Last

It was the last Sunday of the year, for those of you that haven't looked at a calendar in a while. I wrapped up my Primary class with a trip down memory lane and we watched Mr. Krueger's Christmas. I brought my Target popcorn buckets and we watched the movie on the laptop. For the last lesson of the year, it was a nice one to end with.

I did find out that I will have 9-11 girls this next year. I know that may not seem like many (no comment Sherri, Debbie, Tia) but that's double, nearly triple the numbers I had this year. I will have to be more creative with birthdays, handouts, and treats (known allergies). AND....we're studying the Old Testament! Admittedly, that's at the bottom of my favorites list.

So, what do I have going through my head lately?

Begin as you mean to go on.

Aim high.

Be the best you can be.

Think of all your motivational quotes and share.

Day After

Saturday is a good day to have after Christmas. I was able to get some stuff done, but I know that I have a "day of rest" tomorrow. I guess that means that the Christmas decorations are going to stay up until Monday.

I dropped Jack off at a friends house for a couple hours and headed to Target to get a few things for my lesson tomorrow. Target wasn't as crazy as I thought it would be, although the Christmas area was a bit crowded with most of the stuff @ 50%. I wonder how much stuff will make it to 75% off. That's my favorite kind of shopping.

Merry Christmas

It's 6 AM. I wonder how long until we can all take Christmas naps?

Wedding Bells

I just took a whirlwind of a trip to Seattle to enjoy the nuptials of Nathan (my nephew) and Rebekah. I was just a tad bit nervous that I'd been asked to take pictures, but I think that we got some beautiful shots. Shockingly, the weather DID NOT cooperate and we had a cold drizzly day. Rebekah was so in love that she didn't mind the rain. I think all the kissing kept them warm in the rain.

Gold shoes...brilliant choice!

A Nathan among Nathans. (there were four Nathans)

Nathan was a trooper and held this very heavy mirror to get this shot.

Will not forget the date!

Such a fun wedding and reception. I promise to edit and share as quick as possible, Christmas seems to be taking up this week.

10

Jack turns 10 today. That's totally like a whole decade old. I'm in awe at how fast and how slow that time has flown by. So For Jack, I honor him with his own Top Ten List;

Ten things to do on your 10th Birthday
10. Eat donuts for breakfast
9. Lounge around in pjs until noon
8. Watch as many cartoons as possible
7. Play on the computer as long as possible
6. Pick out your first snowboard
5. Invite a friend over for sleepover
4. Eat favorite fast food burgers for dinner
3. Blow out 10(ish) candles on lemon cake
2. Open presents
1. Play with Legos

Phone Sewing

I should know better than to try and sew and talk on the phone. I sewed myself into a corner, forgetting to leave an opening to turn the baby blanket right side out. Of course I couldn't find my seam ripper, I'm sure it's in the "to be found when not needed" pile. Luckily, I've done this before and know how to fix a rookie mistake like that. In the end the blanket turned out cute. I was making it for our Relief Society Humanitarian newborn kits. If only I could get motivated to sew something for my girls.

Brrrr

When I woke up this morning it was a bit chilly in the house. The heater is SUPPOSED to turn on about 6 am and warm up the house. Well, the upstairs heater was on and running but it couldn't quite warm up the downstairs. It was 58 degrees downstairs. I'd like to say that my blood was gotten a little thicker while living in a cold climate, but I'm not sure that's true. After a bit of futzing around with the thermostat, we determined that the problem was the heater itself. I'm starting to envisage a call to a repair place, an exorbitant fix it bill,...you know where this is headed.

Michael takes a look at the heater. Flips a switch, flips it back. Presto, we have heat. Thank goodness we got that sorted out, tonight we're expected to get down to single digit temperatures.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

I'm still in my pjs, watching the Macy's parade, and dinner is shaping up. This is going to be a GREAT day. I hope everyone else has a healthy happy Thanksgiving.

Pie

I like Thanksgiving just fine. Dinner is pretty good if you eat at a reasonable hour to ensure that there will be room for dessert. And maybe even dessert after dessert. Tomorrow we'll hopefully eat around 2 pm. I'm saving room for pie.

Ice Ice Baby

Out of desperation for entertainment, I took the kids ice skating. Last year we went once and it was opening day. I vowed not to go back, especially since I went around the rink once with Lily screaming her head off. We took a chance that it wouldn't be crowded today and we lucked out. Lily found her friend and actually made it around the rink MULTIPLE times without crying. She did get tired and hungry by the time we left and there were tears and threats, BUT it wasn't on the ice.

