It was a Very White Christmas Day

(I got a new camera for x-mas - this is the only photo I took because the battery had to charge for 14 hours, but there's the nativity scene on my piano. What says Christmas more than that?)

Let me paint you a picture because I was honestly too frightened to grab a camera.

For the last 14 years we've lived here, B with the help of D, and now Mr. T, has been shoveling snow. No snowblower for him because it is "good exercise". With the storms we've had lately and last year, I thought it was high time to get one. I hid the big machine in the laundry room under towels. (B never goes in there, esp when it looks like every towel in the house is dirty). I got up around 6:00 and pretended to go out and get a drink of water, but I dragged it into the family room. He was impressed with my sneakiness! So after breakfast, he, D and Mr. T went out with their new snow clearing equipment (D & T got their very own shovels too). Let's just say, the wind was blowing hard and the wrong direction while B was trying to snowblow and he came roaring into the kitchen COVERED in snow, with red eyes (picture the abomidable snowman from Rudolph) saying he doesn't like the snowblower. (this is when I wished I pulled out my camera) I think he figured it out & he didn't take it back, but me, Michelle & Aub got quite the laugh at his expense.

I printed copies of my blog for each of the kids. It's the closest thing I'm going to get as a journal/scrapbook for a while. It was fun for me to go back and reread. I'm not sure how much they liked it.

Later we went to Grandma's house for dinner. Thanks to Roma & Mom! Michelle T. got me this fun game of cards, called Tabletalk, that has all these good questions to get good conversations started. We had a lot of fun with a lot of new topics and didn't even really give much attention to "He Who Must Not Be Named", except giving him that new nickname. If you want to know who that is - send an e-mail to me, Becca or Dad (we liked it the most). Did you know that Roma would love to go into space? I didn't and I wouldn't!

I'm going to keep my christmas music up on here for a little while longer, hope there's no diehards reading that have something against it!

Our Version of The Polar Express

For our Christmas Eve tradition we build a train out of graham crackers & candy. That way, we can be sure that the kids are properly sugared up before bed! And this year was a doozy, as you can see by Ari's needing to be held for the photo. D surpassed his previous year's skill in building a half pipe for lego snowboarder. Mr. T didn't want to build a train car, so he built the train station, that you can't see behind D's half pipe. This year we also had more cars built because even Mom, Roma & Michelle built one. Dad was the hold out, as we have yet to get him to join the fun. One of these years maybe?

B & I were in bed by 11:00! That is quite a record for us, and then we had to wake up the kids at 7, because Aub needed to be to work at 10:30. (Benedryl is the antidote for sugar high, in case you were wondering)

Ward Santa Breakfast

Friday night, my friend Connie had tickets & invited me up to go to the Savior of the World at the Conference center theatre. The weather was horrid! So we took trax up there, went to dinner & were totally spiritually uplifted by this beautiful program. I need to take my kids to something like this. It was very much testimony reminding. I hope they do something in Primary today with the Nativity.

Yesterday morning, our ward had their like 25th annual Santa breakfast with a guy who lives to be Santa every year for this. Ari went & sat with Santa and when he asked her what she wanted for Christmas, she said "I want to pull your beard off!" He was a very good sport and just laughed. This after doing a little play for me & B, with Lelu & Mr. T about Santa putting her on the naughty list and she grabbed Lelu's shirt (who was playing Santa) and pulled her close to her face saying in her sassiest voice "Listen you old fat man, if you put me on the naughty list, I'm going to hurt you!" What do you do as a parent with that? You laugh or you cry......and we laughed until we cried. Merry Christmas to everyone!

The Twins Politically Correct Program

I can't even say it was a Christmas program. Because it was a Hanuka, Kwanzaa, Ramadaan, & Diwaili (sp?) and then Christmas program. I've never even heard of Diwaili, have you? And the most I caught was something about a monkey demon who killed an evil king and stole the evil or maybe she was good, I couldn't tell, queen. Huh? That's what we thought. And they never put the twins by each other, so I have to videotape going back and forth. I need a better camera, don't I?

I Love Thanksgiving!

I wish I had more photos of Thanksgiving.
I just didn't think to pull out my camera enough. We were so happy to host this year with Jeff & Christina, Landon & Wyatt with Michelle T too.

