Setting up Christmas

It's sure nice as the kids get older to have them help with setting up Christmas. We decided to do it on Monday night for family night. I just let them put things where they like, I'm not that picky. The inside of the house is done, and there's a wreath on the front door. I'm not sure if there will be any lights outside this year.
Everyone hates my clear plastic angel for the top of the tree. They think it's freaky. They put it up just to make me happy, but they tease me about it. As you can tell, everyone had a fun time.

Christmas Dinner

I must admit, it's hard finding just the right gift for people. Steve has 5 brothers, and for the past few years, Steve's parents decided that instead of trying to figure out a Christmas gift to place under the tree for each of their sons and daughters-in-law, they would prefer to take us all to a nice dinner and spend time together as a family. I personally think it's a great idea! This year they took us to Little America. I must say, I think it was the nicest place we have gone yet. We were missing one brother, Todd and his wife Denise. He was spending time with his own family before he had to go out of town. But everyone else was there, and we had a really nice time.

Visitors

I got a message just before Thanksgiving that my Great-Aunt, Bessie, and her daughter, Sidney, would be coming into town for a funeral. Bessie's sister-in-law had passed away. She lived in the town just next to us. I was very excited to have them stay with me because I don't get a lot of visitors. Aunt Bessie owns a bee farm and makes honey candy, they brought me a box of honey taffy, and truffles. They were so good!! I think I'm addicted to honey truffles. They spent Friday and Saturday, and left Sunday morning. It was really nice spending time with them.

I forgot to take pictures while they were here, I don't know what my problem is, but here is a picture I have of Sidney and her husband, Laurence, with Aunt Bessie and my parents.

Happy Thanksgiving

This year, Thanksgiving was held at Steve's parents house. It was really nice spending the day with his brothers and their families. Everyone pitched in with the food, so it wasn't a lot of work for anyone. The weather was amazing, so the kids played games outside for most of the day. Conner was even playing in the dark for a while. Conner and Kaylea got to spend the weekend with their cousins. I think they both had a really nice time. I forgot my camera, so here are a few pictures I stole from others in the family. Thanks guys for a great holiday!

Roadshows!!

Our stake had road shows over the weekend. We have about 60 youth in our ward and all of them were in the road show. Our story was about 3 people trying to come up with a road show idea. They would make suggestions and the kids would act them out in the background. We had them do The Sound of Music, Grease, Romeo and Juliet, and West Side Story. Instead of rival gangs in West Side Story, we did another rivalry... BYU/Utah. Our program started at about the same time the real football game ended, so there was a lot of emotion behind our show. Kaylea was the head BYU cheerleader that the UTAH quarterback fell in love with. Steve was the BYU quarterback.

The Sound of Music idea...didn't work because the kids were too hard to control and got in a pillow fight.

Grease scene didn't work because... they couldn't dance. (They actually danced really well!)

Romeo and Juliet didn't work because the actors were too dull and boring at first and after giving them a second chance were too "dramatic".

Sadly, this is the only picture I have of Steve in the roadshow. Jessica took the pictures and couldn't find him. He is wearing a blue wig, and has a "Y" on his shirt. They actuall had several football plays, Steve was tackled once, and caught an interception. He had some key plays in our faux game. Kaylea is arguing with the UTAH head cheerleader.

Kaylea showing her true colors! (I hope!!) She actually came wearing a bright red coat over her costume... I'm confused.
The grand finale. We are about 5 rows deep on the stage. It's hard to see everyone. But they belted out the songs. People didn't have a hard time hearing us at all. It was a fun night.

Family pictures

We took family pictures last week, we had a lot of fun. These were taken right here in town, and our photographer was amazing! I've been comparing this one to the last family picture that is still hanging on our wall in the living room (taken 7 years ago!) my kids have changed so much! They are almost all taller than me, they are all faster than me, and they think they are all smarter than me. Aren't kids great??

