Thanksgiving....

I LOVE Thanksgiving. I think mostly because I get to eat mashed potatoes and gravy. A lot of people don't get it. They think you can have mashed potatoes any time you want. Which I guess is true, but you can't always have my mom's gravy. We had mashed potatoes and gravy almost every Sunday growing up. Now that I don't live at home, it is always a treat when I get them since I don't dare attempt the gravy. (Actually I did once and it was not so good so I don't want to do it again.) Anyway.............we had a great Thanksgiving. It was so fun. I love getting together with family. We always have so much fun even when we just sit around and do basically nothing. It's nice to have people you can do that with and still enjoy it. We had a great feast with ALMOST all of us there (we missed you Trista and Terry, Sabrina and Blake). It consisted of potatoes and gravy (have I mentioned I love potatoes), turkey (of course), stuffing, homemade rolls, salads, corn, an apple and pumpkin dish, jello, and probably some other things. We were all full by the end but there's always room for pie on Thanksgiving. We had about 4 chocolate pies (2 chocolate and 2 peanut butter chocolate - we love our chocolate) lemon meringue, pumpkin, fluffy key lime pie (without the key), banana cream, some berry cobbler dessert, and ice cream (probably missing something here, too). My family loves to eat. We can't get together without having a feast and this year was no different.

These were the cute place setters Cassie and the girls made. We all had a kick out of them and Evan carried his around all day.

The adult tables

The kid table. Kamri's in the upper right hand corner in a high chair.

It was a great Thanksgiving. I am grateful for the wonderful family I have who love me and accept me and like to have me around and who I can be my complete silly self. I'm thankful for beautiful kids who are quick too say "I love you" and who make me laugh every day. I'm grateful for a husband who is always making sure my needs are taken care of. Who is willing to take the kids to work with him if need be so I can stay home sick in bed. I am grateful for Ben's job - #1 that he has one and #2 that it is less than 5 minutes away so we get to see him during the day. I'm grateful for friends from all times of my life who still cross my mind everyday and for the things I learned from each of them. I'm grateful for cars, our home, running warm water, clothing, blankets, slipper socks, pajamas, and many more. And I am grateful for the Savior and the peace I feel when I think about him and his love for me. Happy Thanksgiving (even though a little late) to all of you.

Happy Birthday Gina

As many of you know, November 30th is Gina's 28th birthday. I think it would be neat if you could leave a comment on this post and let her know how you feel about her. Or, you can write your favorite memory of her. Or maybe let her know a time that she helped you out. Whatever it is, let's make sure Gina knows that we love her and we think she is wonderful.

A trip to the dentist

Sara had an adult tooth growing in behind her baby tooth that wasn't even loose. So we took her to the dentist today and they pulled out the baby tooth. She said she only felt a little tug. She was very brave. I was so proud of her. Way to go Sara!!

Getting some laughing gas

the numbing shot - OUCH!!

pulling the tooth out

she looks cute even with the marks from the laughing gas tube

we went to show off her tooth to Daddy at work

BEFORE

AFTER

School spirit

Ok, so I grew up a Ute fan but have since become a Y fan. To tell you the truth, I really don't care all that much, but you have to pick someone to cheer for, right? Anyway, for the big game on Saturday we had some fun with Evan's hair. I was cutting Evan's hair when Ben had the bright idea of putting a "Y" on his head. So, I just cut it a little shorter than I was going to and left some on in the shape of a "Y".

My family (who are all "U" fans by the way) told me "the prophet wouldn't approve" and even had Sara cheering for the "U" during the game and Kamri saying "Go Utes". Maybe I jinxed BYU with the "inappropriate" hair do, but it was fun anyway and Evan felt cool.

We had to paint it blue

Don't worry, I had the "Y" shaved off before church on Sunday. His hair is so light he now looks bald.

Date Night with Daddy

Thursday night Ben took Evan out for a Father's Night Out. He took him to the 1st Annual Blue and Red Flag Football game. He was so excited to go with just him and his dad. They met up with our friend Scott and his kids Charles and Elisabeth. When he got home, Evan had a huge smile on his face. He had a great time. BYU won so according to the radio that means Utah's going to pull off the win at the big game today.

After the game they got to rush the field and play for little while. Here's Evan with Charles and Scott in the background.

FYI - While they were gone, I took Sara and Kamri with me so I could play in our stake's volleyball tournament. It was fun (and tiring) but our ward won!!!! Go Wandamere!!!

Who doesn't love donuts?

We had our Young Women in Excellence program this week. The theme was "Following the Light of the Savior" (or something like that). It was decorated in lighthouses. For the refreshments they asked me to decorate 4 dozen donuts to look like life preservers and put together the drink. I enlisted Ben and his mom to help me paint (with frosting) the lines on the donuts. It only took us about half an hour. It would have taken me about 2 hours without their help. Thanks.

