Merry, Merry Christmas!

Here I am, blogging about Christmas... and it was only a week ago! I'm so good! :)

We had a really good Christmas this year- no one got sick- that is huge for us! Although, I did find one way to make it NOT the perfect Christmas.... after we opened all of our presents, I went into make breakfast- we decided on breakfast burritos and scrambled eggs. Well, I got our yummy breakfast on the table and went to get the ketchup out of the fridge and guess what? No ketchup. YEP, that pretty much ruined Christmas. Never mind that I had been baking for a week straight. That I had been up at 6 am every morning in December working on getting things ready for the big day. My mom called right as we were sitting down to eat and Aspyn told her, "Yeah, Santa came. Mom just made eggs for breakfast and we're out of ketchup so everyone is pretty quiet around here...." SPOILED kids! Here are some pictures BEFORE breakfast ruined everyone's Christmas spirit.... :)

Yay... a Star Wars gun!

And a Wedding Barbie!

And MORE Star Wars stuff!

And a Princess Dress-Up, of course!

And new snowshoes for Dad... look how happy he is!

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! Next year I will definitely plan Christmas breakfast ahead of time and make sure I have EVERYTHING to make it perfect! :)

Happy Birthday to Me!

Yes, yes, I know my birthday was a week and a half ago, but with all the Christmas excitement I didn't get around to blogging about the big event! Hee hee hee.... I haven't gotten around to blogging about Christmas, either. Oh well. I'll get to it sometime!

I had a really good birthday this year... besides the fact that I turned 35, that is. I just keep trying to forget that I am getting so old. Oh well.

Usually when my birthday falls on the Saturday before Christmas we have at least one Christmas party to go to.... this year it was the Shaw Family Christmas Bowling party- which is an awesome Christmas party if you ask me!

I'm not sure if it was because it was my birthday, the lucky pink bowling ball I used, or my bowling name: "Birthday Princess," but I totally rocked at bowling that day.... I can't remember how many strikes I got! I ended up with 152- I think I may go into professional bowling! :)

After bowling we went to "The Pie" for lunch and my sister gave me this AWESOME Jacob shirt.... which was perfect because I drug Al to see "New Moon" after lunch.... he loved it!

This year, I just felt a lot of LOVE on my birthday. Before we left for the bowling party, the sweet ladies I serve in YW with brought me this BEAUTIFUL picture... I LOVE IT!

Al and the kids gave me a gift certificate for a facial, pedicure and massage- my three favorite things!


My mom gave me a cupcake decorating book- so fun! I especially love the "Starry Starry Night" cupcakes- I'll be making those for sure :)!

Yes, it is made out of cupcakes!

And she gave me a book signed by Will Moses, a snowflake picture frame, and this awesome quilt:


I also got treats from my neighbors and sweet young women, a fabulous scarf from my brother and sister in law, a cute Christmas bell and beaded watch band from my other brother and sister in law and this super cool camera tripod that I have been dying for from my mother and father in law- no more stacking up rocks to balance the camera on for family pictures when we are hiking- YAY!



So, turning 35 wasn't as horrible as I thought it would be. Thanks everyone for giving me such a great birthday! Love you all! :)

A Wild Night

For the past few weeks, the lovely women I get to serve with in Young Womens and I have been working on a special gift/activity for the sweet young women in our ward. We made them a 12 days of Christmas bag with a story for them to read each day to help them get in the Christmas spirit. We made them a sweet ornament of the baby Jesus for their Christmas tree. We bought white boxes and tied them with ribbons to do the "Gifts for the Savior" lesson. We planned our activity for last night and made yummy treats for the girls to eat while we watched "Mr. Krugar's Christmas."

Just before our activity got started last night, after the opening exercises, one of our young women pulled the fire alarm.

I'm thinking I may get a new calling on Sunday.

Bah Humbug....

Are anyone else's kids on the naughty list this year? Because holy cow- my kids are driving me crazy with fighting and crying! I feel like the threat of "Santa's watching" isn't working AT ALL and we are spending A LOT of time in time out....

Maybe Santa will be leaving lumps of coal this year....

Let it Snow Let it Snow Let it Snow!

Hooray for a white Christmas, right? I love snow in December.... I'm not super fond of snow in January, February and definitely not in March. So right now, I am happy we have snow on the ground! :)

Monday afternoon I was out scraping the driveway and sidewalk when all of the sudden I had to stop and just PLAY in the snow with my kids. Our yard is quite hilly which makes it perfect for sledding!

And we have to try snowboarding, of course!

It was so much fun to stop being so busy and to play in the snow with my kiddies. I need to play more often- it is definitely something I need to work on!

Emmet Otter's Jugband Christmas

Holy cow I can't believe I haven't blogged in December yet. Crazy! December is just so super busy!!! I'll do my best to keep up! :)

Last Saturday, we held our annual "Emmet Otter's Jugband Christmas" Christmas party. I have to admit, this is actually my FAVORITE Christmas party! (there- I said it!) When I moved to Dixie College after high school, I met my super BFF- Jami. We knew we were soul sisters when we found out that we both had family from Fountain Green (a super cute little town east of Nephi) and that we both loved Emmet Otter.

What? You have never heard of Emmet Otter? Well, it is a super cute little Christmas Muppet Movie.... with singing Otters and an awesome rock band with a weasel, a frog and a bear. Ma and Emmet are poor, and the only way they can give Christmas presents to each other is to enter the town talent contest. Kermit the Frog makes a guest appearance on the VHS version of the movie, but for some reason he isn't in the DVD.

Almost every year since we have had children, Jami and I have had our Emmet Otter party. We take turns making soup, someone always makes sugar cookies and the kids love decorating them. Jami and I and the kids LOVE the movie, and our husbands love heckling the movie. Here are some pictures from this years' festivities:

Hooray for Emmet Otter! :)

Slacker!

Forgive me for not blogging about our fabulous Thanksgiving.... it was super fun and yummy and full of family and food and thankful-ness. My camera is NOT GOOD at taking indoor pictures :( so I don't have any from the big day. Booooooo!


So for my excuse for not blogging... I am up to my EYEBALLS in super cute online Christmas gifts that have to be ordered no later than Dec. 2nd. YES... I said DECEMBER 2ND and when did I start them? Oh, like Friday.


My arm is tired from clicking the mouse... and I'm not really even close to being finished (even though I keep telling Al I'm almost done!) I think I am in for a few late nights. Wish me luck.