Bring it on, Santa! We're ready for you!

The stockings are hung by the chimney with care....We have cookies, milk, a cutie, and carrots for the reindeer....and even new jammies!
We continued the tradition of the homemade present exchange on Christmas Eve. Chris made Caleb this great blanket (with just a little bit of help from me....he did really well!)

Joshua made Samuel a velcro handball game

Shelby made Joshua an army guy launcher that shoots army guys with a rubber band. Hopefully no one will shoot their eye out!
Savannah made Chris a gingerbread man and a mug.
Mom made Savannah some felt flowers for her hair and put a cute patch on an old pair of jeans. Caleb made Mom a calendar and Samuel made Shelby brown sugar scrub....somehow I didn't end up with pictures of these.... :(So here I am celebrating my first white Christmas in over 10 years! I love it!

Merry Christmas from our house to yours!

The New Car

......in the snowstorm! We have been blessed to have a company car as one of the perks of Chris' job. In the past we have had mini-vans and cross-overs, but they have been big enough to carry our family, which has been an incredible blessing. We were so sad to hear that the largest cars available this year would only seat five people. So no more free road trips for us unless we leave 2 people home! Chris and I are both incredibly conservative and have always gotten a tan, silver or gold car, with the exception of one year when we went out on a limb and got a *gasp* green van. Well, this year we have really done it! I said "Why don't we try red?" thinking of the pretty burgandy color I had seen when I was out driving that day. When Chris went to pick up the car, it was RED, I mean REALLY RED!!!

So we are feeling a bit obtrusive when we drive down the street now! It will take some getting used to!

Flat Stanley, Orchestra, and SNOW!!!

He's BAAaaack!!!After a fun trip to Oregon to visit family, Samuel's Flat Stanley got back just in time to join us for the Flat Stanley Gallery Exhibit at school. The invitation said "semi-formal" dress, but Samuel assured me that his teacher said they could just come in school clothes......we were the only ones dressed casually! :O)
That's okay though, we still had a GREAT time! Christmas cookies AND a chance to show off Flat Stanley's scrapbook....PRICELESS!


Then we were off to Caleb's first orchestra concert. This was a first for me as I have never attended an orchestra concert of any kind. Caleb attends the Governor's School for the Arts, so their orchestra is very good. I really did not know what to expect, and I very quickly learned that it is an entirely different crowd that attends orchestra concerts! We have only experienced band concerts where they play very loud 2-3 minute pieces and my kids can wiggle and talk and even dance in the aisles without upsetting anyone! This is definitely not acceptable behavior at orchestra concerts.....the kids were really very good, but I still got several dirty looks when Samuel could not seem to hold still!

Caleb is seated in the back row on the left hand side. He is playing his clarinet in this picture.

Here he is in the musician's uniform!


Here is a very bad video from the concert.....perhaps you could just close your eyes and listen! It kept going in and out of focus and I was never able to get a closeup on Caleb.

Last night a major snowstorm hit and we now have 8 inches and counting!

I LOVE IT!!!

The bad news is that I sprained my ankle a few weeks ago and it has never fully recovered....as a matter of fact, I re-injured it a few days ago and it is really unstable, so I have been unable to go out and play in the snow. SO depressing!

I have been sitting in my house, snapping pictures out the window, baking cinnamon rolls and making soup! I am not minding being snowed in at all!

With temperatures next week supposed to be around freezing and below, this white stuff may stick around long enough for me to have a White Christmas for the first time since I moved away from Utah!

Swim Champs

Our super swimmers had a successful weekend at YMCA swim champs! Samuel competed in the AAAA division and took 1st in backstroke and 2nd in breaststroke and freestyle. Joshua got his first ever medals and was THRILLED! Joshua competed in the C division and he took 2nd in backstroke and 3rd in breaststroke!

Way to go boys!!!