The drink was just a mixture of pineapple juice with a little lemon lime soda. It was actually prett good. Next time I would use a little less soda.

On the radio...

Tuesday morning Sara's and her class were on the radio saying the Pledge of Allegiance. The week before someone from Kbull 93 came and recorded them - on his cell phone. It was played at 7:00 am so we made sure we, the kids, and Grandma were all up to listen to it. We all gathered in our bedroom (where the only radio is) and snuggled up under Ben's cozy Red Sox blanket.. She was really excited. It was fun, although maybe a little too early.

Just a cute picture taken that morning. We can do Ben's and Kamri's hair the same (don't worry - it didn't stay that way). And look, she is actually smiling and not puckering up her lips.

Late Monday night Ben left to go workout at the gym. When I woke up Tuesday morning these were on the table. They were beautiful and the card was amazing. He hates cards and thinks they're a waste of money (I might have to agree with him on that) but he did it anyway. It was awesome.

Grandma

Last Sunday Ben left us to fly to Nauvoo to drive his mom back from her mission. (Maye he'll post some pictures from his trip later). He was gone from Sunday to Thursday. We missed him. Thanks to my mom for coming and spending a couple days and nights with me so I wouldn't have to do this mom thing by myself :) We got our basement a little more organized. Thanks for the help mom!!

The kids love having Grandma here and I hope she didn't mind their constant attention either.

This is Ben's family's official game. It is played almost every night their family gets together. They are all way too good and take it so seriously it's hard for me to enjoy so I usually read or do chores while it is being played. The last game they played had to have been the longest Scrabble game EVER.

The newest addition to our BIG family...

Friday afternoon the newest addition to my family clan arrived. My brother and sister-in-law had their fourth child - a beautiful baby girl named Josephine Joy. She is beautiful. We went to see her Saturday afternoon and due to a dirty diaper by Kamri we had to cut our visit short so I definitely did not get to hold her long enough. Cassie, I may be driving up someday to visit her (and you too of course). With so many other people wanting to hold her, I know I will not get enough of her in her newborn stage. They don't stay that way long enough!!

Kamri was having so much fun with her and was making all of us laugh.

You can kind of see it in the picture of Kamri, but Koy blew up some doctor's gloves for the kids and drew some faces on them. They loved them. You'd think he was a doctor or something :).

Let it snow, Let it snow, Let it snow....

A couple weeks ago we had our first real snow storm with enough snow to play in. It has since melted and gets pretty warm, but it was fun while it lasted. The kids had fun tackling dad and throwing snowballs at me and Kamri when we would venture outside.

Kamri couldn't go out and play because I didn't have any boots for her yet so we watched from our back window. I have since bought her some boots so she can go out and join in the fun next time. (But I am definitely not hoping for more any time soon)

Actual Halloween!!!

So it's been two weeks since Halloween but I haven't gotten around to blogging about our Halloween activities on the actual holiday. We had a wonderful night at my parents house. My mom provided some games for the kids and she and Cassie provided a craft. We also had lasagna and breadsticks - our traditional Halloween dinner.

Ding Dong spiders

Pumpkin bats

Not sure what this one is called, but they had to bounce

the little eyeball balls into the cups

Stick the wart on the witch with bubble gum

The kids waiting for their turn with the cup game

The trick-or-treaters

...with some of the adults

This was their stash. The picture doesn't do it justice. There was tons. After about 4 times trick-or-treating they had a good size pile of candy We split it up into two piles. One of stuff Ben and I didn't want them to have and the good stuff in one pile. We let them chose 10 pieces each from the "good stuff" pile. The rest Ben took to work and the "not to be consumed" pile went to the trash. We were going to find a dentist to sell it to, but I couldn't find one.

My husband

Yes, this is a post about my Ben, but I promise I will put as little cheese as possible. I just wanted to let the world know how appreciative I am of my wonderful husband.

I'm always saying Ben is just a big kid. Proof, he LOVES to climb trees. Last week he and our neighbor got a couple of balls stuck up in the tree out front. They were HIGH. The picture below shows just how high he had to climb to shake the limbs to get the balls to fall out. I have become such a scaredy cat as I have gotten older so I was scared he was going to fall the whole time.

The culprits

Other reasons from the last week I think he is great....

he painted Sara's fingernails for her when I didn't want to

He woke up early one morning last week and made me my favorite breakfast - bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit sandwiches. He had to fry the bacon and all. I love the smell of bacon and I got to smell it ALL day long. Mmmmm!!!

Tuesday night he folded ALL 4 loads of laundry while I was out with some friends. (wish I had taken a picture of the mounds of clothes)

And last night he got up all night (I don't know how many times) with Evan and Kamri when they were up sick. I couldn't get out of bed - sorry. (I'm sure you don't want to see any pictures of what he had to clean up.)

Thanks babe. I love you!!