Happy Holidays 2011

That was the theme for the dance recital this year.

The girls had a great time, it was a really good show.

Deidra was in 3 dances this time around.

First up was hip hop, still my all time favorite to watch.

This is Tiffany's hip hop class (new to her this year). She danced to "ice ice baby" Doesn't that song bring back memories? I just wanted to get up and dance with them!

Deidra's ballet class. I'm still not sure how these girls get up on pointe, (it looks so painful to me). But watching ballet is so beautiful, it's my second favorite!

This is Deidra's jazz class.

This is Tiff's jazz class. She had 2 dances this time.

Having her be lifted was a fun surprise we didn't know about.

And Kendra's ballet class.

They all enjoy dance so much, and we enjoy watching them shine! They are all great little dancer's. We are so proud of them.

You get the picture!

Today in sacrament meeting our Bishop got up and explained that things today were going to be a little bit different. He went on to tell us that with the new storm pending that there was still a lot of debris left over from Thursday's storm and lot's of people throughout the community that still needed help. So after the sacrament was passed we were released to go home and make sure we didn't have any debris in our yards, and to secure it if we did. Then all the brethren went out helping anyone in need. It was a very short meeting (I've never been to one that short) but it was incredibly spiritual.

Last night we rented a couple movies for the kids to watch so I wanted to get them returned today in case we had a ton of snow tomorrow (I try not to drive in the snow as much as possible, as it makes me very nervous). So I went out to return them today. And as I was driving to the store I saw an amazing sight. The national guard has been called in to help in the city clean up. There are several parks that have been the drop off station for debris. In effort to not have all this debris be a danger with the pending storm they are filling dump trucks trying to get rid of everything. The parking lot was full (on both side's of the park) and they started dumping stuff on the side of the road right next to our sound wall. It was a very well planned clean up. So many volunteer's were out helping as well.

I didn't have my camera with me, so I ran home and got the kids so they could come see how awesome it was to see every one's hard work.

The pictures aren't the best, but we were driving and didn't want to get in any one's way. But you can totally see how much debris was thrown through out the community. And this was just one of the parks.

look how much stuff is piled up, our sound wall is very tall, and there were multiple pile's almost to the tip top.

This used to be the upper parking lot of our park.

What a blessing it is to have so many wonderful people in our neighborhood and community so willing to help out those in need.

Mother Nature taking revenge

It's true Mother Nature was not a happy camper on Thursday December 1st 2011.

About 2 am, Mike and I woke up to some serious wind, in the end it was reported that we had wind's up to 102 miles per hour. It was intense, I thought for sure our house was coming off the foundation. I kept running through countless ways as to how I would save my kid if the unthinkable happened.

At about 3am still unable to sleep we both got out of bed, checked on the kids and got on the computer's. Chatting with friends via face book at 3 am is always fun.

At about 4 or 5 am I headed back up to see if I could get some sleep, Mike followed shortly after. Only to have the older girls come up and tell us to look in the back yard to find this lovely tree. The house behind it is our neighbor's. This tree was pretty big, but apparently it was done fighting the wind and ended up in our yard.

Our broken swing set :(

Kendra and Tyler were out climbing on the tree.

The only thing we liked about this tree was the fact that it has the coolest branches ever, you can find them in your craft store for a pretty penny. But our neighbor's always let me cut some down to go in a big vase I have in my front room, so I loaded up today on some more branches as this thing will be gone in the next few days.

Mike had to go into work that morning around 11, these 2 semi's were blown over just up from our house. They were on the frontage road. They wanted to avoid the freeway as other semi trucks were tipping over left and right (12 in all I believe tipped over), well mother nature showed them who was boss.

Driving through our city looks like a tornado had hit, it is truly a devastating site to see. There were tree's down every where, power line's down, shingles off roof's and siding off of houses. Street sign's were blown away. Garbage can's lined the frontage road, there were swing set's that toppled over, trampoline's were crumbled to pieces, very sad to look at. (even Tyler commented how sad it was for what people had lost)

We lost power for about 12 hours. Schools were canceled for 2 days.

