Christmas Morning

Well, things have quited down for a moment while the kids are playing with their new toys, so I thought I would hurry and blog about our morning.  We had a bit of an emergency yesterday.  I ordered one of the kids presents from Amazon and they promised it would arrive on Dec. 23.  By 3:00 yesterday afternoon, after checking with our nice postman, he determined that it wasn't going to arrive until the morning of the 27th.  Nice.  This sent Josh and I (well, mostly me) into panic mode.  We had to make an emergency shopping trip to Ogden, on Christmas eve afternoon.  I would not recommend this to anyone-bleh.  I hate crowds.  But we did get our problem solved.  In fact, I think it turned out better than it would have.  If you want to know the full scope of the issue, ask me.  My kids read my blog so I can't say much more!

Love this picture! I think he was excited about his rock tumbler.

Ally wanted a surprise from Santa.  He brought her some skis.  That's convienient because she just got her 5th Grade Free Skiing pass in the mail.  Funny how things work out!

Logan got a BB gun from Santa.  I'm not sure I'm thrilled, but it was bound to happen some day.

Jensen got a green bike with pegs from Santa.  He was very specific about which bike he wanted, but Santa got it right!

Holden had no clue what was going on, but I'm pretty sure he likes all his new stuff.  He definately had the present opening figured out!  It was so fun watching him.

Last night we went to Josh's parents for dinner and to play games.  Then we came home, had our Christmas interviews, then went to bed. Josh checked on Holden about 3:00 in the morning.  He found Logan on the couch asleep.  It's a good thing Santa had already come, or he might have scared him away!  It's so fun to experience the excitement through our kids.  They were all up and ready to open presents by 6:15.  I love this time of our lives and hope I am remembering to cherish every moment! 

Christmas Tree Hunting

We did our traditional Christmas Tree hunt on the day after Thanksgiving, as always.  It's always so fun to have our friends the Kotters come join us. 

This is a picture of Holden before we got dropped off to look for trees.  Needless to say, he did not enjoy Christmas Tree hunting this year.  It was so snowy this year we had to be dropped off at the side of the road and then hike to get back to the trees.  Josh's dad kept picking up and dropping everyone off in shifts.  We sent Holden back on the next pick up!

Here we are, trudging through the snow.  Doesn't it look fun?

This is our friend, the snow frog.

It was quite a workout for everyone.  It made me feel better about all the pie I ate at Thanksgiving!  Burn, baby, burn!

Ally and Katelyn-snow princesses!

Jensen was a trooper!  He didn't last much longer than Holden, though.  He had to work twice as hard as everyone else and even got stuck in the snow a couple times.

It was still a really fun day.  I loved being out in the beautiful snow covered world and making these memories with my family and friends.  The tree we got this year is probably my favorite one ever!  I just might say that every year, though...

Catch up

I have the Internet again!!!  We have been having problems for months with our Internet.  It's been very frustrating to say the least.  We finally figured out that it was being sabotaged by someone in our neighborhood.  Seriously.  Aren't people nice these day?  Anyway, we're pretty sure we won't have anymore problems now (cross your fingers for us).

I was enchanted by the snow frosting our house on my way to take Jensen to school.  I had to take a picture-beautiful!

I love the Reflections program at school and so do my kids.  Ally entered four different categories this year and was a school winner in three of them!  She even won the "Artistic Merit" award for this picture of Callie and Daisy, our chicken and duck.  The theme was "Together We Can..."  She wrote about how Callie and Daisy are friends even though they are different.  Together we can all be friends, she said.  She also won in 3D art and musical composition.  She always amazes me the way she can compose a piano piece.  She makes it seem so simple!

I couldn't talk Logan into entering this year.  But Jensen painted a picture of fruit and said "Together we can eat healthy foods".  I haven't heard if he won yet.  It's such a great way for kids to get excited about art!

I had a weak moment and let Ally talk me into having a "late night" Christmas party last weekend.  It actually went better than I expected.  They spent an hour and a half just decorating gingerbread houses!  They played games, had a gift exchange and spent another hour or so playing "photo shoot" with MY camera.  As you can see, they got a little carried away with the frosting!  It was fun to see Ally with her friends and listen to their conversations (shhh...don't tell her I was listening).  It brought back a lot of memories of growing up with my friends. :)

Pinewood Derby

Logan was able to participate in his first pinewood derby on November 17.  This is the car that he and Josh made.  Well, Josh probably did 90% of it.  Not sure why they call this a kid activity.  I think Josh was more excited than Logan was.

Josh tried to model it after the one that he made when he was a kid.  We even found the same stickers to put on it that Josh had on his car!  They have had the same pinewood derby stickers for a LONG time!  Josh also had lots of tricks up his sleeve (thanks to his friend Caleb) to make it a winning car.  And it was really fast!  So fast that Logan got in trouble with the City police.

This is Logan getting his first ticket.

A ticket for speeding in the church gym!  This had better be the only ticket he ever gets.

Logan ended up winning second place overall.  Way to go!  All those "modifications" paid off.

