Thanksgiving

So my sister called me on Thanksgiving to remind me of this funny story from when I was first married. Andy's sister-in-law Marni and I had volunteered to bring all of the pies for the big day. At this point in my life (and now) I had very little experience in the kitchen but was under the impression that pie making was as simple as following a recipe. So I made my three pies - I was pretty proud of myself - they all looked edible enough. Then Marni comes in...now I should mention that Marni has that touch...I swear everything she touches turns out beautifully - she is just very gifted in the domestic arts - Well, she walks in with her three pies and I felt like a halo was shining down on her pies...they were so beautiful. It was so funny I wish I had a picture of the contrast between the two sets of pies - I think they all tasted good but I wasn't taking any credit for the pies I made :) I think I just let everyone think I had as much to do with the impressive ones and the "not-so-impressive" ones. I had completely forgotten about it until my sister called to tell me she was laughing about it as she made her pies this year.

At any rate, we had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We missed our family but filled the day with friends and fun traditions. We had 5 families over for a big feast -we all brought something and it was almost easy! Andy had bought a 21 pound Turkey and I felt like I was wrestling a heavy-weight most of the time but it turned out tasty all the same. We are so grateful this year for all we have been given. I've decided that this year I am going to try to apply President Monson's advice to find "Joy in the Journey" - we have so much to be thankful for!

Didn't Andy do a great job with the table. This is our before shot!

The beastly bird :)

This is our group!

The kids table...we borrowed this little table from the nursery :)

Andy with his eggnog - he loves this stuff!!

Calvin and Ethan trying to absorb all the noise...

From their dads who played RockBand on the Wii into the night :)

Go Utes!

This is how we went to church on Sunday morning. Nope, it's not because it's Christmas. If you need a hint: check out the prop in the picture. If you still don't know why...nevermind :)

Hannah Montana??

So I took the kids to McDonalds for lunchon Wednesday. As they were playing in the play area Tal walked up to a little girl and asked her, "Why do you have Hannah Montana on your shirt?" This may seem like a rather innocuous question but....HOW DOES MY FOUR-YEAR OLD KNOW WHO HANNAH MONTANA IS? Apparently, not only does he know who she is...but he is familiar enough to recognize her picture on a T-Shirt!!

This followed up a visit to Target on Tuesday where he excitedly exclaimed, "Look Sissy, it's the Dreamer Design Dollhouse!!" So this has to be commercialism at it's finest! I mean seriously either he is some sort of genius who can read packaging perfectly OR we watch WAYYY too much Nickelodeon. My sister blocked Nick from her TV because she was tired of hearing her son ask for things from their commercials...her decision is making a lot more sense to me now...and everytime I hear a chorus of "I want that!"

Ten for Texas

Two of my friends and I ran a 10 mile race a couple weekends ago. I was coming out of recovery from being injured and then sick for a few weeks...and let's just say it wasn't my finest hour! At mile two I started to question whether I would be able to complete the entire 10 - I was really feeling cruddy :) Anyway, the race photographer emailed us some pics and I thought I would share them...just so you can really appreciate how "great" I was feeling that day...

...the good news is that we did a 20 mile training run this Saturday and it felt much better...and I can still walk :)

The Incredibles!

So for Halloween I had this great idea that we would dress up as the Incredibles (you know - from the Disney Movie) since our family had all the characters covered. About three days before Halloween I realized that I hadn't figured out how I was going to do this yet. Luckily, I was in Utah where my mom and sister helped me scour the shelves of Target for all the right pieces. It turned out pretty cute (Andy did wonder about my sanity when I took the kids trick-or-treating in leggings and a swim-suit bottom! [I forgot Spencer was here too - so he probably thought I was really crazy]) and it was fun. I couldn't get Andy to commit to the full-tights and gloves outfit but he did wear an Incredibles shirt under his suit - kind of like Superman :)

We flew home from Utah on Halloween and I let the kids wear their costumes on the plane - I think it earned us a few bonus points with the crew and they were easy to spot as the raced through the airport!



All the kids at a neighborhood Halloween Party!


Naomi (aka Violet) and Tal (aka Dash) - this picture doesn't really do the costumes justice - they really looked very cute :)



Andy didn't tell me my shirt was see-through. Thanks hon!

Don't we look like serious crime fighters? Interesting that I'm the only one smiling...hmmm

Tal's Birthday

His expressions says it all!


Yep that's right - it's reversible!!



I have been promising I would post so - here I go. Tal had his fourth birthday in October! It was great fun - he has been asking for a "Batman, Superman and Spiderman" birthday party since his birthday last year so I scoured the internet and found some great ideas for a superhero training camp birthday party (thank you Google!). We had the kids start with a moon-bounce moonlighting as an anti-gravitational chamber. Next, they used super soakers to shoot "bad-guys" (aka Mc-Donalds toys) off of the deck balcony. Then, with Andy's help they had to pass fitness training - this was an obstacle course Andy set up - they slid down a slide, under a rope, through a tunnel and up a ladder to rescue one of Naomi's dolls - it was a huge hit. Finally, they graduated - they each got a super-hero cape (it started out as a great idea but Tal's was the only one I got completely finished) and a can of silly-string. Why the silly-string you ask? Because "Monster Daddy" (aka Andy) was coming and all the super-hero's had to use their weapons to stop him! Andy was a pretty good sport. Anyway, it was fun - probably the last "fun" party I throw for a while - so I hope Tal enjoyed it :)

Setting up for target practice - these water guns were bigger than most of the kids :)

Part of the obstacle course. I tried it and couldn't get through that tunnel :)

Okay so not the most creative cake ever. Basically we just through some superhero toys on top!

Silly String!

Isn't she the cutest superhero?

I told you Andy was a good sport - these guys were serious :)

All the newly graduated super-heros!!

This is hard work!



Presents! Tal really liked this part!