Christmas Morning

Christmas, sleep overs, and more...

This month for Aunt Kari's Fun Night I had the nieces and only one nephew over for a fun filled night. We started off with a yummy dinner of Sweet Pork burritos and then watched movies all night and made sugar cookies and decorated them. It was tons of fun. I had them all sleep over this night since it was during Christmas break and we had yummy chocolate chip waffles the next morning, then I painted the girls toes and decorated them with cute snowmen for the holiday. Then their mom came and took them all home. It was so much fun and I look forward to the next sleep over we have!!

Fun Movie watching

Here is a cute video of Asher dancing very short but cute.

Ella with her cookies.

This was last months Aunt Kari Night.

I had the kids over to eat yummy dinner, Homemade Personal Pizzas, paint rocks with pictures of things we are thankful for and to watch a movie. Lots of fun.

I love doing my Aunt Kari Nights!!!

Cute cousins in matching pj's

Angie with her ladybug rock

sorry for the blurry picture.

They also made lots of different clay/playdough objects.

This is Ellas??

Sunny's bug

Logan built a whole scene of things

This was the entire rock collection when we were done.

Christmas Eve

Asher enjoying his dinner.

On Christmas Eve we always go over to my parents house to celebrate and open gifts. This night we played out the Nativity scene while reading the story from the scriptures. It was lots of fun.

Here is Dallin as the Angel before he changed his mind and no longer wanted to be an Angel, although I think he makes quite a cute angel I wish he would have kept it on longer!!

All the actors in character.

Dallin decided to be the star.

My brother and his fiance with their boy Sol played

Joseph, Mary and Jesus

Doesn't she make a beautiful Mary?!?

Bryant played the part of the Hulk Shepard. He loves loves loves to dress up and be in character as you may have noticed from earlier posts and this was how he wanted to play the part as the "Hulk Shepard". My silly son, I sure did get a good laugh out of it though.

THis is one of my super cute nephews, Grant, my sister's little boy.

He is one month older than Asher.

Santa stopped by to say hello, on Grammy and Papa's roof, he made sure the boys were being good and then went on his way. The boys loved it and were sure to get in their requests for presents. Here is Dallin telling him he wants an Ironman toy.

Grammy and Papa got the boys these cool scooter's. They love love love them!!!

And Asher got a awesome Lowe race car.

Papa and Asher

Another cute nephew, Sol, I could just eat him up he's so yummy!!!

Christmas morning the boys loved their gifts and loved helping Asher with his.

We headed over to Grandma Gigi's for breakfast Christmas morning and played a few games on the Wii while we were there. Here is Bryant boxing.

I forgot to take pictures of our Christmas decorations until I started taking them down so here is a quick look at our decor for the holiday.

Christmas tree.

I made this cute sign to hang our stockings on and didn't realize I spelt stockINGS wrong until it was all done, bummer I still used it though I'll fix it next year.

Entry way mid-clean up.

We had a wonderful holiday.

But here is a pretty disappointing story. After Christmas we decided to head up to Eagar to see Corey's parents. He said he had Monday off at work because of the holiday so we thought we would head up after church and hang out with family for a couple days then come home. So we left our house around 1:30pm and took off for Eagar. We pulled over in Heber because Corey was getting tired and decided that I should drive. So after switching spots and I take off down the road about 2 miles into my drive I see a cop pass by turn on his lights and flip a U'y. So I automatically knew I was getting a ticket. I was speeding but didn't realize it cause we were just about to leave the small town we were in where the speed limit was going to change to allow for my excessive speed anyways... so when I saw him turn around I just pulled over and waited for him. He told me I was going too fast and gave me a ticket. Huge bummer, especially since I had just got into the driver seat minutes before being pulled over. So we go on our merry way to Grandma's house and get there around 5:45 and Corey check his work schedule which doesn't post until 6 the night before the work day, and guess what, he has to work Monday morning bright and early at 6:30am. That was a SUPER HUGE BUMMER!! So we ate a little dinner played a game of Yattze(sp?) and loaded the car back up and headed home. We were home by 12:00am and Corey got a few hours of sleep before heading to work. So it was a HUGE waste of time and an even Bigger waste of our money!!

Train park and Temple lights...

Last night we headed over to Scottsdale to the train park to see the cool lights and ride the train. The boys loved it but had a hard time with the length of the line. Dallin has no patience for those kinds of things.

The Cat in the Hat. My boys love watching his show but don't love getting up close with him for a photo. We pretty much had to force Dallin to get this close to him!

Above is a picture of Asher as we were waiting in line for the train. The other boys were off running around and playing at the park while I stood in line with Asher and we were having fun taking goofy pictures.