We were blessed in the fact that we had no damage to our home, just the fence (in multiple spot's), the shed has some damage to it and our poor swing set, but we are alive and able to live in our warm home, it could have been worse.

It's great to see neighbor's pulling together to help each other out, we live in such a wonderful area. There is still a lot of work to be done, but we will get back to "a new normal" city soon. And be a stronger community for it.

Good Things Utah!

On Thursday November 3rd the kids and I did a segment on GTU. A week or so previous Alicia Richmond had made a post on face book that she wanted families with teens to do a family photography fashion show. I have followed her for quite some time, I think she has a great sense of humor, and have thought how fun it would be to go shopping with her. So I signed us up and she choose us to model some clothes. So on Tuesday the 1st we headed up to South Town mall and shopped. It was fun, she knew exactly what she wanted. We would walk in a store and if something didn't catch her eye, we were on to the next store. She was so kind to me, as I have recently lost 20 lbs, she was putting me in clothes and telling me to go with the smaller one, as I'm still in the mind set previous to my weight loss. It was pretty cool to see the size's I fit into.

So on Thursday I kept the kids home from school as we needed to be there at 9:15. They were thrilled with this, as I NEVER keep them home for anything.

They had our clothes there ready for us when we arrived, we quickly changed and were able to be in the "promo" shot.

My clothes all came from Down East. I loved the pants, just wish they weren't bell bottoms, as I'm not into that :) I wasn't too hip on my "shiny" shirt, but the gray long sleeve underneath was great, as was the belt.

Deidra's came from Forever 21, they have great stuff there and their prices are awesome. She loved the shirt and pants, (which I need to go get as she needs those for her "hip hop" dance class to use in the recital.

Tiffany's came from JC Penny, we loved the whole outfit.

Kendra and Tyler's both all came from Children's Place. I loved Kendra's jacket, so did she. And I loved Tyler's green shirt, pants and shoes, and again, he liked these as well. He just wasn't digging the long sleeve button up, but that's OK.

We didn't get to keep the cloth's or even get a discount on them, but it was still a ton of fun.

This is Nicea, one of the host's on the show, she was darling.

After it was all over we changed and headed back to the real world.

If you really want to see the segment, here's a link.

HaLlOwEen 2011

Halloween 2011 was a glorious one.

The night was beautiful and the company and food were amazing.

The kids had the day off of school so we were running around getting the house ready for family and friends to join us, we were getting last minute props for costume's and we were (some of us) trick or treating at Mike's work. (the other 2, ya know the older one's; were either at a movie or hanging out with friends).

Kendra was a zombie prom queen, she looked great, and she totally loved it.

Tyler was Darth Vader, his second choice, but he too ended up loving his costume!

They hung out with each other for a few minutes, but soon decided it was funner to be with their friends, the boys went one way and the girls went the other.

We were kinda slacking on the photo taking this year (shocker I know), we didn't get any photo's of Tiff and her friend before they headed out. They dressed in their pj's and called it good.

Deidra was having friends over for dinner and a movie and clearly being that age it isn't cool to dress up anymore, or is it!

I love this picture of her and Spencer, it's just too cute.

We didn't get photo's of our pumpkin's either, or the evening with Deidra's friends or with Connie and Fritz. I guess we were just having too much fun to worry about photo's. (Actually that part was my fault, I was the one home while Mike was out with Tyler, my bad)!

All in all it was a great night. Can't wait 'til next year.

The Birthday celebration's

It seems the older the kids get, the harder it is to find time to celebrate their birthday's, I mean with all the things they have going on, it takes a little planning.

On Deidra's actual Birthday, her french class had a planned field trip to La Caille. I had never been there and at the price they offered for her to eat, I told her it was a great opportunity to try it out. She wanted me to go with her, so I did.

This is before the whole event started. I do say event, as this was a 6 course lunch.

Both of us got a little brave and tried the escargot. Hmm, it was jammed packed with garlic. But it wasn't too bad. We put ours on this toast and ate it that way.

