Happy Birthday BLUE

Today our little Blue turns 7.  I can't believe that he is that old.  Time has sure flown by.  Blue is our artist and avid Sonic fan.  He loves to draw, read, play video games and tease his sisters.  He is a pretty good helper when he wants to be, and has brought lots of love and fun to our family.

Blue was born with the hiccups.  (He loves that story and wanted me to put that in for you all to read.)

Happy 7th Birthday

Sonic the Hedgehog

Little Boy Blue

Christmas Past . . .

Yes folks, this is how I began my holiday season.  I was NOT in the mood to buy presents, make goodies or make merry in any way.  My family and friends bore with me and FINALLY got into the mood.  We had a nice Christmas at my parents with ALL 6 of my siblings and their families (minus one on a mission).  We had 31 people stuffed into our childhood house.  My parents are getting ready to sale the house so this was our last big get together as a family there.

My dad trying to share a story with 18 of his 19 grandchildren.

Brown opening her Santa gift.

Red with her Santa gift.

Blue and his Wii game from Santa.  SO EXCITED!!

Not too happy.  Yellow was hard to please this year!

The Christmas tree BEFORE the kids got to it.

All lined up waiting for the whistle to blow letting us know that Santa had been to the house.

Today we woke up to a lot of snow.  Green and I spent the day shoveling and snow blowing driveways.

Meet Mario and Princess Peach

Here are Blue and Red all dressed up for your video game pleasure.  I can't believe how creative they are.  Right now they are discussing their dialog.  Great stuff!!!

I'll save you Princess Peach!!

And we're off . . .

Someday my Mario will come!!

I know you'd never believe it, but they pose themselves.  They also get this tendency to dress up from their father!!

Christmas cards

I am not sending out Christmas cards this year.  So if you get on and look at this blog here is our families holiday greeting!!

Our family is wishing your cake doesn't fall,
your tree's not too tall.
That Santa brings you what you need,
health for all the mouths you feed.
A spiritual experience that doesn't include near death
and after it all your sanity has not left.
Merry Christmas

Brown

Red

Blue

Yellow

Our Family 2010

THE Talk

Yes folks, we had to have "THE Talk" at our house.  Brown has been making messes all over the bathroom when it should all be contained in the toilet.  After 4 messes and another one this morning I had had it!!  Green went into help her clean up the mess and she showed him that she had been trying to stand up and go potty like she'd seen her brothers do.  Man alive.  Have to say it was nice to know she didn't have a UTI and even better that I didn't have to explain to her that boys are made different than girls.  No more accidents now that she knows she has to sit.  

Happy Thanksgiving

So here's the story:

There once was a girl from Green River
Who thought she'd cook her own Thanksgiving dinner
She looked at all the web sites and got out all the stuff
She prayed the rolls wouldn't be doughy or the turkey bird too tough.
(I am making this up. Pretty good huh?!?)

Her kids wanted pumpkin pie.
She thought why not give homemade a try.
The pie crust wasn't pretty, the pumpkin a bit chunky
but for love of kiddies hopes it don't taste funky.
(It's getting worse)

The pie is in the oven, the turkey in the brine
If there's a Thanksgiving ghost helping everything should turn out fine.
So hope you bought your dinner, and missed out on all the stress.
Here's to the fact that my Dinner will taste better than the REST!!!


Turkey after 16 hours in brine and then 2 1/2 hours in the oven.



My 1st attempt at a HOMEMADE pumpkin pie.  We grew the pumpkin ourselves.  It was YUMMY!!





Aunt Kaimie came for the morning and helped the kids make a gingerbread train. 

The before.  Look at how happy these kids are.  They were really confused that no one else was eating with us, we usually have 20 or more people over for Thanksgiving.

Kids played in the snow.  It was a wonderful day!!

Let it SNOW

Yippee, snow in the streets, on the trees and on the roof tops.  Today we woke up to 18 inches of the powdery stuff.  Green and I shoveled/snowblowed for quite awhile.  After church we came home and Green put the snow tires on the truck and I made 5 (count 'em 5) loaves of bread.  I LOVE winter.  I wish we could hole up in the house for the remainder of the season, eat yummy food, drink hot chocolate and read good books.  Hope that you are enjoying the snow as much as I am. 

Anyone want to trade a jar of jam for a loaf of bread?

Snow, and LOTS of it.