Below is how Dallin spent his time waiting in line, after we reached a certain point in the line all the boys had to get in line and wait and Dallin HATED every minute of it so he chose to wait like this.

Super excited to FINALLY be on the train, and we are ready to go!!

I L-O-V-E this picture. We were going at a nice speed on the train but according to the look on Asher's face you'd think we were on the most awesome fast flying roller coaster. He cracks me up. And Bryant looks pretty funny/scared too I might add.

Then last Friday night my family all went

out to eat and went to see the temple lights. It was tons of fun.

My favortie part was Bryant up on Papa's shoulders and the way we was describing everything. He loved pointing out all the colors and was so amazed at the beauty of all of the lights. Defiantly the highlight of my night at the temple!

Papa and John Bryant, best buds!

Family photo.

As you can see none of the boys were cooperating but I think it captures the "real" us.

This one's for you Aunt Jennie...

And these are just a couple more...

Too Funny...

Asher went down for a nap at 1 today.

I let the boys watch a quiet movie as soon as he went down to keep the noise to a minimum.

After the movie was over and Asher was still asleep I sent the boys outside to play to continue to keep the noise level down.

After 30 sec.'s Bryant, who is dressed up as a power ranger, comes running in the house telling me that Dallin wants to be a power ranger and that he wants to be spider man.

He found his spider man outfit outside.

After taking the power ranger outfit off of a dancing little Bryant I told him to go use the restroom and then he could be spider man.

Before he left the room completely I told him to be quiet in the bathroom cause Asher was asleep and I didn't want him to wake up.

So he yells from the bathroom,"Ok, Mom, I will, I'll be careful!"

I just had to laugh.

About 2 minutes later I got Asher out of bed.

Got love those moments, at least right now I do!

Asher Laughs

Anyone....

Anyone at all want to come over and be my sewing friend?? I have a terrible itch to sew something fun, creative, cute. I need some good ideas, oh what to make...what to make??

Fun Weekend Happenings...

This past Saturday we attended 3 different parties. It was a busy day but tons of fun.

Our first party was a Princess's Royal Ball.

The boys were dressed to impress even though it was for their cute cousin Ella. You never know who else will be at a Royal Ball right??

(I made Dallin's Prince charming outfit out of an old blanket we

had and one of his old shirts, it was too cute and way fun! Bryant was a brave and strong knight.)

This is the cake that I made for my cute niece Ella. Her request was that it be pink.

These are the cute cousin's together.

Our second party was our Ward Christmas party. The second counselor in the Bishopric put on the entertainment and it was fabulous. Sorry about the blurry picture. And the food was great. It was Tongan. Although I didn't eat as much as I would have liked because our next party was an adult dinner party.

So I totally forgot to take any pictures of our adult dinner party but Corey's siblings and all their spouses got together for a fun night of good food and fun. It was really great! My parents let me host it at their home since they have a big enough table for all ten of us to sit around. We served pork barbacoa and had delicious desserts. We then had a fun white elephant exchange and then play one of my most favorite games, Guestures (not sure if that is how you spell it?). It was lots of fun although we did miss our long lost brother and sister in Michigan, you guys need to move back!!!

It was a great day and I'm so glad I was able to spend it with lots of people I love!!

Why Mommies like to eat out...

and why Daddies don't.

Tonight as I was starting to prepare dinner...

My thoughts along the way were as follows...

Cranky kids, nice...

Get meat in the microwave...

Defrost...

Peel potatoes...

Almost peeled my finger...

Get potatoes going...

Baby crying...

Make eye contact with baby, make him smile...

continue to open cans of corn...

start them in their pot...

Baby crying again...

Stop dinner, make baby a bottle, sit with him a minute, lay him down to finish dinner...

check on steak in microwave...

fiddle with them a bit pick up baby that made his way over to you and is now crying or actually cried his whole way to you...

listen to older boys fighting...

trip on boxes that are now covering the entire floor of my kitchen...

check potatoes, set timer for 3 minutes cause that's when they'll be done...

stir corn...

wash a couple dishes, still holding baby...

hear, "Mom come wipe my bottom!"...

Go wipe a bottom one handed(holding baby)...

Timer goes off...

Run to kitchen wash one hand, put potatoes in strainer in sink...

Look for bowl to mix them in...

Find the bowl, it's the one that I wore as my robot shoe earlier today...

Wash out bowl, mash potatoes...

Get steaks out of microwave and season, one handed still holding baby...

Go start the grill, should have done that sooner...

Put baby down...

Listen to kids asking me over and over to watch a movie...

Start to put a movie on...

