Merry Christmas 2010

Since we send Christmas cards this year, here is an electronic one. The sweet potatoes:

Midgie McDoodle:

C-boy:

We hope it's a great one for y'all!

(A girl in our ward wants some photography practice, so she took these for us)

Jenny Jr.

Notice the shoes . . .

And the womens' tube shirt she's made into a dress . . .

Not taking after me as I am now, mind you, but as I dressed up when I was her age with my BFF Lisa Williams. Thank goodness she had a stylish lady to get dress ups from, cuz them ain't mine!

P.S. Can you tell our Christmas rush is through with all the posts I've been doing??

Decisions . . .

The anal side of me thinks we should be doing school this week because we aren't halfway through our books. It drives me nuts that we aren't. That's why I should never be a real school teacher.

The fun mom in me is trying to break out and say, Let's take the whole week off! We have our monthly baptism for the dead tomorrow, Jon has surgery on Wed. etc. etc. Plus our doorbell just rang - at 9 am. The neighbor kids ready to play for the day. I guess that settles that!

December = BUSY!

All month I've been making lists and checking it twice so here is my list in pics:

1. Tree up (Jon trying to fix the top lights and the kids not being able to wait). Check.

2. Stockings hung by the chimney with care (ok, I thought they were in this pic). Check.

3.Gingerbread houses made. Check.

4. Annual picture of Collin about to "eat" his house. Check.

5. Visit fam. Check. Jons brother Dave and his family had a layover in Dallas on their way from Hawaii to Chile, so we rented a ginormous van and went up to spend the day with them.

6. Ditto on #5. We visited the Dallas Zoo. Very cool. Check.

7. Get Collin to test for the next rank level in Tae Kwon Do. Check.

8. Daily advent calendar. Definitely check. One of the highlights of the Christmas season when I was little and for the kids too.

9. Sunday Advents. Check. This is what happens when you go to make Peanut Blossoms (best Advent cookie out there) Sunday afternoon and realizing that even though you have passed bags and bags of Hershey's Kisses dozens of times in the last week, you forgot to buy some. Thank goodness I found a bar of Hershey's, some M&M's and some other chocolate.

10. Get a cold. Check. I thought I might as well put in on my list so I could at least check it off. So nice to have kids who are old enough to do most of the Advent readings when you're sick!

11. Daily orders. Daily errands. Check. This is from a slow day and doesn't include UPS orders or foreign ones. Sooooo looking forward to the Christmas Rush being through.

Things I haven't done:

1. Christmas cards. And doesn't look likely to happen this year. A first!

2. Watched our whole collection of Christmas movies. That WILL happen.

3. Made neighbor treats. Not sure what to do this year, but still most likely it will happen.

4. Decluttered the house. Probably after Christmas.

5. I'm sure a bunch of other things, but too worn out to think of them. Looking forward to sitting and relaxing next week!!

Thankful

photo found on zdnet.com.au

Today I am very grateful for something I always took for granted until lately. Today I am very grateful to live in this modern day and age with all the advances in medicine and technology. My baby girl went to the doctor yesterday and got tested for Celiacs Disease. In 3 years she had only gained 10 pounds from feeling "yucky" all the time. I'm grateful that doctors know about this disease and that she's getting tested for it while she's still so young. It's also SO much easier to be Gluten Free these days than when I was young.

Jon will be so glad to hear me say what else I am grateful for . . . my iPhone 4. I have griped numerous times that no one NEEDS movies on a cell phone or games etc. It just contributes to being "Heavily Dependent on Electronic Devices" (there is a GREAT story behind that quote). Well, I ate those words yesterday when I had the brilliant idea to have Grace watch a movie while they took her blood. It helped her be distracted and me to not be so nervous for her. And later when I was trying to find Sprinkles cupcakes so she could get a Gluten Free cupcake, I used my uber fast phone to find directions to it so I didn't get lost.

We can't wait to skype with our family this afternoon, and we couldn't do it without technology, so I am very grateful for the internet and to have a computer so I can see our families today while still being 1500 miles from them. Yay for technology!!

Sunshine Boats . . .

Bangers and Mash . . . kind of upside down Sunshine Boats

I grew up in the hick town of Springville. I don't know if Sunshine Boats were a Springville thing but no one else I ever tell about these (not that I tell a lot of people) has ever heard about them. Maybe the lunch ladies got the recipe from one of their ancestors or something. I like to think that. I'm sure they really just made it up after having leftovers and wondering what to do with them. But let me live in my own little world. At the beginning of every month when the new school lunch menu came out I would look for Sunshine Boats and count down the days. We took our sack lunches every day, but once in a while we got to eat school lunch (for 35 cents!) and I lobbied hard on Sunshine Boat day.

So, what are Sunshine Boats?? Think Bangers and Mash with cheese. Or think a split hot dog (Art City Elementary used these long, skinny, spicy, red hot dogs) with 2 ice cream scoops of mashed potatoes, sprinkled with cheddar cheese and broiled till browned. Mmmmmmmm. Every few years when I have some leftover mashed potatoes I need some and today was one of those days. If you feel like making some, here's what you need:

Hot Dogs (Oscar Meyer is the best)

Leftover (or new) Mashed Potatoes,warm

Sharp Cheddar Cheese

I like to brown the hot dogs on the outside, split them and brown the inside. Put 2 nice sized scoops of potatoes on top and sprinkle with cheese. Broil until cheese is browned.

Homesick . . .

Exactly a year ago I went up to Utah so my sisters and I could kidnap my mom for the weekend to celebrate her birthday.

Can we make that a new tradition? I know it was for moms birthday, but it did wonders for me. My family are my best friends and I miss you guys! I miss our lunches, family dinners, running into you at the store and honking every time we drove by moms house. Thank goodness my "little" sister Ems is coming here next week! We can't wait!

Silk Road Mummies

Did you know I was going to major in Archaeology at "Uni"? I subscribed to Archaeology magazines in High school and studied all I could. Then I got to BYU and realized that my lifelong desire wasn't really what I wanted. I wanted to study living people, not dead ones, so I switched to Anthropology, but I still have a love of artifacts and especially mummies.

At our Natural History Museum there is a really interesting exhibit called Secrets of the Silk Road. We are one of only 3 museums in the US to be getting this exhibit and it was really interesting. I couldn't take pictures and didn't even think of taking any of the kids before or after, so you'll have to do with these pictures of a couple of the mummies. This one is a baby but the main one, The Beauty of Xiaohe (this is a link with pictures and good info) was too scary for Grace to look at so I won't put it on here either.

The kids favorite part was the 4,000 year old mummified spring roll, wanton, and flower cookies. Ok. I liked them too.

Flashback Monday

I found this a few weeks ago and keep chuckling about it, so I thought I'd share. Where has the time gone??? When I showed this to Collin he said, "Oh boy . . . who is that?" His jaw dropped when I told him it was him. Wasn't he the cutest chub o' love??

Hello November!

No, this isn't what it looks like where we live. It's suppose to get to 88 today and set a new record, and leaves don't turn colors here, but I can always dream right?

My Christmas shopping is 3/4's done, a "cold" front is coming this week and Grace has a cold, so it feels almost like fall should! Have a happy Autumn.