Lily and Rowan take on the ice.

Jack trying to dodge a picture.

Future Olympic Skater.

Insanity

I went shoe shopping and swimming with the kids in one day. The days that Michael has class at night tend to be long days with the kids. I figured that since it was already going to be a long day, why not go all the way over the edge of insanity and take the kids swimming.

The good news is that I think I exhausted the kids and they put themselves to bed. The phone rang just as I was about to herd them upstairs and about 20 minutes later it dawned on me that it was awfully quiet. Lily had fallen asleep with Emma reading to her. Jack and Emma were quietly reading. When does that ever happen?!

X Marks The Spot

Have you ever taught something that you know NOTHING about? I tried to assist 7 eight and nine year old girls how to cross stitch. Not really a craft that I want to pick up, but we (the other leader and myself) figured that it would be a good activity for the girls.

We thought ahead at the last activity and had an "expert" come and teach the girls. It works out well when you get to sit back and watch the expert. When it came time for the girls to try their hand at cross stitch, there were lots of tears and a bit of frustration..on the girl's part. We decided to try again this week and "hope" that it would be a better experience.

It did turn out better. There were no tears. That's a win in my book.

Goal Oriented

I seem to have missed the first half of this month and it's seriously bumming me out. I made a ridiculous goal of trying to blog more than I did last year. Ok, not ridiculous, but I wanted "be better". I looked at my post count and realized that I needed to write a post EVERYDAY plus some until the end of the year to meet my goal. That kinda overwhelmed me and I went the other direction. You know, not posting AT ALL! Well, that certainly didn't help any. I have failed to look at what I have accomplished and focused on what I haven't.

So, enough of the whining, I'm pulling up my bootstraps, grabbing the horse by the tail, well you get the picture. Add whatever motivating saying you can think of.

Happy Halloween!

We had a really low key Halloween in our neighborhood. Jack invited a friend over, we went over a neighbors house for pizza, and trick or treated for about an hour. Since I didn't want to stay home, we put the bowl on the porch with a sign "Happy Halloween. Please take one." Surprisingly, there was still candy in the bowl an hour later.
I pretty much let the kids gorge themselves on candy. This is Lily saying; "One more?" She had just informed me that her tummy hurt a little bit. I said, "Maybe you shouldn't eat anymore candy."

Harvest Party

Since we had a "snow" day this week, I've been a little off. I'm glad the kids are having school the day before Halloween, but man!, the kids are wound up.

Lily has a "Harvest" party that she gets to wear a costume to. Not sure how that fits in with the "Harvest" theme, but she was excited to wear her Tinkerbell costume. She even let me do her hair! It's been a tab bit chilly and I had to convince her that Tinkerbell wears long sleeves in cold weather.

Snow Day

After snowing all day Wednesday, the kids had Thursday off from school. It didn't snow hardly anymore (we got about 12 inches in total) and the snow was melting most of the day. The kids had a ball playing in all the snow and freezing their noses off.

A Paying Gig

It seems like I've been taking more and more pictures lately. That's a really good thing, it actually turned into a paying gig. A friend of a friend emailed me and asked if I'd take pictures of a 8/9 year old football game. I said sure and then started thinking about what I said yes to. I took sports pictures when I was on the school newspaper...eons ago. I ended up getting excited for the team, they were behind and then ended up winning the game. At half time one of the teammates came up to me and asked if I was "Jack's mom". Small town.

Conferences

Can you believe that we've already made it to the end of the first quarter for the school year?! We had parent/teacher conferences today and I managed to mess up the times. I thought that Emma's was first so we waited outside her classroom. I kept trying to make eye contact and hurry the teacher along but Michael and I decided to divide and conquer. He'd go to Emma's and I'd go to Jack's conference. Well, I walked over to Jack's classroom and I noticed that his conference was supposed to start ten minutes earlier. Opps. His teacher was running 15 minutes late, so I ended up getting there just in time.

Michael might have gotten the better end of the deal. Emma is doing great so far this year. Jack...well, we have a few things to work on. Baby steps.

Belated Birthday

Since Emma's birthday was on a Sunday and I happened to be traveling that day, she had a belated friend birthday party. She choose a pottery painting place and invited a few friends. Because it was a party, they had a large table set up for all of us and we got to choose between a few specific pieces.
The dragon was a big hit, I think 4/5 kids picked that one. Lily went with the fairy box, hopefully it will survive. I picked up the fired pieces today, but I forgot to take a picture. Even though we had four dragons, they all turned out quite unique.