Veteran's Day

Every year the 6th graders have a Socail Studies fair. Steve's was on ancient Greece, and Kaylea's was on China. Basically the kids study that area of history for a couple of months, they each write a report, and create a display. This year was Conner's turn, and they learned all about World War II. On Tuesday, Veteran's Day, they had their social studies fair and put up all of their displays. It was really incredible to see all of the work these kids went to. They really knew a lot about WWII. Conner decided to do his report on Grandpa Dickson (his Great-Grandpa) and life on the homefront. Grandpa Dickson was a welder leadman in the shipyards throughout the war. We had Grandma and Grandpa's journal that was kept during 1941 and 1942. Conner got a lot of information out of that journal and some other fun tidbits from Grandma and Grandpa over the phone. He displayed the journal, and printed up some pictures out of the journal to display.

It was fun hearing about rationing, and how they would only drive 35 miles per hour to save the rubber on their tires. There was one of the kids who had a display of the stamps and cards used for rationing, it was so neat to see. Another had several letters on display with the post mark 1946. Many of the kids wrote their reports on their great-grandparents who served in the war. One young girl's report was titled 4 Great- Grandparents, 2 Sides of the War; it told separate stories of her German Grandparents and her American Grandparents. Several of the displays brought tears to my eyes, I'm so thankful these kids are learning about this, I felt like it made Conner feel closer to his Great- Grandpa, and it was so appropriate to hold this on Veteran's Day.

Erin came with me and brought her kids, I think they thought it was really neat. Corban really liked the airplanes and Gabby liked everything made out of clay (especially the bright colored ones). I'm proud of Conner for his hard work.

Celebration!!

STATE CHAMPIONS!!

Today was the state championships for little league football. Conner is #27, he had some amazing plays. They played against Hillcrest, and won 33 to 6.

Our team mothers really take care of the boys. They brought football cookies and drinks for the boys after the game. On the last practice of the week they painted everyone's car windows with the boys' names, number and "take state". The team was really pumped up for this game.

At the end of the game they took a team photo. This will be in the local paper in the next week or so. This team has taken state 4 years in a row, that is why all the boys are holding up 4 fingers. Conner played with this team 2 of the 4 years, but he still liked to brag about 4 state championships. He says they broke a "World Record" for state championships...I'll have to look that one up.

The funnest part about living in a small town is the small town fire department and police department. They really care about the boys, and take the time to celebrate with us. They took the boys on a ride through town on the back of a fire truck with sirens blasting. All of the parents followed behind honking our horns. People came out and waved, cars going the other direction would honk and wave too. I think the boys had a great time.

I took about 5 pictures of conner on the back of the fire truck, he kept hiding behind his friends and turning around backwards. This is the only one that turned out okay.

There's no place like home

I went out back to feed the horses today and when I threw out the hay they didn't seem too excited to come and eat. I looked in the field behind my house to see what the horses were so interrested in, and saw a herd of deer. I counted eight. I just love living in the country.

Semi-finals

Conner had playoffs in football today. They played against Park City, a team they lost to the last time they played. I was really nervous for them, but I guess I didn't need to be, today Conner's team won 13-0. Steve's parents came to watch. It was so fun having them there. Conner played really well, he had 3 very important touch downs. Next week they play for the State Championships. It should be a very exciting game.
After the win, they took us to lunch to celebrate. We had a really nice visit. This was such a fun day.

Happy Halloween

We had a really nice Halloween. Steve and Kaylea had a party to go to, and Conner went trick or treating with his friends. I just got to pass out candy and chill out all night. We have so many trick or treaters, I bought 4 large bags of candy and ran out by 7:30. I need twice as much next year. Here's a picture of Conner, he was an ape, but couldn't find the mask, so he put on his scream mask. Conner went trick or treating for about 10 minutes before deciding he was too hot. He came home and changed into a ninja costume.Here are Conner's friends, the air freshener, and Hannah Montana. Aren't they sweet?
This is Kaylea's version of Cruella Deville. She and Steve were supposed to dress up as some kind of villan for their party. Steve dressed up as a "Cereal Killer". He wouldn't pose for a picture for me...(he never does) but it was pretty good. He took cereal boxes and stabbed plastic knives into it, and painted blood around the knives. Then he took spoons and dipped them in red paint (blood) and made a spoon necklace. It was funny.

