So here is Hunter's note to Santa sweet and to the point. Here they are waiting to go out and see the tree the next morning. Yuck, sorry bad lighting in those pictures.
This year was so cool with Hunter we really spent a lot of time in Dec. filling it with Christmas activites.
We went to the temple lights, playing in snow, visiting Santa, making S'Mores, reading Christmas stories, watching every Christmas movie, baking all kinds of goodies and so forth.
Hunter was so excited about Santa this year and made a very sweet list for him of things he hoped to get which mostly consisted of Legos. About the last six months he has wanted nothing but to play Legos and this year he was hoping to get some Lego Agents.
The set consists of six "missions" and so for Christmas he recieved Mission #1 and #2. Both of which have led to much secret agent play and "bad guy" evading. I will post on this most recent stage with him later. Including the details on the backpack that he never takes off.
Hunter had a hard time settling in on Christmas Eve and kept thinking that every noise he heard was surely Santa on the roof, and he was bound and determined to catch him as he came down the chimney.
After much convincing that Santa would only come once he was sleeping he finally gave up the fight.
When they woke up the next morning they ran out to the tree and Avery excited exclaimed, "WALL-E mommy!"
She was so excited about her pillow she carried it around all morning. Aren't they CUTE??
She like all of her baby stuff, but her actual favorite thing about Christmas morning was the shoes for her baby doll and the fact that mom let her eat a candy cane for breakfast!!
It was really fun to be with my mom and the girls this Christmas and do some of the traditions that we grew up doing.
Hunter and Avery love Grandma sooooo much and have so much fun getting to go to her house and spend time with her.
It is hard to live what feels like so far away sometimes but we enjoy every minute of our time with her.
One such things was reading the "spider story" it is a very sweet Christmas story that we always read when we were little girls and this year my kids got to read it and we got to make a little spider for our own family. There is a cute but little blurry shot of Hunter's hand putting it on the tree.
We had a great Christmas and are ready for a great new year!!!!
Every year I feel this way, I can't believe another year has come and gone. Each year I can't believe how big they would have been and how we are learning to live happily and patiently without them. 
I marvel at the progress we have made in healing and the faith we have strengthened. Every year we attend the temple to do sealings on their birthday. 
It is such a sweet reminder to us that our family is eternal. Every year Heavenly Father always provides the tender mercy of some sort of spiritual experience at our temple trips. Some I have shared and some I have not because they are so sacred to me. This year as we were going in the temple President came up to us and introduced himself and asked why we had come to the temple tonight. I felt prompted and so I shared with him why we were there and shared a little bit about the twins. He got this tender look in his eyes as he said "I can understand that completely, many years ago we lost twins boys also their names were Shane and Shawn." He in such a tender way that Deke and I can totally understand shared with us their experience. They had lost Shane and Shawn after only a few hours just like us with Ethan and Dylan. He shared with us their experience and added that throughout the course of their life he and his wife often pause and say "I wonder what it would be like if Shane and Shawn were here." As we talked with him my heart burned with a fire that is indescribable with the spirit. I have met people that have lost children before but he is the first person that I have met since losing the boys that has lost twin boys after only a few hours. He could understand us like no one else could that we have met yet, not to mention having such a strong spirit being the temple president. Our conversation with him was so special and spiritual that the fire comes back to me every time I talk about the experience. It was such a tender conversation. I know that Heavenly Father is so aware of Deke and I and our family and sends us these tender mercies. 