Evolving Activities

So, the last post with the Filo figures was just an idea for future activities to do with the girls for Activity Days. I was in charge of the activity for this week and I didn't want to spend any money but I wanted to have a "fun". Not that it's impossible to be frugal and fun, but I find that it does take a bit of creativity to make both happen.

Initially I thought about doing an engineering project involving playdough, straws, dixie cups and pennies. While the idea may have sounded fun to me, I had to put myself in the mind of a 8/9 year old girl...ok, I asked Emma and she didn't seem too interested. Probably because I didn't sell it hard enough. She was interested in the playdough and was pleased as punch that she got to help me make a batch.

The engineering activity turned into a Library Appreciation activity. I checked out a bunch of fun books and integrated "how to make playdough" as a way to use your local library. I also checked out some riddle/joke books and had the girls read them to each other. That might have filled up the entire time, but the girls did want to make their own bookmarks and play with the homemade playdough. Easy peasy Parcheesi.

Random Activity Idea

I saw these pictures posted on some random strangers blog and I'm stealing the idea. I'm keeping a list of activities I can do with the girls.

So, the supply list is FIMO and whatever else you have handy. The metal piece can be baked with the dough and any plastic pieces glued on after being baked. I think the suggestions were for Christmas tree decorations or putting a magnet on the back for the frig. Super cute.

Pumpkin Patch

We're at that awkward stage where Jack is getting too big for the kiddie rides and Lily is not quite big enough for some of the big kids stuff. We went to a patch that seemed to cater to all ages. The added bonus is that they didn't charge an arm or a leg.

This pumpkin patch had a corn maze. Here's the kids and some friends before we head into the corn maze.
This was a cool "bouncy" bubble that the kids had a blast jumping on.In front of the pumpkin patch they had old cars painted as the characters from the movie "Cars".

Musical Concert

Emma had her musical concert Tuesday night. The concert started at 7:30 PM, which is about the time that I start to put my kids to bed. We were asked to stay through the second portion of the concert which was the 5th graders program. I will say, they keep the concert on time and ended right at 8:30. Lily didn't quite make it through the entire program, she ended up falling asleep in my friend's lap.

I braved the video camera and took it instead of my camera. Hopefully this will work;

No Fear

I can't say that I'm a proficient sewer. I'm slightly fearful of following a pattern. This weekend showed me that I can cut out pieces from a pattern with little to no problems. I decided to have "no fear" when I needed to make something for Emma.
Emma informed me that she has a musical concert tomorrow night and she wanted to wear a "western" outfit. In a flash of brilliance I went to the fabric store and hoped for the best. I was able to find a $.99 pattern that looked fairly simple. I decided to use fabric that I already had at home and hoped that I had enough thread to finish the project. If I have enough time, I'll make a matching apron, but she wants to wear the apron that Aunt Debbie made for her. (It's sooo much cuter than what I could whip up in the limited time frame I'm working with)

Surprise

I haven't been blogging much because I was afraid that I'd slip up and reveal that we were going to surprise Debbie for her birthday. I even had to cut back on phone conversations due to my poor lying skills. I almost got on Facebook a time or two the day I was leaving.

Happy Birthday Emma and Debbie

I love that Debbie and Emma share a birthday. It makes it so much easier to remember both birthdays. After a whirlwind weekend, I flew back from Seattle and got home late afternoon just in time for Emma's birthday.

Perfect Storm

There was a knock on my bedroom door at about 2:45 AM. Lily is the polite child in the bunch and knocks before she comes in our room. Just as she's coming in the door, the hall light gets flicked on by Jack heading to the bathroom. The hall light is blinding while Lily gets her drink and then heads back to bed. (I love it when they put themselves back in bed!) I somehow got a song stuck in my head as I'm tossing and turning. Listening to the "Black Eyed Peas" in your head at 3:30 AM is not very fun. Especially if you only know one line.

Fall Pictures Continued

Bloopers.

First Jack finds a log that he need to walk.
Then the girls take a walk in the river.
Emma just being goofy.

Fall Pictures

I took the kids to a park to see what it was like for pictures. I love taking pictures outside, but the kids love to "explore" more than they like me to take pictures. I can usually bribe them... there may or may not have been a promise of ice cream after.

Homework

After spending HOURS with Jack making up homework this weekend, I was looking forward to having a "normal" week. There were many a tear shed in the homework process this weekend. Thankfully Michael is a good tag team member. About the time that I'm ready to throw in the towel, he picks it up. I hope that we have turned a corner...any corner would be good.

