Birthday Girl!

This week has been getting everything finished and ready for Christmas and Emily's Birthday. Emily has been out of school, and the kids have enjoyed having the run of the house. I was feeling better from being sick starting Tuesday, and I think now that is Sunday again, that I am finally feeling better.

Monday Dec. 14
Emily and Nathan took it easy today because I was still feeling yucky and started out by watching Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory with Johnny Depp-Emily's favorite movie. They decided to empty the toys out of the baskets and sit in them. Then after the movie, Nathan bumped into Emily who had an open bottle of red fingernail polish, and it spilled on the tile. Robby and I quickly got out the nail polish remover, and started wiping it up. We got most of it off, with only a small light pink spot.





Tuesday Dec. 15
Today I ran errands this morning with Emily. Emily and I had a good conversation about death and I was able to talk about the Plan of Salvation and that we can be with the ones we love after we die. She was in tears knowing that she would miss her Gran-Nana, but grateful she could see her again because Jesus was resurrected and then she started crying because she misses Jesus. It was a great conversation that brought us closer together. After the kids went to bed I made Amish Friendship bread. Yummy!



Wednesday Dec. 16
Tonight Robby got his new toy. Intouch Technology now has a UPS battery that is an uninteruptable power supply that will run for an estimated 30 minutes after the power goes out for us to safely shutdown our server farm. It came on it's own pallet, and easily ways over 70 pounds. Robby tried to give himself a hernia trying to pick it up!



Thursday Dec. 17
We ran a major errand run today. We went to the post office, the dollar store, Wal-mart and Fry's. On the way home I treated us to Whopper Jr.'s and onion rings at Burger King. We don't eat at fast food restaurants very often, and the onion rings have been a big craving of mine.



Friday Dec. 18
I had to return something to Wal-mart so I picked up a "birthday surprise" for Emily of Popcorn Shrimp. When I got home she proceeded to take the breading off, eating the breading, then eating the little shrimp. She was so dedicated in her work too!



Saturday Dec. 19
Robby had to wire a new outlet for the UPS battery, so he took down the server farm and went for it. I'm so grateful he is talented in so many ways. Tonight we went to the temple and watched mom and her singing group perform. The temple lights are always so pretty, and even with the large crowds, it was great walking around with my little family and enjoying the Christmas season.







Sunday Dec. 20
Today is Emily's 5th birthday. I can't believe my baby is so big! She got a call during breakfast from my mom who sang her Happy Birthday. Church today was filled with the Spirit of Christmas and I shed many tears as the spirit touched my heart. This afternoon my family came over and we had a little party for Emily. She wanted a candle in her ice cream instead of cake. She was blessed with many wonderful gifts: I Spy Books (Jessica/Michael), Headbands (Nathan), Leapster2 and TinkerBelle game (Kathryn), Color Wonder Fingerpaints (My Mom), Puzzle and Dress Up (Mommy and Daddy), Pretend Hair Dryer, curling iron, hair/beauty stuff (Gran-Nana), 6 $1 bills (Granny Pat) and we're waiting for a package to come from Nanny and Papa. After the party Nanny called and talked to Emily to wish her a happy birthday. We delivered some Christmas gifts and then our Home Teachers came over. Emily was so excited from the day that she didn't want to go to bed!





We took another 4 Generation tonight. This is the first picture we took Christmas Eve 2004, when Emily was 4 days old. Look how little she was!

Whirlwind of a week

Well, it's Sunday again and life is flying by. I saw a post on Facebook that said "I wish time would drive like an old grandma, not fly." That is exactly how I feel, especially at this time of year.

Sunday Dec. 6

Today we went to mom's house and decorated gingerbread houses. This year mom bought premade gingerbread kits. Mom/Kathryn had a sleigh with Santa and reindeer, Michael/Jessica had a house and our family had a train. Right before we started to decorate, Nathan walked up to me, said mom, and then emptied his stomach of his dinner all over the floor. Thank goodness it was tile! We got that cleaned up and started decorating. We laughed, ate too much candy and just had fun being together. Emily got to feed Allison her bottle which made Emily feel like such a big girl!