Ward Christmas Party

My sweet little singing boy, Joshua, was asked to sing in a group at our ward Christmas party last night. He did a beautiful job and I was so proud of him! He reminds me a little bit of my brother Glen when he was younger....

Lots of updates today, and rather than making them into one huge post, I have done them each individually below, so read on!

Muffins for Mom

Joshua and Samuel's school did their yearly "muffins for mom" breakfast on Friday. I had a fun going with my two boys, but Savannah had to tag along because it was early in the morning before school. She was our official photographer and was pretty proud of herself for taking this picture!

Fruit and Veggie Derby

Samuel's class capped off their unit on simple machines with a fruit and veggie derby. Their task was to build cars out of a total of 3 fruits/vegetables, skewers and rubber bands and then race them down an inclined plan to see which car went the furthest distance.

After the first race, the kids got to reconfigure their cars and see if they could make it better. Here is Samuel's best race.....

Unfortunately, it was not as successful as he would have liked, but he had a fun time building a car!

Twas the Night Before Christmas......

In spite of a very sprained ankle, I was able to take Savannah to attend our first ballet performance. Her dance studio puts on "The Night Before Christmas" every year downtown. I was worried about being able to get from the parking deck to the theater, so my friend let me borrow some crutches rather than just not going.We were SO glad we went!

Here is Lindsey, one of Savannah's friends from our neighborhood. Savannah thought she was the most beautiful dancer on the stage!

I was worried that Savannah would be bored, but she stayed entranced through the entire 1 1/2 hour performance. She even got to go backstage with some friends from our neighborhood and loved seeing all the costumes and makeup room. It was a fun night out for both of us!

Sixteen Candles

Amidst fevers and mono, Shelby celebrated her 16th birthday! Unfortunately for her, she missed 4 candles so her wish won't come true ;)!Mom decided she was finally old enough to get a Seventeen magazine subscription, so now she can stop sneaking it from the library.....And she got a much admired leather jacket, some boots, a flat iron and some money to spend.Sadly, she had been pretty sick ever since and hasn't had a chance to go out on her first REAL date.....since the one with dad didn't really count in her book!

On Being GOOD....

Some children are born with just a little bit more mischief in them than others! While deep down inside, they really want to be good, life is just so enticing! Natural curiosity seems to get the better of them more often than not......and that often leads to getting in trouble! My 9 year old Samuel is one of those children.

He has spent his life learning how to BE GOOD, how to TAKE TURNS, and how NOT TO BREAK THINGS! It has been a learning experience for him AND for me as his mother! So the following conversation had extra significance when Samuel and I were talking in the car yesterday....

Samuel: I can't wait for Christmas!

Me: Why not? You must think you've been extra good this year.

Samuel: Well Mom, I think this is MY BEST YEAR SO FAR!!!!

Not only did I have to laugh, but I had to agree with him! Samuel, this absolutely IS your BEST YEAR SO FAR! I love you and I am so glad that I have been able to be your mom. Your joy, excitement and zest for life can always make me smile! If that means a few broken windows, dishes and beds along the way, I will take the good with the bad and love you even more!

Sweet Sixteen TOMMOROW!!!

So tonight's the first date.....with dad, of course!

Leaves, Leaves, Leaves......

Poor Chris! Do you know how many times our yard has looked like this so far this fall? He spends his evenings and weekends raking leaves only to have it look just the same the next day! We are going green this year and mulching our leaves, then using the mulch under our bushes and in the natural areas. Of course that requires lots of running over them with the gas powered lawn mower, so I don't know how green we are really going! But at least we are keeping them out of the landfill!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Sending thankful wishes from our house to yours, courtesy of our own little Indian, Starry Sky!

Isn't Kindergarten fun?!!!

He's Got Rhythm

Last week was the 5th grade program and Joshua has been talking about it for weeks! He is my first boy who LOVES singing! He walks around the house singing the songs and was so excited when he was selected to play the xylophone in the program.