I don't know if I have faulty memories, but I think I was pretty good student. I don't remember having battles over homework. There was the expectation that it got done. If it didn't....well you didn't want to go there. How do I pass this lesson on?

On a completely related note, the house is much quieter due to restricted tv and computer time.

Photo by Lily

I'm often behind the camera. It's usually much easier to take pictures from that position. Lily took this picture of me. I think I'll keep it.

Last week we went up to Estes Park. It's a rarity to get a "family" picture. Someone offered to take our picture. It was a little comical to hand over the camera and then proceed to give pointers while hoping that a picture comes out of the process. I'm actually pretty pleased that we're in the same picture.

Letter of the Week

The letter of the week is F. F is for fever. Jack had a fever over the weekend, but managed to miss two days of school because of an awful headache. Lily had a fever Sunday and Monday. She seemed to be doing much better and I sent her to school yesterday. Honestly, she seemed better, it wasn't that I was desperate for a break. This morning she managed to "barp" all over the kitchen floor and now has a really bad headache. I'm ready for the week to be done. Thank goodness tomorrow is Friday.

Piano Man

We are the proud owners of a piano. One of Michael's co-workers was giving away the piano and Michael volunteered to take it off his hands. I just need to find some VERY beginner music books and we're set.

Tales of Craigslist

I am by no means the Craigslist guru in our family, but I can recognize a scam when I see one. I have an armoire that is collecting dust and would make a lovely addition to someone else's home. Read the following email and tell me if I have "sucker" written on my forehead;

Hello Suzanne,
I really appreciate your response to my inquiry. Im interested in
buying the Item from you. I would love to come and check it myself
but I just got married and im presently on my honeymoon trip to Hawaii
with my wife.I would love a surprise change of furniture in our home
on our return.Pls do withdraw the advert from Craigslist as i dont
mind adding $20 for you to do that, so i can be rest assured that the
item is held for me. I should believe it is in good condition as
stated. I will be making the payment via a certified Check, which my
secretary will mail to you. I'll be picking the item from you with the
aid of my mover. My Mover will be coming to pick it from you once the
Check has been cashed. Pls I will need both your full name and
physical address along with your phone number to issue out the
payment.
Regards
David.

Lilyisms

The other morning I was fixing Lily's hair. Yes, she actually lets me touch her hair. I started to ask her how she wanted her hair, but she already had plans.

Lily; "Mom, I want my hair like a hot dog."

Me; "Like a what?!"

Lily; "Like a hot dog."

Me; "A ponytail? two pony tails? a braid?" (very perplexed at this point)

Lily; "No Mom! I want my hair like what a hot dog is in....(long dramatic pause)..a bun!"

Grandparents and Scouts

What better activity to take Grandparents to than a Pack Meeting?! Michael headed up the bottle rocket launching part of the evening. Needless to say, it was a BIG hit.

PreSchool

Lily was in heaven as she stepped into the wide world of school. Today she only got to stay an hour. She was disappointed it wasn't longer. I was too.

Sick Day

The first sick day of the school year goes to Jack. He woke up with a sore throat and said it hurt to swallow. Well, let's just say he's going to school tomorrow sore throat or not.

The school year has started with a bang so far. We've have good days and bad days. Tears have been shed over homework. The kids have been getting used to waking up early and going to bed earlier.

Tomorrow is "Dress of Choice" day. I can't wait to see what Emma chooses. Jack dresses for comfort not style.

Sunburn

I managed to make it through most of the Summer without a sunburn. I even made it out of Florida without a burn. But today, I got burnt. I feel slightly worse because Lily got a bit of a burn as well. It probably didn't help that we spent a few hours at an outdoor pool. In my defense, it was a balmy 75 degrees with slight cloud cover.

When I got home from the pool, I noticed that we had gotten a "little" pink. Several hours later Jack freaks me out by saying; "Mom, Lily has something on her back!" I'm thinking the worst, but as it turns out, it was the lines from her swimsuit. I had to take the picture because Lily wanted to see what was on her back. She can now identify the letter "X".

Healthy Kids

For a bit of entertainment on the weekend, we went to a "Healthy Kids" fair. It was a series of stations set up so that the kids could try different sports. The kids had a lot of fun trying new things. After the fair we went to the girl's soccer game, but because it was so hot we stayed for about 20 minutes.

Aidan, Lily, Kayla, Jack, Emma making silly faces. It was a hot day and the kids need to cool off in the shade. We had cups for water and found a water jug that had the "good" crushed ice in it. It was like having an icee. I think the kids nursed the ice for as long as they could.

Chip the mascot for Colorado University. Lily was pleased as punch she got to hug him.