Monday Dec. 7
Today it rained most of the day. We stayed inside and enjoyed watching it rain and spent the day trying to stay warm. It definitely felt like winter! The internet/cable/phone went in and out all day, so Robby had Cox come out and fix it. Well, at 11:45pm, the power went out for about 15-20 minutes. That reset all the work Cox had done to make the internet/cable/phone function properly. But it made for a lot of business this week because people needed things fixed because of all the rain! (I forgot to take a picture of the rain Monday, but lucky I found one on the internet somone took that day!-Thank you to whoever you are!) We dealt with internet/cable/phone craziness all week until Cox came back out on Friday.

Tuesday Dec. 8

Today I packaged up all 8 packages to be mailed out. My family room looked like a packaging place blew up in there! I'm glad that's done! Now to mail them!

Wednesday Dec. 9
Today I mailed 7 of the 8 packages. I can now say I have to file bankruptcy! No, I'm just kidding, but it did hit the bank pretty hard. The kids and I met my friend Marianne and her daughters EmmaLee and Maycee at the mall. The kids played on the indoor playground and then we had lunch. We had a great time being with friends and none of us wanted to get back to real life! We have too much fun playing!

Thursday Dec.10
Tonight I worked on our Christmas gifts. This year for our neighbor, friend and family gifts, we are giving them caramel dip. I got the idea from this blog: http://www.browniescraps.com/blog/2009/11/13/friday-freebie-7/. Robby doesn't like that I turn the house into a humidifier every time I do this! I even had the vent on, and we opened the doors for a few minutes too. I finished them completely on Friday during the day so that we could have the doors open. In Sunday's Relief Society lesson they had Gifts for Christ by President Howard W. Hunter on the board, and I knew I wanted to recreate it and give it to our friends. I loved how it is shaped like a Christmas tree, that's what caught my attention. So, for you friends and family that will be getting one, just act surprised when you get it!

Friday Dec. 11
Today was full of cooking and getting ready for the weekend. I finished boiling all the caramel dips, made sugar cookies and frosting for the ward party, and did a bit of house cleaning. Tonight we had our ward Christmas party. The activities committee always does a great job with the program, decorations and refreshments. I got to sing with the Young Men/Young Women choir, Emily sang with the children's choir, Nathan was a grump that didn't want to sit still, and Robby had fun running the ice cream maker with a few of the other men there. The kids were able to sit on Santa's lap, and they actually took good pictures for me! We sat with the Gleasons and found out Shawna is having TWINS!!! I'm so excited for her! We waited in line for ice cream and Santa with them also, and you can tell that Rhett and Emily are good friends. Emily talks of him often because they have preschool together. Nathan has started a funny new habit. He loves to have his picture taken, and then see himself on the little LCD screen on the camera. If pull out the camera, he'll say "Cheese" and hold his hands up near his face. It's rare to catch him with him holding his hands down!

Saturday Dec. 12

I spent the majority of the day getting ready for the Pew family Christmas party we had at our house tonight. I didn't get everything done I wanted, but the party turned out great. I always love getting together with family and catching up with everyone's life. I finally finished decorating the house today (parties are good for that!), and made a texas sheet cake, and chicken enchilada soup. I went to bed with a little bit of a sick stomach, thinking it was because of all the soup I ate. Boy was I wrong!

Sunday Dec. 13
Last night the stomach bug hit me. Knocked me out! I have been achy all day, with fun times spent with the toilet. I have been able to sleep most of the day, and even though it's 9pm, and I don't usually go to sleep till midnight, I'm ready to crawl back in bed and stay there until morning. Robby was awesome today and let me sleep and kept the kids occupied so they wouldn't come in my room and wake me up. I'm praying that I wake up tomorrow feeling better because I don't do the achy/sore/sicky body very well!