We have EIGHT 5th grade classes at our school, so they had to split them into two groups for the performance or there wouldn't have been enough parking available! I didn't realize until they so graciously informed us that they would be Joshua's last elementary school program. I got a little misty-eyed and swallowed down the lump in my throat.....who gave these kids permission to grow up anyway? :)

Here's a video of Joshua rockin' out to the pinata song.....so cute!

A Model Citizen

For the third year in a row, Joshua has been recognized for his citizenship. Each quarter, the teacher is asked to select two students from her class that best exemplify the core values. Joshua was selected and we attended an award ceremony at his school. If you look closely, you can see him 3rd from the right. (I did take better pictures, but they gave away too much identifying information and I am a bit wary about the internet :)

Afterwards we went to McDonald's to celebrate the citizenship award and STRAIGHT A's for the first time since Joshua went into the program at the gifted school. They really make the kids WORK for their grades there and they spend alot of time talking to the kids when they come in about not getting discouraged because in K-2 these kids all got straight A's and in the gifted school, not very many of them do. This is Joshua's 3rd year in the program and it has taken him this long to reach this milestone, so he was VERY excited (this picture doesn't really show it, but I promise, he WAS excited!)Congratulations Joshua!

We are so proud of you!

Faith and Our Founding Fathers

Remember how I said that I really wished I would have lived in colonial times? Well, I had the unique opportunity today to be an extra in a PBS documentary called "Faith and Our Founding Fathers". The portion I was in was filmed in Colonial Williamsburg. My call time was very early this morning, so I had to leave home at 3:15 am......not something I would want to do on a regular basis! After getting my costume and visiting hair and makeup, this is what I looked like.

I was officially a "street person" and was one of the lower class peasants or servants. I have never been on any kind of a movie set while they were filming, so it was a fun experience to see how things were done. We had to be ready to film as soon as the sun came up, so the children were practicing their part while the director, Lee Groberg, watches in the background. He is an incredibly kind and gracious director and I couldn't get over how complimentary he was to everyone who worked with him. There was never any yelling and there was always lots of praise to go around.

These two cute kids are in my ward. Their dad worked on the production crew, so they were assigned children's parts. I LOVED the little girl's costume!

It started misting right before the sun came up. I didn't even realize it till I took this picture and it looked like it was snowing! Fortunately, it stopped pretty quickly and didn't develop into rain.

Here is the black preacher practicing his part before the sun came up.

It was fun to see all the diversity in costumes. I kept stopping people and asking to take their pictures! The incredibly cool costumes of the fine ladies made me wish I wasn't just a poor servant!I absolutely loved this lady's hat and jacket! Isn't it so cool?!!!

And here they are, filming at last! I think we had been on the set for 2 1/2 hours at this point.

Mark Mabry was there taking pictures for a companion photo book that will come out when the movie comes to PBS. You may know him from his "Reflections of Christ" photo exhibit.

We had a time schedule to keep; we had to be out of Colonial Williamsburg by 9 a.m. when it opened to the public. We filmed right up to the last second and they told us all to be ready to grab our stuff and RUN as soon as they said "CUT"! It was hilarious to see everyone running as fast as they could holding onto hats and props! It was pretty cool to see how quickly the film crew could move their stuff out of there!

All in all, it was a fun experience. I was in several scenes that may or may not end up in the movie. You might see me in the background washing windows, walking, putting coins in a collection plate, watching a preacher speak, or standing outside a factory listening to young boy read the newspaper. It will probably be at least a year before this movie is shown.

Oh, and I made $75 for my few hours of work, so I spent the rest of the morning at the outlet stores before I had to be home to get my kids from their bus stops!

Birthday Time!

November is a big birthday month around our household! So far we have celebrated two birthdays!

Savannah turned SIX....and Samuel turned NINE!

It was Samuel's year to celebrate with a family party. His favorite present was this Wii game....

I might have to put him to work in my kitchen now!

Savannah got to have a dress-up party with all of her friends! According to her, it was the best day of her life!