Steve's birthday!

On Monday Steve celebrated his 17th birthday. This year we just had a family party, we went to Flowrider in Ogden. It's like indoor surfing. I took a lot of pictures, but not many of them turned out. Steve and Conner were the only ones from our family that wanted to actually go flowboarding, Kaylea, mom and dad all decided we would be safer to just watch.

By the end of the day, the boys were actually pretty good! This is the best picture I could get of Conner. Doesn't he look great?! Grandma and Grandpa Collings came to watch the boys, they brought our cousins: Kelton, Cameron, and Zoe.

Afterward we went out to pizza at Robintino's in Bountiful, we finished a large pizza, salads, and garlic bread. Hopefully Steve enjoyed a wonderful birthday with his family.

TOUCHDOWN!!!

As you can tell from this picture, Conner is extatic! (Okay, mom is extatic.) He got his first touchdown today. The cowboys played against Olympus and they won 32 to 0. Conner ran into the end zone and was wide open, and they passed it right to him. I know I'm just the mom, but it was the BEST touchdown all year!! This was the last regular game of the season. Next week they have the State playoffs, and if they win that, they have the State Championships the week after that. It's been a really fun season. Woohoo!!

I lied...now it's finished

I have had some door trouble for the past few months. I've lived here for 8 years this week. After about 7 years, the front door was looking like it needed a new paint job. My neighbor had painted theirs a year before and I noticed that the paint had bubbled. I wasn't about to let that happen to me. I made sure I used the same paint that had been used when my door was first painted. It bubbled. I sanded it off and purchased paint specifically for high heat. It bubbled even worse. I sanded it off again, and then tried to strip off the paint. That's not an easy job to do. I decided to have a painter come and do it right. Each time a painter was called, they said they would be over to look at it and give us a price. They never even talked to us. I actually had people that thought I antiqued my door on purpose! When they complimented me on my lovely door, I just thanked them. Well today Erin came over and helped me to paint my door black to go with the new house color. I'm so happy with how it turned out. Here is the front of the house before the new stucco with the door waiting to be painted. The shutters have been removed.

Here is the house with the new stucco, and a newly painted black door.

And here is the door! It is not perfect, but it is so much better than before. I'd just like to thank Erin for her help with this project, I have tried to do it by myself 2 different times and just made a mess of it. She helps me to think through things a little more clearly. It's nice having her so close.

It's Finished!!

Yesterday they finished putting the stucco on the house. We decided to change the color after all, and update it a little bit. I'm so happy with how it looks.

Region Cross Country

Kaylea's last race was today. She ran in Ogden and did pretty well. She came in 12th place overall, but 2nd place on our team. We are so proud of her hard work this season, she has really done great for a freshman! This picture is the beginning of the race... a thumbs up!

Homecoming Week

Last week was homecoming week. Kaylea is in student government, which means her week was really busy! They had to decorate the freshman hall, paint the sidewalks, serve lunch to the class of '89 alumni, and decorate a float. The classes compete in each of these areas (except serving lunch) and the freshmen won first in hallway decorations, and second in sidewalk painting. This is the float they made for the parade, it's only about half way done. Kaylea took pictures with her camera of the finished float and all of the officers on it, and we have had upload issues! Erin took a video of us in the parade... I got to pull the float... but that wouldn't upload either. So you get to see a half done float, but it was a lot of fun. I think Kaylea is relieved homecoming week is over. All in all, very busy, and very fun... but they lost the game...terribly... 34 to 7... And I'm missing half of the pictures I wanted to show... uugh!

Almost done!

The workers came by Monday morning, and put stucco all over the house. I'm thinking it looks pretty good!

It has to dry and then they will come back in a week and put the color on. We are keeping it the same color as before, so it shouldn't look too much different, just no more siding!