Merry Christmas 2010

Christmas Eve

Ethan, Bella and Lexy on Christmas Eve. (Austin was asleep for much of the night)

Christmas Eve was spent at Uncle David and Aunt Laura's house. They made a yummy mexican dinner for us and Grandma and Grandpa Gengler. We watched the Gengler Favorite Christmas movie- "Christmas Vacation" and played some games. The night ended with Ethan's Wonderful reading of "The Night Before Christmas" and Ashley's reading of Christ's birth from the Old Testament.

Lexy, Hailey, Bella, Ashley, Courtney and Ethan

Merry Christmas- 2010

Christmas Morning

Austin's first Christmas!

Bella with her doll set! She was in heaven!


Lexy with her coveted Easy Bake! Her first cake was baked the very next day.


Ethan with his new Lego toys. He had them assembled the very next day as well!

A Halloween Blessing

October 31, 2010

Austin's Blessing Day

Isn't he a handsome boy!

Austin was so good during his blessing. He didn't make a peep. But as you can tell from the picture, he was not very happy when we got home for pictures!!

As you can tell, it's going to take us a while to get everybody looking decent for a family picture!!It's such an event.

Our Baby Brother

Lexy, Ethan, Bella and Austin

August 2010

Bella loves being a BIG sister!

Ethan loves having a BROTHER!

Lexy loves helping to take care of a LITTLE brother!

The kids could not be more excited to have Austin here. They ALL love him! They are always wanting to hold him. For some reason, I can't get any of them to change his diaper though!! Everybody says he looks like Ethan. I think he has his own look. It looks like he will follow Lexy with the brown eyes though. Now we have a child with green eyes, blue eyes and two with brown eyes. What a mix!

Austin Christopher Rico

On Thursday, August 5, 2010 we were blessed with our 4th baby! At 5:22 pm, Austin Christopher Rico was born. A couple of weeks before, we had set an induction date with my doctor for Austin to be born on 8-9-10. Like all of my other children, I figured that I would have to be induced with this one as well. But being that we planned this baby to be our last, we thought it would be so fun to go on my own. We tried everything under the sun that people had told us would put me into labor. Nothing seemed to work. A week earlier, I had my doctor strip my membranes. I went home that day and did some weeding, took two walks, and anything else that might get me going... it didn't work. On Thursday, August 5, I got up and started getting myself ready for my last doctor's appointment. I was hoping that the doctor would try again as one last attempt to put me into labor. About 10 am that morning, I was sitting on the couch next to Tony as I felt as though I had peed my pants! I stood up real quick, trying not to make a mess on the couch! As I stood up, A LOT more "stuff" gushed out of me. I looked at Tony and said "Tony, my water just broke!" He yelled back, "Well go to the bathroom!" (Love the support!) After washing up, and taking care of the kids, we were off to the hospital. Tony said on the way to the hospital that this was way more exciting than being induced! We arrived just after 11 am. I love how they confirm that it was your water that actually broke! They asked me, "Are you sure it was your water?" My response was "Ah, yeah. I had no control over the gush that fell out of me!" They set us up and we were ready to go. Everything was great. After being there for about an hour and a half I got my epidural. I went from a 3, to a 6, to an 8, and then a 10. By 5 pm I was ready to go. It took the doctor a couple of minutes to get himself ready, and after only about 10 minutes of pushing, Austin was here. Austin weighed 8 lbs even, and was 20 in long. The day was perfect! We are so excited to have Austin in our home. He is so stinkin' cute! His big brother and sisters absolutely love him! Like all of my other kids, he had to lay under the lights for jaundice. I hate that.

Happy Birthday Tony

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TONY!!

I realized that I did not take any pictures during Tony's birthday this year... sorry! So I decided to use recent pics he's taken with the kids. He is such a great dad and a wonderful husband. It was so fun to celebrate him for a day. We all went shopping for some shoes that he wanted and then went out to lunch. That night, he and I got to go to dinner without the kids. We love you Daddy!

Our Fabulous 5 Year Old

Happy Birthday Lexy!

My Big Girl has turned 5! Lexy was so excited to turn 5 because she knew that it meant she would go to Kindergarten soon. It took a long time for her birthday to get here also because she had to endure Bella's birthday and Ethan's birthday all within about 6 weeks before her birthday. She was in agony waiting for her turn! We love Lexy so much. She has so much personality and enthusiasm.

Lexy learned how to ride a 2 wheeler a couple of months before her birthday. She started to look really silly on that little bike! She does a great job now on the big bike that should last her a while.

Lexy decided to go to the Legacy Center for some swimming for her birthday! The kids had a blast. With their birthday money, the kids bought snorkling gear. It was too cute!

I love this picture. It looks like Lexy is giving me an attitude, talking back to me with the tube in her mouth!! That would be Lexy!!! But really, she was just posing for me.

Being that I am 7 months pregnant, I chose to sit out on the swimming. And for some reason, so did Bella. For the first 2 hours, this was her sitting next to me. When we finally got her in the water, she screamed her head off when it was time to go because she didn't want to get out! Typical 2 year old!

Notice Ethan who can hold his breath entering the water and Lexy who is plugging her nose still. I'm just proud of her for going down by herself when she can't even swim!! Don't worry, Tony was there to grab her!

Congratulations Ashley

Congratulations Ashley!! We are so proud of you.

Ashley is the first cousin to graduate high school. She is such a smarty pants too! She graduated from Alta High School and will be going to BYU in the fall. She should finish there in about 2 years before she plans to go on to Law School. She has set such a great example for the rest of the cousins. Good Job Ash! We love you!

The proud family

After the graduation, we talked to the kids about what it means to graduate and how hard Ashley worked to do so well in school. I asked Lexy if she wanted to be just like her cousins... she said yes, just as pretty and smart! I hope so:))