Dad says, "You shouldn't do that."...

Tell Dad that he shouldn't tell me that I shouldn't do that...

Watch steaks, get them off the grill when their done and...

Dinner is finally ready.

Now Daddy and family can sit down and eat a "better than Outback" steak dinner,

and Mommy will clean it all up when they are done.

And Daddy didn't have to fork out a minimum of $50 for it.

(I need to make it known that yes Corey was home, but he was planning his lesson's for work so pretty much he was still working he was just at home working.)

Penguins

This year my boys, nephews and Grandma were in a parade out at her community. Every year the golf community gets together and they decorate their golf carts and participate in this parade. This year we decorated my grandparents golf cart and had a theme of penguins. My grandma bought her outfit and I made the five little boys penguin costumes. It was so fun and the penguins were a major hit. Every where we went the people would say "oh look their goes the penguins". We won 3rd place in the contest which was fun and got us all pumped up for next year!!! Enjoy a few photos..

Busy, Busy, Busy!!!!

I need a minute to vent my craziness so if you don't want to hear about how crazy I think I am please just skip this post!!!

I love to do service. It is something that I rarely turn down and enjoy looking for. I don't mean to complain about the service that I do and I definitely don't want to stop doing service but I think I might be neglecting a few things in my life that I also find to be very important because I have an obsession with helping others.

Like for instance the cleanliness of my house. Holy cow, it has gone to pot!! I hate looking around and thinking how I need to catch up on the mounds and mounds of laundry or how I haven't mopped my floors in who knows how long and don't even get me started on the bathrooms and kitchen...

So today I decided that before I get to go help my grandma clean her house I was going to get back into the Saturday chore chart routine. HAHA, big fat joke!! Corey had to go to work this morning, which made it so that I couldn't go help my Grandma this morning, which in turn allowed me my Saturday morning chore chart routine to be put in place before I go help Grandma this afternoon, but not before I finish the wood letters I promised to have cut out by this afternoon for another lady. Anyways, it also meant that I was alone to do my Sat. Chore Chart with three needy, energetic boys.

I like to start outside the house, so we went outside to pick up outside toys together before mom mowed the lawn. I think I picked up 95% of the toys, my own fault I know, blah blah blah, Then I mowed the back and front yard and while in the front yard my boys ventured over to our neighbors house where he has been shoveling rocks from his front yard into his back yard for the last two days. The boys found this very fascinating and wanted to help HIM, not me. First off, I don't think my neighbor is a kid loving person. He doesn't smile at all and he told my kids to go get their shoes on, which they did right away, A-MA-ZING!!! I wish they listened that well to my requests and demands. After they, I mean I, put their shoes on them, Dallin ran outside to get his "garden" shovel to help him with his rocks. I kept telling Dallin he wasn't old enough or big enough to help with that kind of job. He kept telling me he was. Now remember I'm a BIG advocate for doing service right!! So I thought, like I usually do, how me denying him this opportunity to do an act of service might hinder his desire later in life to want to do service for others, crazy me always worrying about how what I say and do now is going to shape the kind of people they are going to be later in life, anyways, so I put down my broom and told myself that this service was more important for Dallin than my desire for a clean house was for me. So we went over to "grumpy and doesn't really like kids but is willing to put up with them" house and helped him shovel rocks for a while. Then about 5-8 minutes into it Dallin lost interest and just wanted to climb the rock mountains. I reminded him why we were there and that what he was doing wasn't really helping. Bryant however was doing a great job at shoveling rocks so I just told Dallin that it was important to help and kept shoveling right along side Bryant. I thought to myself how tricky Dallin had been to get me over there to help with the rocks. Maybe he knows how much I like to do service and that is why he drug me over there to help the guy out. Well after about 20 minutes or so of helping and Dallin climbing I decided we had done our neighborly duty and decided to drag Dallin back home kicking and screaming and pushing the stroller with Asher and Bryant following slowly behind. After Dallin hit me I decided that was means for a time out for the both of us. His was spent in his room, mine was spent folding clothes. Although Asher didn't think that was a very good time out for me so he decided it was time to scream and cry until I got up and took care of his needs.

Now I'm sitting here writing all this out and wasting my precious time to be cleaning.

Off to rotate the laundry and fold the huge mountain on my couch so that I can clean the floors and the bathrooms and the kitchen...

If you happen to come over to my house, which you probably won't because most people don't, so I'm not exactly sure why I'm so worried about having a clean house... but if you do come over please know that if my house is a complete pig sty it is because I'm trying to be the best mother I can be and also trying to help others along their way.

Asher says "More"

Asher talks, well sort of...