This week!

When you send out a request for snow, you just might get what you ask for and WOW! My kids had a blast spinning around on the 4-wheelers. I always get nervous since Sean rolled one in August, resulting in a very scary trip to the ER.

Emma, Alex, & Haili

I walked out to get pics of the kids and when I turned around I felt like I was looking at a giant Gingerbread house! Just missing the colorful candy.

Here is Alex and Emma trying to run over Haili...I swear my boys life-long goal is to give their mother a heart attack!


Alex got some serious spins going.

Sean had fun making and throwing snowballs at everyone!

Monday afternoon I get a call from the girls school that I should attend the Tuesday assembly. I had no idea why, but I grabbed my camera just in case and headed over to the school. It turns out that Haili had entered two paintings in the Reflection contest and she won one of them and got an honorable mention for the other. So I was all proud and snapped some pictures of her. I was about to leave, but decided to stay and to my even bigger surprise Emma had entered a story and won an honorable mention as well. The girls won tickets to the Hale theater and Clarke Planetarium. They were so excited!

Emma accepting her ribbon and tickets

Haili getting her medal and tickets

Thursday was the school program, so Scot and I went over to watch. I have to admit that it was a far cry from Ivy Hall's AMAZING Christmas programs, but the girls looked cute and we enjoyed it anyway.

Emma is on the front row to the right of the girl with the green shirt.

Haili is right in the middle of this picture.

Christmas Dance Recital

The girls did such a great job on their dance for the Christmas recital. We just love to watch these girls dance and improve each year.

Haili was not too happy about this costume, but on stage it was way cute and fit the dance perfect! She is so girly that anything that looks like it might be for a boy makes her crazy.

Emma was walking around backstage pretending to be a chicken with all her feathers on her behind (silly girl).

My camera's batteries died just as I was trying to take pictures of their dancing....darn! I swear every dance recital either my video camera has low batteries or my digital does. I've got to get better at checking these things.

Sooooo, I've signed up for the adult Jazz and Zumba classes starting in January at my girls studio. It has been 20 years since I danced and I'm a little nervous!

Sean overheard me telling someone what I was doing and said, "Moms should not take Dance lessons, that is just weird!"

Here I was thinking I was doing something so cool that all the other moms of teenagers probably aren't doing, but no I was so wrong!

Oh well, I'm still going to do it and maybe I'll even practice in the basement while he is practicing his drums...ha ha ha ha....that will teach him!

Emma's Baptism

Emma was Baptized Saturday, December 6, 2008

She has been looking forward to this day for several months, learning all she could about what it means to be baptized. I was so fortunate (ha ha) to give the talk at the Stake Baptism. Emma had a large group of aunts, uncles, cousins, Grandparents, and friends there to watch her. It was a very special day!

My Father-in-law made it home just in time for the Baptism. We were so glad he did!

Emma is such a little sweet heart and I just love her to bits!

Here is a group picture of some of Emma's cousins. She has 7 more cousins

that were not able to make it. Are family is growing:)

After the Baptism, we headed over to our house for brunch. Scot made his to die for whole wheat/flax waffles with homemade blueberry syrup mmmmmmm! We also had fruit, sausage, and bacon. It was a little chaotic with so many people, but we made it work.

I swear Sean never takes a break from his cubes!!!!

Look, he has Jordan starting it now...good grief!

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving at my sister's house with her family this year. It was my niece's 2nd Birthday, so we celebrated Wednesday night. Every time she would open a present she would hold it up to her and say, "Oh cuuuute". It was too cute!

The girls really got into their "Gingerbread whatever"! They made trains, houses, and filled their board with lots of candy!

Mmmmm....I just want to eat it!

Working ever so carefully!

Scot and I really love spending time with family and we are very grateful to have such a wonderful extended family.

Ahhh...We miss this! She just crawled up on Scot's lap. He kinda liked that!



My dad and step mom came for dinner, then stayed to play games. My brother drove up also, so we ended up with 14 people for dinner. Notice my Dad's mustache:) He grows some kind of weird facial hair every year at this time because he travels and plays keyboard with the Bar J Wranglers. Check them out, they are coming to town in a couple of weeks!

Sean recorded this from his phone last year...very shaky. This doesn't do the show justice so you'll just have to see it live. It is great for the whole family. My kids Loooove it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8N2YFYNKCOs

Bar J Wranglers will be performing at the Utah Valley University McKay Events Center in Orem on December 17 at 7:30 pm. Tickets are $10 http://www.smithstix.com/

Emma LOVES to put puzzles together and she was so excited for Grandma to help her.

My SINGLE brother was just hanging out with Emma patiently waiting for the turkey to get done. Does anybody else feel like they are ALWAYS waiting on the turkey? Seriously, why does is seem to be cooking fast the first couple of hours, then you turn the oven down just a bit and it seems to take forever!!!!

My adorable and HILARIOUS nephew keeps us fully entertained with his never ending energy.

The guys went 4-wheeling Saturday and even ran into some snow. They saw 3 Moose!!!!! It was cold, but they had a great time.

I didn't take any pictures of crazy "Black Friday", as I was way too busy trying to protect myself against the crowds while grabbing a much needed Christmas present! My sister and I braved the cold, crowds, and craziness by venturing out at 4:00 A.M. to get all our Christmas shopping done. By 10:30 A.M. we had accomplished that, including fillers and stocking stuffers! My only issue was trying to get everything home and hidden! It was challenging, but we made it.