The day before is my favorite because I start listening to Christmas music while baking pies & rolls. Is there anything better than yummy smells with good music? Someday I think they'll add smells to movie experiences - come to think of it - that's one of the things I do love about the movies is the smell of popcorn! Lelu informed me that was one of the traditions she will continue when she's a mom (there aren't too many because she will do everything so much better than me, so I'll take what I can get) - BUT Ari WILL NOT! She will only start to listen to Christmas music when it is December 1st. And she was quite adamant about it too.

After stuffing ourselves, we headed over to Mom & Dad's to stuff ourselves more with pie, etc. Everyone was a good sport as I reminisced about my afternoon with Chris. Ahhhhhh, sighhhhhhh. Thanks for letting me!

On Saturday we went up to the shack and spent the night. There was exactly 1/2 inch of snow on the shaded road across the meadow from us & Landon, Wyatt, Lelu & the twins decided to sled on it with Uncle Jeff chasing them down the hill every so often when they went out of control. It was truly sledding on the mud! Christina & I stayed close to the fire reading & watching them sporadically. B & Jeff fixed us a yummy steak & everything sandwich dinner. Then we played "Settlers of Cataan". After 20 years, I saw a very backstabbing side to Jeff that I didn't know existed, it was quite shocking to me! I still haven't recovered from it;0.

Even after that shocking turn of events, I would still love to have them come up here every year. I will just be very suspicious of every move Jeff makes in board games in the future.

Cooler than ANYTHING I ever could Have even Dreamed Up!

I wasn't going to blog about this, but it's so huge for me, it would be ridiculous not to put this in.

He really gave Lelu a Piano Lesson for 1/2 hour. He taught her to play the beginning of Clocks. He was SO nice and friendly. We spent an hour and 45 minutes all together touring backstage with his assistant who is also SO nice. We got to go into their dressing room & talk to the other guys (I know I am the LAMEST at taking photos & only got autographs from them) Every member of their crew is British and have been with them from almost the beginning.

And then the concert was AWESOME! Of course! I was in the 3rd row next to the side of the stage and during the second to last song he was over there and made eye contact with me and we both smiled at each other. B says "Did you see that, he looked right at us and smiled?". We were kind of in the aisle and B was standing behind me. That was the absolute icing on the cake. I could add a negative comment on here about how much I hate how I look - but I won't because the experience of it all was as positive as it could have been regardless of how I look! And don't I have the absolute greatest husband ever to have supported me in this dream (I think he's okay with it, because Chris looks an awful lot like B when he was younger, sorry Aub!)

Lelu's Trip With Mom & Dad

For the past couple years Lelu has been begging to accompany B to one of his Conventions. The problem is that she's in school and it has to be one I go to, because B is really too busy to entertain her. This year she convinced B. I admit I am very selfish about my trips with him, so I wasn't very happy. In my defense, I feel like a lot of the time we are just ships passing in the night with all the work & kids that take up our attention - so these trips are our reconnect trips so that in 11 years we don't look at each other and say "Who are you? and Why are we together now that the kids are gone?" But I did get the Cancun trip, so I didn't put the cabash on the idea. Now, however, we have to take a kid with us for the next 3 trips to make it fair to D & the twins!

We went to Clearwater FL. The weather was perfect. Lelu & I drove a couple hours to Universal Studios. We just went to Disneyland back in Feb. So I thought we'd do something different. It really was fun taking just one child who is old enough to ride everything. I have become somewhat of a chicken and we made a pact to ride that huge roller coaster & did it. I did close my eyes the whole time, which was probably worse! Being the middle child and the most easy going, Lelu tends to get lost in the crowd. I was really glad we took her and for B "she made a great booth babe".

Just a few observations about FL: They are the most courteous drivers. Lelu perfected her British accent by talking to so many British tourists. It really seemed like there were more of them than Americans. I can see why old people flock there for the winter - the weather was perfect.

More Reports.......

This is one of the downsides to having twins - double the same homework assignments! In order to save myself from saving these things, I have to take pictures and post them so that they will not dig them out of the trash to sit in their rooms and rot. These were country reports about basic needs - food, shelter, clothing etc different from our country. Ari picked Madagascar because of her excitement to see the new movie. She didn't quite understand why the photos don't look like the animated movie.