Modern Molly Mormon Giveaway

This is a great giveaway! Modern Molly Mormom (http://modernmollymormon.blogspot.com/) is giving away TWO Food Storage Made Easy binders! What a great way to plan, track and organize your food storage! I want one!!!! :)

Go and post a comment for your chance to win! This contest ends Thursday December 10 and the winner will be randomly chosen on Friday December 11. http://modernmollymormon.blogspot.com/2009/12/food-storage-made-easy-giveaway.html

Christmas Preparations

I have turned a new leaf in my life and am now perfect! HAHAHAHAHAHA! Now that you've had a good laugh, let me tell you what I've really been up to lately. For Relief Society's Enrichment meeting in November, the theme was "Simplify the Season". That was a real kick in the behind to me. I not only need to simply the holiday season, which I always overdo, but I need to simplify my life in general. The first thing I decided to do was create a task list for me to accomplish my to-do's a little each day. If you want to know all the boring details, let me know. But in general I have a specific load of laundry and two other things to do each day. They range from cleaning to organizing and writing thank you notes and sending out thank you cards. I got the idea from this website: http://sherbetblossom.blogspot.com/2009/10/cleaning-system-explained.html I put my own spin on it, made up some cute cards, printed, laminated, and purchased 3 black wood easles to put them on. The three cards (morning routine, daily task list, night routine) sit on the window sill over my sink to look at each day. I did really well Monday, but went downhill the rest of the week. This is a new week, so I plan to do better!


One of the new things I am doing is each day I will take a picture of what we are doing, big or small. Then on Sundays I will post about each day of the week and what we have been doing. That way I know every Sunday I update, and it's easy to remember and not a stress of "I've forgotten the blog for way to long and there's too much to remember, so I'll just forget it some more." Plus, who doesn't want to see pictures of my cute kids? LOL I'm excited for this because it is also a great way for me to track this as a journal entry of sorts.


Sunday Nov. 29
Today we went to a missionary farewell for one of my Young Women's leaders, Linda Crandall. She and her husband will be serving an 18 month mission in Birmingham, England. Then we came home and Robby set up the tree, with Emily watching with great excitement.




Monday Nov. 30
Today I started my new task list. I finished all my chores, but since it was a 'start from scratch' day and not a maintenance day, it took way too long, and by the end of the day I was major grumpy.




Tuesday Dec. 1
In preparation for Evening in Excellence tomorrow night, I was one of the leaders over Food Group 1. We made sugar cookies and frosted them. I for some reason have always been afraid of making sugar cookies. So I have never made sugar cookies or frosting by myself. But I learned tonight that they are so easy to make!




Wednesday Dec. 2
We had Evening in Excellence for Young Women's tonight. The theme was "Faith of our Father" and we focused on our ancestors and their stories. I was really touched, and I felt a great desire to learn more of the stories behind my ancestor's lives. Today to organize my life better, I created a little folder that has 4 pockets: Calendar, To Do, Projects, Notes. Now I can carry it with me in my purse, and have it at all times if I need to cross something off my to do list, or write down something I don't want to forget. I'm really excited that I created something crafty! :)






Thursday Dec. 3
While playing outside today, Emily fell on the dead grass and and scratched up her face. We put neosporin on it, and it's healing nicely. She looks like she's been scratched by a cat! Tonight we made our first fire of the season. It was more fun to take pictures than to watch daddy try to make the firewood cooperate with him! Emily and I were laughing so hard by the time we finished making faces into the camera. This is one of my favorite pictures of Emily and me.






Friday Dec. 4
Tonight we decorated the tree. Emily was so excited to help decorate our tree because she got to help decorate Nana's tree last Friday with Aunt Kathryn and Nana. Emily did a great job and was sad when we had put all the ornaments on the tree.



Saturday Dec. 5
Today we went to Falcon Field and the Arizona Wing of the Commemorative Air Force Museum. We were able to donate some toys and canned food, take a picture with Santa and Mrs. Claus, climb onto a firetruck and look at all the old war airplanes. The museum had a little airplane that they kids could pedal around. Emily absolutely loved it, and Nathan was frustrated that his legs were too short to reach the pedals. Both never wanted to get out and wished we could take the little airplane home. Then tonight we cleaned up the yard and hung the outside Christmas lights. Emily tried pushing the lawn mower and went about 3 steps before she stopped. Robby was bummed because he's ready for her to take over the lawn care! LOL Last year Robby's parents bought Nathan this Air Force jacket and he wore it for the first time tonight because it was SOOOOOOOOO cold outside and he's finally big enough to wear it! He loved it!