Monday, December 20, 2010

Lights, Cameras, Santa!

Santa Claus is coming to town. These boys visited him and Mrs. Claus at the capital. Caleb asked Santa for a ball and, on a later visit, a light saber. Daniel had a list which included Star Wars legos, a scooter, and fixing his green bike. Liam wanted a camera, scooter and legos.
When they got home, they all became Santa's elves...




At one point, Daniel decided to be one of Santa's elves and build toys when he grows up.
We all got a chance to visit with Santa on the annual Santa train at Hagan Park.

Better be good for goodness sake.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Leaves are Falling All Around

This has been such a mild year that the leaves hung around a long time. Our tree doesn't have the great big leaves that are perfect for playing in, so we collected a bunch from our neighbors. They all laugh at us when we ask them for their leaves (they have a hard time trying to get rid of them all). My visiting teacher knew how much my boys loved the leaves and actually brought over two big bags for the boys to play in. (What a great visiting teacher! She is aware of me and my boys' needs.) I took a lot of pictures of the boys. I especially tried to get a good one of Caleb (I need to replace the ones in the living room.) I think I have a few good Caleb pics to choose from.






Liam insisted on shorts and it really wasn't that cold, but it is funny in a leaf picture. I tried to get a few close-up so we wouldn't see the shorts, but this funny one is my favorite. 100% Liam.




Daniel's were OK but not my favorite. I think I'll use one from earlier to replace his pic. Notice his barefeet.


The best picture I could get of the 3 rascals together...

Here's a few more fun ones...




Liam making 'leaf angels'.

Daniel 'supermanning' into the leaves. Crazy! They aren't that deep.

Monday, December 13, 2010

Nathan's Talk on Service

This Sunday Nathan gave a talk on Christmas Service. The other speaker was really good, but took up nearly all of the time. There were also two musical numbers, which shortened things. Daniel kept saying, "Isn't it Daddy's turn yet?" The boys entertained themselves by making faces at Nathan up on the stand. I'm sure the bishopric and visiting member of the Stake Presidency enjoyed that. Nathan is a great speaker and I was a little disappointed that I didn't get to hear his whole talk. Nathan had just enough time to share a few short stories about Christmas service.

I was thinking about it this morning and the thought came to me that Nathan's example of Christmas service is more powerful than anything he could say over the pulpit. I am so thankful for his generosity to others. It is so great to marry someone who can help you make up for the areas that you fall short. I tend to be too judgemental of others that I see out begging for food etc. Nathan always gives a little and says, "I'll try to do my part, and leave the rest up to the Lord." I hope my boys remember that. It's just like in the scriptures when it talks about, "when saw ye me hungry and gave me food...." and "when ye have done it unto the least of these my bretheren...." Nathan is also always ready to offer priesthood blessings. Recently, one of my visiting teachees was going in for her final oral exam to become a US citizen. She was very nervous to say the least. Nathan gave her a blessing and I brought the boys with us so they could watch. I hope they see their daddy's example and do the same some day. (She passed the exam and said she felt the Lord prepared her way.) Anyway, I love you Nathan and I am so thankful for your selfless service.

Why I Don't Wear Nylons

Yesterday I decided to wear nylons to church. I don't like them, so I rarely do. Usually I just go without and hope I remembered to shave my legs. (I did run home between meetings at church once to retrieve a pair when I noticed a heavily wooded area just below my knee-lenth skirt line, one Sunday! I remember wondering if it would be faster to shave the forest or find a pair of nylons with minimal runs and then proceed with the tug-o-war. On another occasion, I noticed on Monday that I'd only shaved one leg! Oops!) The only ones I found without runs were thigh highs. After sacrament meeting I went into primary. This week I was in charge of the full time for both Jr. and Sr. while the Presidency had a board meeting with all of our teachers. That isn't a big deal. We needed the time to work on our Christmas songs. I stood up in Jr. Primary and almost immediately I felt a shift in my nylons. They both started falling down. I tried to do a bit of discreet tugging (I thought the subs must have been wondering if I had ants in my pants. If it had been all women subs I would have been more likely to explain myself and go fix the problem, but there was a guy with sunbeams on the front row.) I tried to stand with my legs slightly crossed so my legs would hold them in one place. I couldn't move, and I must have looked ridiculous. It occurs to me now that the little dance I was doing, along with the crossed legs, probably gave the teachers a totally different idea of my problem! Well, they kept getting lower and I was afraid they'd end up pooled around my ankles at any moment. So I invited a sub to come up and help flip pictures for the kids. Then I told the kids that I was going to stand out in the hall to see if they could sing loud enough for me to hear all of the words. I ran for the bathroom and removed the nylons. I ran back in time to hear the last few lines of the song. Phew! I threw the nylons in back of the piano as I walked back into the room. And that's why I never wear nylons! Who was the idiot who came up with these things! I guess I'll go back to my bare leg standard. --And I'm retiring my thigh-highs forever. I may work on a thick German accent just in case I forget to shave. No picture with this post--use your imagination!

