Thanksgiving highlights

We were lucky enough to spend the whole week of Thanksgiving in Utah. We had a great time and even made a last minute impromptu visit to the Van De Graaffs in Boise. After we had sufficiently drooled, oooohed & ahhhed, and explored every inch of their amazing new house, we played with cousins until we were exhausted, and headed back to Utah 24 hours later.

Other highlights of the week included a visit with Ashley at BYU for lunch at the cougareat and shopping at the bookstore, snow storm and snowmen building, awesome food for the big day, and participating in the 2nd annual TURKEY SHOOT, a visit with grandpa Anderson, hanging with G'ma Karyl and G'pa Boyd, a visit to the TREEHOUSE Museum and going out to dinner with family.

And one very important event not to be clumped with any of the others: Jared and I went to the BYU vs. U of U game and watched the Cougars pull it off in over time!! Such a great game and fun time!!

A few pictures:
The beautiful morning after the snow storm

SOOOO fun
Hanna looked adorable on Thanksgiving Day
The Turkey shoot chearleader
The boys being boys
Our Indian performance

The spread
cutie one year olds- Cole and Maylan
Cole and Grandpa Boyd ruff housin'
Grandpa Anderson or the "dum dum" Grandpa who always gives us suckers

Christmas Photo Shoot

Downtown Ogden provided a fun background for this year's Christmas Photo shoot. The kids were great mostly....except for Cole who thought it was fun to pull everyone's hair. He also got grumpy because it was sooo COLD for us desert dwellers and cried on and off. I love my family!

My First Sprint Triathlon

It was a gorgeous crisp day--perfect weather
Amber, Jen and I--I admire these ladies so much for their determination

In an effort to have motivation to work out, I decided about 4 months ago to train for a triathlon with my friend Jen. She has done two others and really loves it. I have swam farther, ran greater distances, and cycled harder than I ever have in my entire life training for this event. The past 10 years of child bearing have defintely taken a toll on my physique so its going to take even more discipline and more determination to get to the level I want to be, but I'm up to the challenge.

I learned a lot while training and competing in this event. At one point of the bicycle portion I was feeling tired and overwhelmed. What helped me to continue and push through was remembering what a blessing it is to be out there. A blessing which at any given time could be taken away. Thoughts of my Uncle Gary who recently fell off a roof and broke his back and is now paralyzed kept flooding to my mind. I'm so grateful to be able to exercise and to have a healthy body and to have competed in this event. A special thank you to Jen who is positive and encouraging and helped me to accomplish this.

Aspen, Nedra, Hanna, and Mitchell--we need more friends to join us in April

I'm grateful to my little girl who is always willing to try something new and competed in the kids division. She did an amazing job. I was so proud of her. Jake and Carter will be joining her and I in April when we go back to St. George and do it again and try to improve our times.

My time was 1 hour and 37 minutes and Hanna's was 27 minutes. The Sprint for me included the following distances: 8 laps or 16 length swim, 10 mile bike ride, and 3mile run. Hanna's was 2 lengths swim, 1 mile bike ride, and 1/2 mile run.

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Thankful boxes

I'm addicted to making these cute boxes. My Halloween countdown ones are pictured on my creative blog. My cute friend Kristen found this idea for a Thanksgiving countdown. I liked the idea of no candy involoved after Halloween and all!! I decided to use the box idea again, but this time no round ones or oval. I bought all square.....a quick job for the paper cutter. I really like it. Turns out that scrapbooking is way more enjoyable when you don't have to use pictures!
Each day has a little paper with something to be thankful for and an assignment to write about in their Thanksgiving journals. (I just bought little 5x7 ish sized notebooks). My friend Jen wanted me to send them to her, so here are my ideas if anyone is interested for their kids as well. I like it because we can focus on gratitude all month.

1. I am thankful for my eyes –write about 5 things that you love to see in your life right now


2. I am thankful for my mom and dad—write about something special you have done recently with mom and dad or something you love about them


3. I am thankful for my siblings—write about 3 things you love to do with your siblings


4. I am thankful for my house—write about your favorite room in our house and what you like about it


5. I am thankful for our cars—write about where you sit in the car right now and your favorite things about our car


6. I am thankful for my toys—write about 5 of your favorite things to play with this year


7. I am thankful for my family—write about 2 things you like to do with our whole family


8. I am thankful for my grandparents—write something you like about each grandparent


9. I am thankful for my ears—write about three of your favorite music groups, songs, or instruments right now


10. I am thankful for my school—write about some cool things you like about this school year


11. I am thankful for food—write about 5 of your favorite things to eat


12. I am thankful for friends—write about 3 friends you like to hang out with and what you do with them


13. I am thankful for my healthy body—write about 3 things you like to do for exercise


14. I am thankful for my cousins—write about a memory you’ve had this year with at least one of your cousins


15. I am thankful for church—write about your primary class, singing time, or the primary program


16. I am thankful for money—write about what you would buy if you had $100 dollars given to you today


17. I am thankful for Christ—write about why Christ is important to you


18. I am thankful for my testimony—write about your testimony and the things you believe to be true


19. I am thankful for my future—write about what you think you will be doing in 10 years…..

20. I am thankful for vacations—write about somewhere you would like to go with our family on a vacation


21. I am thankful for holidays—write about 2 of your favorite days we celebrate every year


22. I am thankful for talents—write about 5 talents you have


23. I am thankful for sports—write about your favorite sport to play and to watch


24. I am thankful for Thanksgiving day—write about your top three favorite foods to eat on Thanksgiving day

Aynsley Kay

Missy came over today and I got to take pictures of Aynsley for her 6 month birthday! What a cutie....both of them:) Check out my photography blog to see some of the best ones.