Mr. T picked Greenland and he & B built this partial igloo with sugar cubes. It was Mr. T's idea! The snow are marshmellows. They were due on their birthday so I went to the school for their presentation and then ate lunch with them. They thought that was really fun and so did I.

IT'S THEIR GOLDEN BIRTHDAY THIS YEAR!

Here's Ari & her BFF Hailey. We took them all to see Madagascar 2 & then out for pizza & back to our house for cake! Hailey isn't in Ari's class this year and when we went to see their class lists, it was the END OF THE WORLD! They're both really tiny & petite, but Hailey is really shy and quiet and Ari is full of spunk & fire. (I have no idea who she takes after!) She still loves all the baby stuff, ponies and cupcakes!

Mr. T is really into pirates. He loves everything about them- esp the skulls - which I hate! But they are everywhere! I even saw one on a newborn onesie, YUCK. We found this really cool pirate ship in Cancun for him. It has cannon's and everything on it. I can accept the one little flag on top with a skull. This is his BFF Caden with him who also LOVES pirates.

7 years old on the 7th! And this is how I found them when I went to wake them up. I wonder how long they'll still want to sleep next to each other. It's so cute, it makes me want to cry.

Halloween 2008

Mr. T was a frightening "Werewolf" with "Little Red Riding Hood" played by Ari. D found his roots as a "Leprechaun". Check out the cool jacket found at the D.I. for $3 bucks - What a find!

Lelu and BFF Morgan were "Bat Girl" & "Poison Ivy"

Morgan is already overly tall and she's got on her mom's high heels making Lelu look like a really small "batgirl".

"The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe" Closes

D was the white stag, who comes leaping out onto the stage at the beginning of the play and near the end of the play. I didn't get a photo with his horns - but let me just say: the boy can leap! It's really hilarious to see him sort of Irish dance leap about the stage.

D was also part of the witch's army. I have to admit I hated to see him tie up and taunt Aslan. I know it's a play - but it bothered me. The story always makes me emotional anyway. Lelu was part of Aslan's followers as a cute little fox. The kid who played Edmund has quite the crush on Lelu. He kept calling D "his future brother in law". He asked D when Lelu turns 16 so he can take her to homecoming. But around her he was quite shy. They had a great time doing this play. Mom & Roma went with me the last night too. The kids were kind of embarassed because their parts were pretty small - but they've got to start somewhere & I think they should be proud.

I left my camera there and it took me until today to get it back! Thank heavens I did. I'd be sad to not have these photos.

Locks of Love Haircut

Can you see the 3 blond braids next to her? - those are all hers. I think she inherited my hair thickness.

Lelu & I had been talking about cutting her hair & then this salon I go to had a "Locks of Love" day. She got a free haircut & they took off about 8 inches of hair to donate to making wigs for breast cancer victims. They told me that it takes about 8 ponytails to make one wig. They got 3 ponytails from Lelu's head. She looks really cute & she felt really great about it. Now Ari is bugging me to cut hers too. Stay tuned.....

A Trip to Body World

Last week over fall break I took the kids to see this exhibit. If you haven't heard of it. It is all human cadavers that have been "plasticized". Meaning: this scientist came up with a way to inject cells with plastic that preserves bodies in a way that they can be set up into all kinds of positions. It was SO COOL. You aren't allowed to take photos inside of there - so I got these off the internet. If you aren't squeamish - I highly recommend going to this if it comes to your area.

D is a typical teenager and thought it was cool until his next text message came in. Lelu was much less squeamish than I expected. She liked the babies the best. They have embryos on up to 30 week fetuses. Mr. T thought it was the world's coolest thing to see. Ari was quite bothered by how dark it was in there, the sound of a beating heart, the peeled dead animals, and thought it was more like a haunted house than anything and couldn't wait to get out of there. Until she found a plastic model (no human tissue) of the our insides that was a puzzle and then she liked that. They were all very interested in seeing a skeleton that I could show them all of the bones Aub had broken. I said I wanted to go back by myself to spend more time looking and reading everything about it and Mr. T said "Please mom, get me out of school to go with you, I want to go again too." And no one has had any nighmares either!