Friday, December 10, 2010

Christmas is Coming

Christmas is on the way. Liam is full of questions...How big are elves? Who fills the stockings? Do you really call Santa? Why did I see you putting things under the tree last year? Caleb just says, "Ho Ho Ho! Santa." He wants Santa to bring him a ball and a lightsaber of his very own. Daniel on the other hand has made lists. He says that some of the local Santas are not the real one. We tell him they are Santa's helpers.

It's a busy season, but we are doing our best to get ready!

Liam's preschool group put on a little Christmas program. They had fun singing Christmas songs. Their favorite was Jingle Bells.Liam was Joseph (fitting since Joseph is his middle name) in their performance of the Nativity.
And of course there were Christmas treats. This is the Santa Train that Liam made.
Speaking of trains and treats...We made our traditional gingerbread train. That's a lot of candy!
Our boys' favorite part of decorating the Christmas tree, is always putting on the ornaments with their pictures. (We add a new one each year, which they love, but they get really excited to find their baby picture ornaments.)I refused to decorate outside until I finished inside, so the boys decided to help. I love how all of the ornaments in the tree are on the bottom. A few days later we used a ladder to cover the rest.
Daniel took part in his school's Winter Spectacular. He did a great job (the red and white striped sweater). His class sang Jingle Bells in Spanish and another Spanish song (something about colors and animals).
The boys worked hard to butter-up Santa with some very decorated cookies.
We visited Nathan downtown and he took us first to the huge kids' section in the downtown library (my boys' dream come true!). And then to the Christmas tree lighting at the capital.
Santa and Mrs. Claus were there! (So was David Archeletta. He sang a few songs and we wish we could have followed him back to Utah to hear him sing with the MoTabs.)
There is so much fun in this busy Christmas season. I love it. Christmas is for parents--it is so great to watch the kids having fun.

Thanksgiving

Since the 'holiday season' is Nathan's busy season at work, we don't often get to spend it with family. This year my family decided to join us for Thanksgiving right here. Boy am I spoiled! I love you guys. My boys talked about Grandma and Grandpa and cousins coming for weeks. And they are already talking about a visit to Utah. The Brady Inn doesn't have a lot of room, so we felt so blessed to have our friends the Arnolds offer their home to my family (It worked out nicely, because they were out of town while my family was in). I told Daniel and Liam that Grandma and Grandpa would be staying at (their friend) Alaina's house. They didn't understand at first. They couldn't understand why their grandparents were going to their friends' house and not theirs. It cracked me up trying to explain it all.

They got in very late (or early, depending on how you look at it). So Thursday we spent talking and cooking, while the guys watched a game or two. We tried to watch the Macy's Parade, but were disappointed because they didn't spend any airtime on the cool balloons that we had told all of the kids about. They spend the whole parade trying to hype actors from new TV series--I don't follow actors/actresses and I was as bored as the kids--show us the giant balloons, cool floats, and the marching bands! It was nice to have the Arnold's oven in addition to ours. I love the turkey dinner. I never make gravy and that was a yummy treat. Of course my mom made delicious pies. She wasn't satisfied with them because the pumpkin was from a can, but they still beat everything else. During the cooking, the cousins ran in and out playing and getting treats. Emily and I started sending them out running laps for a chocolate chip. It was so nice to be together.





The next day we sent the guys to the zoo with the kids (which has always been free the day after Thanksgiving--but wasn't this year!). I think they had fun, but missed us girls a lot. Daniel got Grandpa to take lots of pictures of animals for him.