Halloween for the kids

Our good friends the Johnsons did a cowboy theme last year for Halloween. I couldn't resist the cute idea and talked my kids into it. Hanna has wanted to be a cowgirl for years so it wasn't too hard! Carter doesn't like to conform and has his very own ideas about everything. His knight costume turned out really cool and fit his personality!
Mr. Cole's favorite part about being a cowboy was taking off his hat and crawling around in the hay at the barn
Josh loved having a weapon, hat, boots, vest....such a cutie and so easy to please!
Jake loved having a cowboy duster long jacket. His gun was fun too and he got to wear Daddy's real cowboy hat.
Hanna loves horses so her favorite part was visiting this barn to take pictures and seeing horses! And she just plain loves getting her picture taken. She loved being able to wear spider earrings for Halloween this year.

Carter was so excited for his costume to get here in the mail. It took too long in his opinion, but he was pretty excited when it finally came. Carter loves to be very dark, scary things for Halloween. Mom and Dad said no this year and let him pick as long as we approved. He poured over the websites and found this knight costume all on his own and it turned out really cool. The sword, shield and skeleton belt looked awesome! When I was taking this photo while all the big kids were trick-or-treating, Joshy was behind me saying "Say Cheese, Pumpkins", "Say Cheese!" I get a kick out of that boy!

Grown ups playing dress up

Our friends the Allreds (aka Wendy and Colonel Sanders)and the Taylors (see below) pulled together and threw an awesome Halloween Part-ay for the grown ups. I have to say, we have met a lot of fun couples here and really laugh a lot when we get together! We had a soup contest, costume contest, donut eating contest, icey spider toe race, and the infamous: act out your costume in 5 seconds or less performances. Way fun party Allreds, we are so happy to have you right next door!
All the costumes were surprises! Here we are in all of our Roman Gladiator and Empress splendor!
This was the donut eating contest. This is also the funniest picture from the whole night! Thanks you Melissa for capturing this very special moment in my husband's life. I laugh every time I see it.... its only half the story. At one point they almost kissed trying to eat these donuts.

More awesome costumes:
Black Beard and his Wench
Audrey Hepburn and Elvis resurrected
Dirty Doctor and Knocked-up Nurse
Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin swung by to campaign this was defintiely my favorite costumes the whole night!
Mr. Staypuff and the Ghost Buster
Whoopie d0-do and his right hand lady
The Mobsters getting back to their Las Vegas Roots: Sticky Fingers, Boopsie, and The Needle
Roll Reversal.....she announced she's expecting at the party!!
Jack and Jill with broken crowns
Ms. CSI and her Knock-out of a husband
Bishop and his wife: Medusa and the Stone Man
A 1970's cop and Amelia Earhart

A "real" Pumpkin Patch

I couldn't do it again this year. Take my kids to the one Pumpkin Patch in town that produces pumpkins the size of grapefruits and is barren by October 2nd. Not to mention the fact that it is still 85-90 degrees and sooo hot still (not at all like the crisp fall atmosphere you hope for). Living in Las Vegas has its perks, but Pumpkin Patches is not one of them. I was determined to drive however far I needed to, to make this a fun experience for my children. Lest they think pumpkin's grow in cement parking lots which is the other option Vegas provides: parking lot carnival rides with over priced pre picked pumpkins on a hay bale. In my research, I hit the jackpot! I found an awesome Pumpkin Patch in St. George only a short hour and a half away. We had a random day off from school early in October so I planned a field trip, called all the moms of our friends and invited them to go with us, packed the car with snacks and water bottles, found the Halloween t-shirts, laid them out and went to bed. To make a long story longer.....Carter woke up sick the next morning with a fever. No matter what I tried he wouldn't get off the couch. I gave him drugs and hoped we could join the other moms and kids late, it was a no go, all of our friends went without us!! We had to reschedule...lucky for us Grandma and Grandpa were coming to town the next weekend, so we got to enjoy the farm with them and Daddy got to come along this way too!
This was a huge mattress that the kids would jump down to and try to jump up on the other side
Carter must have been having fun, he let me take a picture! These swings were sooo tall. I've never seen any swing set taller than this one.
Joshy scared to death of this lamb.... or is it an ugly duckling??
When the lady on the phone was describing to me what they had she finally just said "were just a bunch of hicks and we have constructed some redneck rides for kids that are fun" I loved everything they had and so did my kiddos
The tractor train ride. The kids got to ride in these barrels and get pulled around the farm roads
My most grown up kid!
Sweetie boy
Grandma and Grandpa at the Pumpkin Patch