Happy 40th Birthday

I am trying to include more about my extended family so that when my kids look at this years from now they will know more about their aunts and uncles. 
Today is my brother Michael's 40th birthday!!  I can't believe it.  Michael is several years older than I am  (Ha Ha), but I still have great memories of him.   Mike was such a stud in High School.  I loved to sneak a peek at all the love letters he'd get and watch him bring girls home so we could see what his dates looked like in their prom dresses.  After his mission he and I became much better friends.  I was the first person in our family to meet his future wife.  He would keep me busy on blind dates while Green was on his mission, it was just a really fun time to be Michael's sister.
Mike is a great dad.  I enjoy watching him with his eight kids.  He is one of my very good friends and I am so thankful to be his sister.  


Graduation.  What a cutie!!!



All of Mike's kiddies.

Veteran's Day

Today we went to an assembly to honor our Veteran's.  For the four years we have been attending school here my kids have been trying to get their Uncle Scott to come and participate in the assembly.  Scott is in the United States Marine Corps.   Although he isn't very proud of being a Marine, my sons (and I) are very proud of him and all the people who serve in the military. 
The kids sang songs and read poems about how grateful they are for our veterans.  Needless to say I cried through the WHOLE thing.  Singing our national anthem with the people in my community and school kids was awesome.  I am blessed to live in America and am so thankful to those that give their time, talents and even their lives to ensure my freedoms.
Thank you to Scott, my dad David, my cousin Josh, my uncle Dale and my grandfather Ronal for serving.

My family 'supporting' our Marine. 
(Did you notice I was 'supporting' the most weight?)

  

HallOween

Green and I had a party with some of our friends Friday night while the kiddies went to stay with Aunt Michelle.  We had so much fun.  We also had the elementary school Halloween parade on Friday. Green walked with Blue and his class.  It was fun to see all of the costumes.

 

Carving pumpkins.  Careful with those knives!!!

Are you BLIND Ref!?!?!?!

Say AHHHH  Witch Doctor  Orange

Kamen Rider Dragon Knight Yellow

Sonic the Hedgehog  Blue

Genie Jasmine  Red

Witch  Brown

The Blind leading the Scary
Orange and Green

Hope you all had a Happy Halloween..  I know that we had a fun one and are already looking forward to next year's costumes.

School girl and I Dream of 'Jeannie'

Yesterday Red had her Halloween party for Pre-School.  She was so excited!!  She wanted to be Princess Jasmine, but ended up being a Genie.  (Don't tell her, we'll pretend she's a genie named Jasmine)  We got her all dressed up and even put on make-up.  She had a blast.
Today Brown got all dressed up to go participate in her cousin MaKayla's middle school parenting class.  (I didn't get a picture of them together.)  She wore her 'school uniform' and was glammed up for the big 45 mins of  playing Barbies and coloring.  She also had a blast.  She talked about it the whole ride home.  Have to say I am glad she isn't really going to school.  I don't know what I would do without my little helper.

Magic.



What lovely eyes you have.



Headed to school.

All smiles.  She was ready to go.  I couldn't get her there fast enough. 

Domestic Goddess Extraordinaire

What a busy weekend.  The kiddies and I drove to Idaho Falls this weekend to pick up 120 lbs of chicken.  We arrived Friday night at my sister's house around 8:30 pm, my parents showed up around 9 pm.  My dad was in SO much pain.  They took him to the hospital and found out he has a blood clot in his lung!!  Poor guy.  So now the work of putting culverts in now falls to the capable hands of my brother Scott, my brother - in- law Bryce and me.  I showed up not having a clue what we were going to be doing, but we managed to get all 9 culverts placed before dark!!
My kids had a blast playing at the farm.  They would climb up the haystack and then ride a sled down the side.  I hope they get a lot more opportunities to play at the farm. 
On to the chicken. .. .  I have spent the greater portion of my day making 5 loaves of bread and pressure canning chicken.  Who knew I could be so domestic?  I think I may even scrub a toilet or two.

This is Red and Brown headed back to the farmhouse.  They looked so cute and small.

Brown the 'Beauty Queen' taking a walk while I canned.

Just a small portion of what I did today!!

'END' of an Era

I really find myself amusing!! 
To explain:  We are at the end of an era.  As of a week ago our family said GOOD-BYE to diapers.  Yes folks, Brown is now potty trained!!!! (I 'd add more exclamation points, but that might be called overkill.)
I have been changing diaper NON STOP since Yellow arrived in 2002.  Sometimes I even had two in diapers at once.  (I realize this may not seem like a lot to some people, 'butt' to me it was plenty.)
*So 'addios' Pampers, 'so long' Luvs, 'au revoir' Huggies and 'ciao' Parents Choice.  I hope to never have to buy you (or your adult counter parts) again.*