TAGGED?? I know I just sent a dumb forward - but I'll play along

1. Where is your cell phone? Right next to me - My home phone sucks (long story)
.2. Your significant other? B-the entrepreneur who's unhappy about the economy. Don't vote for Obama - PLEASE!
Your hair? Needs to be colored every six weeks or policemen ask if I'm the twins grandma! It's also VERY THICK
4. Your mother? St. Clarissa
5. Your father? Musical Denis
6. Your favorite thing? My Ipod.
7. Your dream last night? Bizarre It had a lot of water in it.
8. Your favorite drink? Gin & tonic (I just put that in to see if you are reading;)
9. Your dream/goal? Dream: all 5 of my kids graduate college Goal: write & catch up on scrapbooking - digitally
10. The room you’re in? My office loft
11. Your hobby? I don't think I have any - I like to read - is that one?
12. Your fear? Plunging to my death from 30,000 feet. That one is my irrational one
13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? Right here, but much smaller & writing a sequel to my best selling novel.
14. What you’re not? Tall, skinny, bald OR A PET LOVER
15. Muffins? No thanks
16. Two of your wish list items? Back stage passes to Coldplay or a Mac.
17. Where you grew up? 404 E. Greenway Drive - mostly.
18. The last thing you did? Dropped D & Lelu off for their Narnia performance tonight
19. What are you wearing? Jeans & a short sleeved tealish shirt.
20. Favorite gadget? THE PED EGG! bye bye gross cracked heals!
21. Your pets? Are making me have anger dreams!
22. Your computer? Works most of the time.
23. Your mood? A little excited about entering a funny contest with D. (more later)
24. Missing someone? Aub, Michele & Dave, Taylor, Christian, Christina - my old ward
25. Your car? Is black, has four wheel drive & a very cool bumper sticker
26. Something you’re not wearing? shoes
27. Favorite stores? Target & Nordstrom depending on my mood.
28. Like someone? B, my kids, my family, my friends, Chris Martin.
29. Your favorite color? Periwinkle
30. When is the last time you laughed? An hour ago talking on the phone
31. Last time you cried? This morning after almost dying in a Boot Camp class at the gym. I'm competitive to a fault & when I'm carrying 20 more lbs then everyone else - it sucks!

I tag Becca, Jeni & Peggy on their facebooks - except I don't have one - so send it to me in an e-mail. K? Cause I am not getting a facebook - sorry Dave.

Morning Full Moon

.Our annual trip to the pumpkin patch. I had to make a rule that "if you can't lift it, you can't get it" or Mr. T would have been hauling a pumpkin big enough for Cinderella's carriage. This photo doesn't do it justice! But I had to drive D to school the other morning at 6:45 am and the moon looked so incredible sitting so big & low over the valley. I guess I'm never out at that time of the morning - but I had to take a photo.

First Taste of Winter

Summer is officially over. This is what we woke up to last Sunday morning. Brrrr.

Today it's pretty nice though - we're having a warming trend.

My Belated Birthday/Our Anniversary Trip

B & I went to Cancun last week - we were supposed to go back in July but when we decided to move, we postponed the trip. I'm really glad we did because July is their hot season and Holy H@*# is it HOT now. I'll just give you the highlights.......

This is called a cenote'. It's basically a sink hole in the earth that's filled with water and there are quite a few of them around Cancun. If you zoom in you can see B jumping in. I didn't venture in because (I realize this sounds dumb) I didn't want to ride back to our hotel in an airconditioned bus for 2 hours with wet hair - plus it is so humid it took about 12 hours for my hair to air dry.

Did I say it was HOT? When it wasn't raining. We had a crazy dog lady on our flight-she packed two rat dogs into a purse and decided to let them out on the plane, ignoring the flight attendants to put them away. Then when she put them away - the dogs fought so viciously it sounded more like wolverines than dogs. They were on our flight home too - but this guy we met warned the crew about her and she was pulled aside and given a talking to. But then she took them out in the bathroom after we landed & they commenced to fight again.

I realized I am a true claustrophobic - I went a little nuts on a submarine tour and started banging on the door to let me out on top! I guess I don't have a future in the Navy.