I didn't think to take photo's of all 6 course's, but right after the escargot we had some pina colada ice cream (I wasn't a fan), then the roll and salad came, that was delish. Our main course was chicken. I really liked that, but Deidra wasn't too sure of it.

This is our flambé. Neither of us had had this before either. It was interesting to say the least. But we thought it was pretty neat to have it set on fire right in front of us.

They herd us talking about it being Deidra's birthday, so they brought her this chocolate covered strawberry. (I have the cutest picture of her with it, but it won't load on here properly)

That evening it was "Evening in Excellence" for the YW in our ward. So we didn't get to take her out for our traditional birthday dinner (it's coming though). Then we came home to do presents.

This girl loves her sock's!

Cute new bag.

And one of the best gift's of the day (she did actually get him in the morning, I couldn't resist)

On Saturday we had Mike's family over for pizza, cake and ice cream.

She's been asking for the Justin Bieber perfume since it came out.

Mike's parent's started a tradition with all the grand daughter's when they were born, it's the Precious Moment's train, so each year on their birthday they get a new piece. This is one of the cutest piece's, it's a gorilla.

Photo with the Bieb's and his perfume :)

The cake.

Mike's dad and Deidra share a birthday month, so they share in the celebration.

She has had a great week!

We are so thankful for all the sweet birthday wishes and the gift's she has recieved. She has some awesome people in her life.

Love you Deidra!

15

Happy Birthday Deidra!

You are the one who made me a mother, and for that I am very grateful!

You are such a beautiful girl, with a great sense of humor. You keep us on our toes with the silly things you do

We are so proud of the choices you make in your everyday life. You are going to make a great wife and mother someday.

You have such a fun sense of style, going shopping with you is always fun.

Dad has told you before that you came to our family first for a reason, and it's true. You are such a good example to your sisters and brother.

We love you so much. We hope your birthday was everything you could have imagined.

Thank you for being who you are, and making us who we are!

Happy 15! (one more year until you drive, that is kinda scary)

I had a few minutes!

DO NOT report me to TLC's Hoarders! This is just our pantry and man did it look scary.

Seriously I had just cleaned this out like 2 months ago, which really isn't that long ago and it shouldn't have gotten like this. But it did and I was sick of it.

So after my morning work out this was my second work out :(

I took everything off the shelves's and threw out what we either let expire or only had a few chip's, cracker's of piece's of cereal left in the box. I get so bugged when someone puts something empty back on my shelf, Really? Who does that? Apparently no one who lives here because no one seams to know who put the empty box/bag back in the pantry.

Holy cow, how embarrassing!

But all my hard work paid off! I love reorganizing the pantry. It's lookin' good now, and is functional. Although there are a few things I may have to change around, but for now it works!

And look what I did with our mini bags of chip's and cookies for the kids school lunches. It's a shoe bag of all things. But I love it. I no longer have the hugh boxes on the floor of the pantry. And the kids can see what is available for their lunch. And best of all, I can see when we are running low and I need to stock up!

I had such a good time cleaning out the pantry that I tackled the fridge when I was finished. Sorry no photo's of it as my camera battery died right after taking this last picture; but it's looking great as well.

No if I can only get the family to follow my rule of "DO NOT TOUCH ANYTHING" it will stay nice and neat.

I wonder what my next big project should be!

Your such a Witch!

This past weekend was Mike's annual trip to Yellowstone, so the kids and I got our annual trip to Gardner Village.

We ate lunch at Archibald's, it was crazy busy, but yummy as usual.

Then we walked around and did some shopping and sampling at the candy store :)

Here is the fire fighter witch.

Here's the witch brewing up something.

Hilda may be my new favorite.

One of the kids made the comment: Why do they all have Dolly Parton boobs? Well, that is a good question. All the witches seem to be a bit large on top!

Not sure why this wont load straight up and down, but it's still cute of my boy either way.

The sign say's "witchy poo"

Another "Dolly" sittin with some cute kids.

This one is still one of the creepier ones.

This one was pulling a hand cart full of pumpkin's. It was so cute.

I love taking my kids here every year. We had a great time. Can't wait till next year. Love you kids!