Here's all the boys who participated:  Clay, Conner, Jackson, Johnathan, Logan, Taden and Hugo.  What a fine looking bunch of boys!  It's been fun being their den leader and getting to know them.

Grandpa Naylor came to watch the derby and Holden was running around like a crazy man as usual.  I swear the kid never stops.  And look at Ally-she got glasses!!  One week after my LASIK she got her first pair.  How's that for ironic?  We got the ones that were bold and stylish. I think she looks way cute in them. So much for not having to pay for glasses ever again, though!

Oh, Happy Day!

I CAN SEE!!! WITHOUT MY GLASSES!!!

I was able to get LASIK and it is so amazing!  I have been wanting to have it done for YEARS!  My eye doctor wanted me to wait until I was done having children because my eyes kept changing with each pregnancy.  So last month I went in to find out if I qualified, and I DID!

Last Thursday was the big day.  I had to talk Josh into taking the day off of work (that's what I get for marrying someone with an extremely big work ethic).  He thought maybe he could just meet me there or something.  He also said this to me on the night before my surgery, and I quote:  "take a good look at me, this might be the last time you see me if you go blind tomorrow".  Yup, he just oozes sypathy and compassion. But I love him anyway (after I get over the feeling of wanting to strangle him, that is).

I have to say the surgery wasn't too bad.  I purposely didn't google the surgery so I went in not really knowing what to expect.  However, they were nice (?) enough to broadcast each surgery into the waiting room for everyone to watch.  That's when I started to get a little nervous.  It's rather, um, icky (!) to watch.  Especially when you know you're next.  But they were sure quick.  They kept me busy with paperwork and eye exams (and payment-yikes!) until it was my turn.  I had my regular eye doctor (William Harrison-love him) do all the pre-op and post-op stuff.  So it was my first time actually meeting the doctor who was performing the procedure.  He seemed nice enough, I guess.  He maybe said 10 words to me the whole time. I met him with my glasses off and then saw him again after the surgery when my vision was still blurry.  It seems weird that I paid him all that money and I have no idea what he looks like.

The procedure itself was interesting.  I didn't feel any pain, just pressure.  I'm glad they told me what to expect each step along the way.  I think it only took about ten minutes. I spent only 1 hour and 10 minutes at the place.  I felt like I was on an assembly line!

The recovery went pretty quickly.  I was pretty tired for the first half of the day, but I began to feel better as the day went on.  I was able to drive myself to my post-op appointment the next day.

I am thrilled with the results.  It's so amazing to be able to see clearly all the time!  Today it was raining outside and I was excited when I got back in the car and I didn't have to wipe off my glasses.  After wearing mostly glasses for the last three years it is quite the change.  The thing I like the most?  Just not having to wear my glasses-they can be so annoying!  Anything I don't like?  Being able to see clearly in the shower. No wonder Josh always says it needs to be cleaned! 



Trick-or-Treat

Ally decided to be Medusa this year.  It was quite challenging getting the snakes to stay on her wig. She completed her ensemble with a black dress and sunglasses.  Her inspiration for playing Medusa came from the movie "Percy Jackson and the Olympians".  She kept pulling down her sunglasses and turning people into stone all night.

Logan was a convict this year.  He's playing to part pretty well in this picture!

I wanted Holden to be the lion this year, just like all my other kids had been when they were little.  However, he did not like the costume at all!  He would cry if I even showed to to him.  So I borowed this cute costume from Gwen.  I still had to convince him it was a jacket to put on so he could go outside.  And he hated the hat of course, but he sure looked cute!

Jensen just cracks me up.  He gets so excited about things!  He couldn't wait to wear the ghost costume.  Doesn't he look like the happiest ghost you've ever seen?

Ally remained in characted for most of the night.  It was raining pretty good while we were waiting for the trunk or treat to start, but we were able to put the umbrellas away when it started.

The back of Ally's hair.  We glued on a lot of snakes!

Logan thinks it's funny to pop out his teeth for pictures.  His orthodontist might really throw him in jail if he catches him doing that!

 We went to dinner in Brigham after the trunk-or-treat.  Then we stopped by Aunt Lori and Uncle Duane's house to play with cousins for a little bit.  It was an awesome Halloween!

Carving Pumpkins

I asked Logan to move the pumpkins from the front porch to the back porch so we could carve them.  This is what I saw when I looked out the window. Talk about using your resources!

Every year we carve our pumpkins on the back porch and each summer a stray pumpkin plant pop up in the dirt surrounding our rocks.  This year they didn't start growing until way late in the season, so this is the size they were on Halloween.  Ally decided she needed to carve it anyway!  She just poked it with one of those orange pumpkin carving knives.  I was surprized at how well it turned out!

Logan turned his pumpkin into a boat this year.

This is Jensen's twin pumpkin.  He carved it all by himself this year!

Here is Ally's "self portrait" pumpkin.  She even made a pumpkin seed flower for her pumpkin's hair.  She made another one for her and wore it to church on Sunday.  Her own Halloween touch.