (Matt, Cory, and Whit playing Rockband on the Wii)
This Wheezer video is a great one to check out just for Cory alone. He cracks me up, and really does pull off a great rock star. And yes ladies he is single!
9. The Fun Run, this was a fun place with blow up toys right by my in-laws house.
Uncle Big Timmay you would be so proud to see your little C Man climbing like a champ!
One of the many things I love about my husband, is if you wnat to have fun all you need is him. He is one awesome playmate.
We had a blast celebrating Carter's two year anniversary of his arrival to our family. In fact we had so much fun that we dragged it out for three days.
12-18-08
The Actual Birthday
We started out Carter's Birthday by having our buddies Oliver and Heather over for chocolate chip pancakes in our pajamas. After breakfast the boys played so well together that Heather and I just let the morning slip away while we relaxed in our PJs. When lunch came around we decided to make Carter's favorite lunch Mac N Cheese and then finally around two we said bye to our friends so Carter could take his nap.
Oliver gave Carter this cool Lightening McQueen which drives on it own after shaking it.
After nap and when Daddy made it home from work we headed to McDonald's where Carter played on the play place and ate a little food. Daddy and Carter loved climbing around together.
Once we got home it was time to open presents. I took several videos so that Grandmas and Grandpas could somewhat feel like they were a part of it.
Carter loved reading this Little People book that Grandma and Grandpa Herzog gave him.
12-19-08
The next day we went with a few more of our buddies to the Children's Museum where Carter's favorite things to do is paint and play with the Choos.
That night we had friends over for a little Thomas Birthday Party:
The kids I watch gave Carter a basket full of adorable wooden instruments. During the party, the kids decided to put on a concert for us.
Time to sing Happy Birthday and blow out the candles.
What a completely different experience and picture than last year when it was time to blow out candles.
12-20-08
Matt was working all morning on this Saturday so I ended up taking Carter by myself to see Santa. It was hard for me to try to pump Carter up and be photographer at the same time so this is the best we got. His face really says it all as far as his feelings go towards Santa. He didn't cry, but he wasn't too stoked about Santa either. It was a great idea for them to give Santa such a big chair so that little kids don't have to sit on the Big Man's lap because I am pretty sure that wouldn't have happened.
After nap time Matt, Carter, and I headed downtown for some great Saturday celebrations Pittsburgh does during December. Those of you who know Carter know that he LOVES buses. So we got to ride a free Trolley bus that takes you to all the big Holiday stops downtown. They had a Santa Elf on our trolley too who was our tour guide. It was very enjoyable, but the best part was Carter's HUGE perma-grin and hearing him say Trolley Bus over and over almost to remind himself that this was actually happening. The only sad thing is that I forgot my camera so I couldn't get any pictures or videos of this. We stopped and saw a display of Gingerbread houses that were not your average gingerbread houses. Then later on that night we got to go on a free horse and carriage ride around downtown. Carter thought that was pretty cool, but after experiencing the Trolley Bus nothing else could compete with that.
But most of all, we want to wish Carter Happy Happy Birthday. We love you Buddy!!
A MIRACLE came into mine and Matt's lives and we were changed forever. We love our little Carter Matthew with all our hearts and can't express how grateful we are to our Heavenly Father for sending us our little fireball. Mommy and Daddy love you so much Carter Boy.
My mom, Me, and Stacey's son Kyle
My sister Stacey's 2nd, Makenna
Stacey and Kyle (Twin) 
Chris's two girls, Lexi (back) and Emily (front) 
MaKenna and Carter Hugging
Me with the Coolest dog ever, Scout. Scout loves to sled down the hill and would go with whoever would take him. (Kaylee, Stac's 3rd is to the side.)
Left to Right: Emi, Aubrey (Stac's oldest), Carter, Kaylee, and Sydney (Dan's oldest)