The ChiChi nitza (sp?) Mayan ruins were amazing and very cool to see just how brilliant their knowledge of Astronomy and nature was - but horrifying to hear about all of their beheadings and ripping their own hearts out to appease the gods. Most of the locals we met had never even heard of Salt Lake City or Utah.

Our hotel was very empty but we met another couple from St. Louis also there for her 40th birthday and her name was Kristen too. Funny huh? The husband looked just like Rick Moranis but bald with bad teeth. I mentioned that to B and then I could tell he was going to tell the guy. So (I thought) I stopped him. I mean, you can tell someone they look like David Beckham but not Rick Moranis. Who wants to hear that? But last night as I was telling Aub, B confessed that as soon as I was out of earshot - he asked the guy if "he shrunk the kids"? I can't take B anywhere - I'm glad I didn't know that there, I would have been so embarrassed.

I've never been called Mrs. Taylor so much in my life - everyone there is so polite and friendly. There were a lot of Europeans there too. They import their guacamole because it's too humid to grow avocados. I was looking forward to good guac.:(

I felt like it was a great relaxing reconnecting trip for us.:)

I like Cabo better. It has more of a west coast influence I guess.

Jeez - even just the highlights are a bit too long, huh? oh well.

Gratefully, the kids were well taken care of and entertained by Aunt Michelle T. and our neighbor from our old ward (her name is Sandy Taylor - no relation) . They played baseball, went on a hike and picnic, to the movies and made cupcakes in between meeting their nutty schedule. They didn't miss us a bit! Well, maybe a little...............

D and HIS INSANE SCHEDULE

I'll have a few photos to post in the next few weeks because D has a part in "Lion, Witch and Wardrobe" with Lelu too. He's the White Stag and one of the witch's army. Yes, he and Lelu are on opposite sides. He also has a part in the high school's musical "Oklahoma". So every day after school he has rehearsal for Oklahoma and MWF nights & Sat morn are his Narnia rehearsals. I've become the typical overscheduled mom and kids - but in my defense, they want to do all this stuff. I promise.
And he, B and Lelu still manage to go run or mountain bike every weekend together.

D also loves high school, loves our new ward and is just in happy land right now - don't get me wrong - he does get surly, disrespectful and tease the kids regularly - but overall I am sighing AHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Ari the Super Gymnast

I just put this photo on because Ari and her BFF Sierra LOVE to dress up and wear each others clothes - pajamas, swimming suits and these lovely outfits to name a few. Kelly (her mom) and I are constantly returning clothes because they want to wear them home. See Lucy on her throne in the background? That's just another dog irritation of mine - she thinks she belongs on the hot tub and has put a hole in the cover - yep a hole! - reminding me how little control I have over the other living things in my life.

I realize she is not actually doing any gymnastics here, but the kids found this duck at Mr. T's football game after her gym class - so at least she is in her leotard and isn't she cute with the little duck? I talked to one of my new neighbors who's daughter is competing in gymnastics and she recommended this new place. I guess they've trained a couple of the level 10 world gymnasts. I've been disappointed with her last gym because they weren't moving her up and teaching her anything new. She started last week and they already moved her up to level 2 and told me she'll be moving to level 3 within a month. She wanted to play football too - but I told her girls don't play football and then at last nights game - 2 girls were on the other team. I hate being found out - I just said, well girls in our family don't play football. I know that's sexist - but we're talking about my feminine ego here and football is not feminine!

Lelu is Playing Soccer Again

Thank heavens the weather is nice (knock wood) because it is really lovely to sit out and watch 2 soccer games and 2 football games a week. She couldn't wait to play again - it seems soccer is her favorite sport right now. She's taught Izzie how to play with her - it's pretty cute. I'll have to try and videotape that.

Lelu's a really busy girl right now. She's running track once a week with a track club - 2 soccer games - piano - and she got a part in "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe" at our local Draper theatre. She's one of Aslan's followers (a fox) and has a few lines and dances with Edmund, Lucy & Aslan. They practice 4x a week for 2 hours. Next week is opening night and then she'll have 4 performances a week for the next 3 weeks. Poor thing is very tired every night - but she loves it.