Birthday's

A birthday in December is hard all in it self, but having your birthday on the 24th can be considered even more difficult. With that in mind, while we are all together with Ben’s family we celebrate winter birthday’s now. Three in December, and one for February, which is kind of nice for the kids, but some what unnecessary in my opinion, but hey I did not make this rule to begin with. And usually on birthday party day, we all take in a little bowling, to show off our mad skills at being able to throw a ball down a hard wood floor. People are so easily entertained. Although this year we added another outside “family” member to the birthday party crowd a friend from Church who Bernie and Susie are godparents for. It was really nice to help her celebrate her birthday as well. I’m sure that they will become part of the birthday tradition.

Twilight

Very few books have every really made want to read them again and again, well I have recently read Twilight by Stephanie Meyer, and have just fallen in love with the characters and the book. Twilight is the first book in the series and for whatever reason I am completely drawn to the characters and plot. I would recommend this series to all who enjoy reading. The nice thing about these books is that they are a fast read, and can keep your attention from the beginning. The fact that I like these books is kind of funny, because I have waited to read them, since I did not know what to expect. Were they going to follow the same lines as Anne Rice, or were they “cleaner,” since I have heard about them for a long time, I finally broke down and read them. The author is LDS, and so her work has been very big here, and she does not disappoint. I’m glad that I finally started the series and can hardly wait until the next book comes to print.

Texas Christmas

After Thanksgiving on Friday we have our Texas Christmas with Ben’s family. It is a wild day filled with last minute shopping, wrapping gifts and kids filled with high anticipation of tearing into those carefully wrapped gifts the moment it touches their hands. Before we can get to all the excitement of gifts we have to find the perfect tree. Each year it becomes a major production with fifteen people voicing their opinion on the tree they think would be just right. Sadly you can’t make everyone happy. At last we find the “perfect” tree and take the family picture. Now with seven of the kids under four years old it becomes a challenge to make all the little faces look forward at the same time. Which in it self can be very comical, I don’t think it will happen anytime soon that all the kids will face the camera and hold still. Once we get the perfect tree we have to cut it down and bring it home, and decorate it before we open presents. But wait there’s more; we even have to eat dinner before all the mayhem can begin. So after much waiting and anticipation from the kids (read Morgan) we are finally read to get down to business, and this of course leads to a wild frenzy to see what everyone got for Christmas.

Happy Turkey Day

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope that everyone had a great day and did not eat too much. As usual we had tons of food, which amazingly enough we only had for leftovers one day. This year we did our standard deep fried turkey as well as a turducken. I know what is a turducken, well it’s a turkey, stuffed with a duck, and a chicken along with tantalizing stuffing of rice and other Creole mixtures. And we even tried to be a little healthier with our sides but it’s hard to do when everything will end up dripping in gravy. While all of our family members were not able to attend we were grateful for those that could make it for the visit and it was a great day. Everyone pitched in to help bring dinner to the table, even the kids had fun helping out, with getting the potatoes ready to cook. Morgan had the best pleasure to figuring out where everyone is going to sit, because when you have that many people there are bound to be logistical issues.

Kids Kingdom

While I was in high school the entire town of Sulphur Springs got together to build a new playgroup for the kids. They called it Kids Kingdom. One of the citizens donated a very large majority of the money for the playground to be built, and it became a reality one weekend with the help of hundreds of people, who volunteered their time. I am happy to say that it is still a lot of fun for kids to play on. Our kids even enjoy it a lot. We try to take them every year we are back in Sulphur Springs and this year was no exception. They all had so much fun playing, climbing, and exploring the “kingdom.” I personally like the rubber bridge that you can bounce across, it is too much fun.

Fish

Fish, fish, fish and more fish, you can never come home to Sulphur Springs without fishing. I was really happy that this year though we had really great weather for fishing. Bear and Isa had so much fun and they each caught their own fish for the first time. It was pretty exciting. I even caught a fish, which really means that I finally had some fun. I usually don’t have the patience for fishing. It was great that the fish were really biting, and let me tell you there were so big fish out there. I think Jodi caught the biggest fish that came out of the water, so bigger ones got away. It was almost hard to leave but we had to get home and feed the kids before long, and even though there were lights, it was getting dark and harder to see where your minnow was going.

In home Compost

Thanks to my husband being a huge dork who watches the History Channel almost as much as ESPN we have now been introduced to a new earth friendly product that I think everyone should have. I absolutely hate to put things in the trash that I know can be recycled or composted, but we for one do not have a compost option. But wait we could have an in home compost machine that will take the majority of food waste items and turn them into great “food” for your garden. Much to my father’s dismay I’m sure I keep becoming more and more green. This in home kitchen compost product is provided by Nature Mill, their web site is naturemill.com, and comes with an air cleaner so there is none of that nasty compost smell in your home. Not only are you helping to reduce the amount of waste in the landfills you are providing your backyard with much needed nutrients that are natural and organic. I will encourage all of you to check this compost machine out and if you get a chance to see it in action on the History Channel you should watch it, Environmental Tech II is the series name, and the next time this series airs is Saturday, November 17th at 5pm. We could all be a little greener.

Gingerbread Houses

We have just seen some gingerbread houses that will put the ones we make this season to shame. But at least we tried, and anyway who has that much time to make such an amzing structure? Yes that is a Dragon.

Corn Maze Fun

We went to our first official corn maze here in Utah. Now while we did not do the big corn maze because the kids are a little young, we did have fun participating in many of the other activities. Since we went after Halloween we had so much fun and practically had the place all to ourselves. But first our exciting tale of what happened once we arrived.

Upon arrival at Cornbelly’s Maze I began the delicate process of getting the kids out of the car and ready for fun. Barrett was still sleeping when we arrived so I left him in the car while I got the stroller out and Isabelle out. Now this is a little different since I usually get him out then Isabelle but change never hurts. Before I started removing objects I placed my cell phone and keys in the side pocket of the diaper bag so that I could put the bag in the stroller. I had the stroller all set up and Isabelle was getting out of the car and I made my way to the front to grab the bag and instead I decided to just take out a diaper and wipes because that would be so much easier. Since I had gotten a bigger diaper bag when Bear was first born and it took up a lot of room. I told Bear I would get him out in just a minute and closed the front door. I walked around the other side to Bear and opened his door. Low and behold it would not open, so I was like ok let me go get my keys from the stroller. No keys!! Where could they be, oh yea still in the diaper bag on the front seat of the car that is now locked with my child still in the car. That’s right I locked Barrett unintentionally in the car. I could not believe I had done this.

Fortunately I was down at the maze with Mom’s Club so I had some people to help me call the police to get Barrett out of the car. After what seemed like forever but was really only about twenty minutes he was out and no worse for the wear. I should have taken pictures of the police officer unlocking the door but then I thought he would think I was crazy, so I didn’t. After he was out Bear was just fine, a little shocked that I left him in the car but he recovered well and had a great time at the Maze. He followed the older kids around great, and they each had so much fun. I think the coolest part was the giant “balloon” they had on the floor, one for smaller kids and one for big kids or adults. Even I got out on this one, I think it was even better than a trampoline; everyone should try it out sometime in their life.

Halloween

Here are a few pics of the kids from Halloween. Once Isabelle figured out that if she knocked on the door and someone opened it, that she would get some candy she was all over Trick or Treating. Bear thought it was great just knocking on the door, but got pretty excited about the candy as well. So you tell the kids not to eat the candy but then a "big kid" Dad eats some anyway. One house gave out Pop Rocks, and he thought that was great, so down one package went.