Meanwhile, we girls took advantage of our break and had a girls' day out. (Which for a mom of 3 boys was heaven sent.) I decided to take my mom and sisters to Old Folsom to peruse the shops. I tried on hats with my mom (one of our favorite things to do together--I have a bit of a hat fetish). My sisters and I had so much fun together. We went in some antique shops, boutiques, and a few other shops on the path. We were talking and laughing most of the way. We took some silly pictures, including Emily as Princess Leia, and a flower child. Saw books about real witches and the effects of fuzzy red slippers. Then my mom introduced me to one of the finer things in life...Gelato! Yummy. A little bit goes a long way. I love ice cream and frozen yogurt, but Gelato is in a league all its own. I had the dark chocolate. It was like eating frozen fudge brownie mix. I also had the pumpkin. Also yummy. (You can be sure, one of the next date nights we go on, will be for Gelato.) Then I took the girls to Old Fair Oaks to a few additional shops (that aren't much fun when you are worried about what 3 boys are touching-or breaking). Mom got us each a few Christmas decorations. We about doubled over reading some great cards. I don't like mushy cards--it doesn't seem heartfelt when a total stranger writes the message. Funny cards, on the other hand are an entirely different matter. I love them. (Nathan has been known to buy me a totally mushy card as a joke.) Honestly, the fun we had together that afternoon, made the whole trip worthwhile. I would love to live closer to my sisters and Mom. We would love to have one day a month to just relax and go out with the girls. I came home feeling totally rejuvenated. What a great day.

The guys were nearly exhausted, so we all went out for dinner at the Spaghetti Factory.


The next day we weren't sure if our company was staying or going. The Arnolds had to schedule an early return due to weather, so part of the day was spent packing and cleaning up (Mom got a little carried away cleaning-and left everything spotless). Once that was taken care of we decided to go to the Capital to take family pictures. Of course it was raining, so there were very few places dry enough for a picture outside. It is so difficult to get a happy family picture. My boys seem to think that family picture is synonymous with torture. Daniel started out really upset, then we went inside and unbeknownst to us, Liam was pulling faces in the pictures that the rest of us were smiling in. Then back outside and Caleb decided after just a couple of shots that he was done. After the torture session we tried to go see Tangled, but it was sold out. So we went back home and played Apples to Apples and ate pizza. What a great game. We had a lot of laughing. At the end of the game someone suggested that the cards we won described us. My sisters held cards like beautiful, charming, feminine, honest. I held the most cards but they were things like grumpy, miserable, boring, cold, difficult. Yikes! It was pretty funny.




By this time, the family decided to stay the night in hopes of avoiding the storm in Donner Pass. They got one hotel room and then Andrea and Paul stayed with us. Unfortunately, in all of the chaos, the Arnold's key disappeared and we were all stressed out looking for it. We had to tell the Arnolds that we weren't sure where it ended up, and were so relieved when they told us 'no biggie'. My family had left them lots of toilet paper and the new Thomas Monson book as a thank you. Their brother had lost 2 or 3 of their keys. What amazing friends. --It did turn up in a bag of stocking stuffers that Grandma left for the boys. (But not for a week.)


I tried calling my family as they traveled back to check on their progress and found out that my sister had hit a patch of black ice and slid off the road, hitting another car and rendering the truck undrivable. No one was hurt. The other driver was caravaning back to BYU and said that his car was old and falling apart anyway. (So nice.) They were delayed about 6 hours or so and made it back in a rental at 6 in the morning! Then they had to drive back to Elko to retrieve the truck a few days later after it had been worked on. Nathan and I felt so bad. Here our family had come so far out of their way to visit and it ended on a bad note again. (On previous visits, my dad cut his hand to the point of needing surgery, someone hit their car and ran, my dad got really sick and had to get a blessing...the list goes on and on.) I worry every time that my dad will decide he's had enough. No more visiting. My dad assured us that we're worth it, but I feel horrible. He said that it could have been much worse, which of course he was right--at least no one was hurt. I guess this is one time that we need to revisit our Thankful list and count our blessings. Hopefully, we haven't scared off visitors for next time.