Ethan and Dylan would have been four this year. I have seen so much healing this year for us. I felt so much peace this year and only cried when it was time to leave their grave sites. I cry everytime I leave because it always is hard to leave them when it is one of the places that I feel close to them. I feel so calm and peaceful. I miss them and always will and some days are still unbelieveably hard but over all we feel peace and are starting to have more understanding and acceptance. We both feel that it is time to move forward, we have felt that so strong. It doesn't mean forgetting them or not loving them as much, it means being patient and faithful about waiting for them. It means that we need to continue on with our family here and continue to grow and enjoy them growing. We are excited to hopefully expand our family again and feel the joy of a new little life. We love you Ethan and Dylan so much you can't even comprehend. "A moment in our arms, forever in our hearts." Love Mommy and Daddy
So we grabbed the kids some hats and gloves and up the hill we went. We were so sad to see that there was not a lot of snow and it was really icy so it wouldn't even stick together to build a snowman. That didn't stop Hunter from enjoying it though, he jumped right out there and got busy playing. 
Avery picked some up and then quickly giggled and shook it off her hands. She didn't cry about it or anything but she just wanted Deke to hold her and enjoy the snow from a distance. Hunter cracked us up, he picked up two sticks and would sit on his bum and slide down the hills and use the sticks like ski poles to help scoot him down.
Then he would turn around and use the sticks to help him climb back up the hill. Then of course he and Deke had to engage in a snow fight. I could hardly contain myself as he ordered me to follow him. 
He had us hiding behind a tree then when Deke wasn't looking we would dart to the next tree and hide, making our way up the mountain towards Deke who was also tracking us through the forest in a stealth like manner. He was totally serious as if we were actually on some kind of forest mission. Maybe time to start decreasing the "lego agent" play at home. :)
He had us ducking behind a couple of large boulders and kept giving me orders like, "mom head west east to the third tree base" and "I see the target at 29, 58 degrees...go go go!" Once we finally reached Deke at the top of the hill Hunter red in the cheeks giggling quietly with glee at being within range of getting dad and I panting heavily from my recent lack of practice sprinting through the forest and carrying about five stick "guns" we prepared for the attack. 
It was was such a blast, I love my guys and I love the way they make me laugh. There is always something fun to do with those two around. 
It just seemed to fit her. I think that she has those big brown eyes that look up at you.
By the way doesn't she look so grown up in this picture? I am so bummed that she had that little bruise on her forehead...oh well. The other day she was dressed up all cute and I gave her the moo cow, put her up on the bed and took some shots of her playing with it.
Grandma Burch gave her this cute stuffed animal cow one day and she fell instantly in love with it.
Whenever she wanted it, she would wander around the house calling "moooooo, moooooo" it then acquired the oh so creative name of MOO COW.
It is without a doubt her favorite stuffed animal, she sleeps with it every night and drags it around with her every where that we will let her.
One night I was putting her to bed and I took the cows arms and opened them wide and let out a loud moooo in an opera voice with lots of vobrato. 
She laughed so hard she could hardly breathe.
I had her try to do it and she copied my opera mooing sound in her little voice when I opened the cows arms and then stopped when I closed them. Soon it became a silly nighttime ritual which had spread through the family. 
Hunter has tried hard to be inventive with his moo sounds including: "granny moo," "monster moo," "sleep moo" etc. etc. Her affection for this little stuffed cow is really endearing, and it cracks us up.
I wanted to make sure that I recorded this so that I wouldn't forget it... little Missy Moo. 
What is that word you ask? Well if you think about it phonetically then you'll have it. 
The word is AGENT and now here is the story behind it. For about six months now Hunter has developed a love for 
He never ceases to amaze me with the things that he can create with them. I would much rather buy he 
It is so neat to watch him build different vehicles and set them up into various play scenes. Well one day about six months ago we were at Target in the LEGO aisle and he saw the LEGO AGENTS mission series and he was hooked. They consisted of Mission #1-#6 each mission providing more and more excitement agent action. 
We told him that maybe he would get some for Christmas we would have to see. From that point on there was all sorts of secret missions happening around the house and one day he came and handed me that piece of paper. "What is it" I asked him, "Mom, it is your agent card." It cracked me up and it was so cute I had to take a picture of it. 
Needless to say for Christmas he got the first two LEGO missions from Santa including this mission which has alligators with microchips in their heads that lets the bad guy control them by remote. Sweet.
Having a 
