Girls Day Out

The girls and I got tickets to the nutcracker.  We went to Salt Lake for a day of fun.  Now that my girls are older it is really fun to take them without the boys to do girlie things.  We ate at the Olive Garden.  I gave them all the cutest charm necklaces as a early Christmas present.  Aunt Lynne made them for me to give to them.  They all have cute charms that represent them.  Then off the watch the nutcracker at the capitol theater.  It is so worth paying for this treat,  since I live in a household of dancers who really appreciate the art of ballet.  We all loved it! This may have to become yet another tradition.  Maybe we can add the other girl cousins in a few years.

More Snow Pics

Let it Snow

Any other time of the year I hate the snow! At Christmas time I love it. We have had mountains of it. Conner, Scott and Austin built the best snow fort ever and even added Christmas lights and a Santa on top.  We went sledding on Christmas eve.  It was a perfect few hours of fresh snow with no new snow and wasn't even cold.  We had a blast with the whole Stalker family.  The kids also took advantage of the four wheelers and pulled each other and Dad on sleds throughout our neighborhood.  Somehow they got four kids on the sled at once and Scott pulled them all.  It can snow for one more week in the valley, then I want it to be over!

WE ARE IN A DEPRESSION ?

DO WE REALLY NEED THE NEWS TO TELL US, EVERY MINUTE, OF EVERY DAY, THAT TIMES ARE TOUGH?  I'M SO SICK OF IT!!!  I'm pretty sure every family that is going through hard times, knows it.  Please try and at least balance the bad and the good.  I wish a channel would take over the good news and report on all the great things that go on in this world everyday!  We need to stay positive and help each other through these rough times.  I'm not saying sweep it under a rug and not report on things but the dwelling on the negative has got to STOP!!

Austin 16? Could it be?

Austin thinks it is great to be 16

#1 - he gets to date

#2 - he gets to drive

3#- he can get a job

Mom doesn't think it is so great

#1 he gets to date

#2 he gets to drive

#3 he needs a job to pay the 179.00 a month insurance bill for him to drive.  OUCH!!

I couldn't ask for a better 16 year old son. He has never given me an ounce of trouble and he is a blast to have around.  Love you Ozzy!

Ski Season is Here

Scott and I went skiing for the first time a few days ago.  It was a beautiful day up at Brighton.  Last year I took ski lessons and it helped me so much. I love to ski now.  I can almost keep up with Scotty now.  It makes it so fun to go together.  All our kids have passes to Sundance so I'm sure we will be going a lot.  I am also planning to do Lady's Day again at Sundance as soon as I convince some of my friends to come.  My great friends Lisa Wilkey and Cheryl Davis are actually ski instructors this year.  Now we just need lots of snow.  Only in the mountains...I hate driving in snow!!

Our Weekend in Salt Lake.

This weekend Sidney had her Nuevo Dance Competition at the Salt Palace.  The girls and I went up and stayed for the weekend.  We had a blast. Nikki and I spent all of Friday night together.  We went to gateway, ate at Rumbi Island Grill and went to see Four Christmases.  It was fun to spend the whole night with just Nikki.  It's funny the things you learn about your kids when you are alone with them.  Saturday we watched Sid compete with her Teen team.  All their dances are so fun to watch.  Jessi even got to fill in for a girl in the hip hop dance, so I got to see her on stage again.  After the competition we went with Jess to the Festival of Trees.  Her studio Front and Center dance performed there.  She choreographed four dances for them.  It was really fun to see Jessi in action as a teacher now.  I could tell how much those girls love her. 

 The boys stayed at home, completing Austin's Eagle project.  YAY!! The blankets are done! We will be delivering them to the United Way very soon.   They drove up to stay the night Saturday.  We saw the lights and ate at Macoroni Grill.  WOW is it expensive to take 7 there.  Luckily I had some penny pinching gift cards but not quite enough for our 127.00 bill.  OUCH!

We stayed for the weekend in the Reber apartment right behind the LDS conference center.  It is on the top floor and has a spectacular view.  I love weekends like this....I have my kids all to myself with no distractions!

Twilight

Ok, since I can't sleep I'm going to have to blog about twilight!  These books were a life saver to my Sidney! She picked up Twilight and hasn't quit reading since.  She used to hate to read.  She got Jess to read all the books and then I followed right behind.  We all loved the books.  We were not too sure about our visions of Edward, Jake and Bella being ruined by a movie.  Sid swore she would not go.  Well she went...to the midnight opening.  All my girls thought it was cheesy and didn't really like it.  I went the next day with my girl friends.  I loved it!  It was over the top cheesy, silly, bad effects, overacting, everything that could go wrong with a movie, but still it won me over.  I laughed and laughed when the fan catches Bella's scent and didn't stop laughing through the entire flick.  I even went a second time with Scott, Steph and  Nate.  Scott had to see what all our lusting was about. The funniest thing to me was all the Mom's at the 10 in the morning twilight show.  I guess we all just want to stay young and keep our hearts alive.

Too Much Fun!

We had the greatest Thanksgiving Break ever.  We spent tons of time together as a family and actually enjoyed each other for 5 days.  We saw the Jazz play on Wed. night.  Thursday we made, ate and loved Thanksgiving Dinner at our home.  We had a small get together this year.  Ron, Linda, Camie and us.  We played the ABC thankful game.  Watched Dallas win.  Played flag football and Dominos.  Friday morning we went Black Friday Shopping. This needs to be a blog within itself.  I'll write about that later. We decorated our home and picked out our tree.  Friday night we went on a date with Steph and Nate to see Twilight again.  The boys loved it!  Saturday I cleaned all day and then that night Scotty and I got to go to another Jazz game! Sunday we took extended Snowden family pictures and then Cary and Lynne made us a yummy dinner.  I couldn't of asked for a better break! Thd kids were very sad this morning to go back to school

Boxes

Conner loves boxes.  I almost hate bringing anything new home with a box because it hangs around our home for weeks until I finally sneak it into the dumpster.  Conner would not let this last box out of his sight.  He even chose to make a bad out of it and slept in it for over a week.  Luckily, due to a little accident, we had to get rid of the box.  Wow I'm looking forward to Christmas.  Why am I even buying him gifts?

Girls Christmas Benefit Concert

Last Saturday night Studio One put on a benefit concert for the Stephanie Nielson family.  Stephanie had a very popular Mommy Blog called Nie Nie.  Her and her husband were in a plane crash.  They were both badly burned and have been in intensive care for months. They have 4 small children.  This story tore at my heart.  Go to her blog and you can read about her story.

nieniedialogues.blogspot.com

It was great to see Sid and Nik dance with their new teams.  I loved their dances.  I love watching them perform.  Jess choreographed 4 dances at the show.  It was fun to see her teaching dream come to life on the stage and talk to a lot of the Mom's of the girls she teaches.  I love seeing her effect little girls in a positive way.  

The Polar Express

Last night we took the whole family on the "The Polar Express".  Conner and Nikki loved the adventure.  Cookies, Hot Chocolate, The reading of the book, Christmas carols, a visit from Mrs. Claus, Elves, and finally a visit from Santa.  Our older kids took it all in while texting and laughing together.  Scott and I enjoyed the joy in Nikki and Conners faces.  All in all, a good time was had by everyone. 

 Conner woke up first thing this morning and told me "Santa said Austin has a lot of work to do, but he told me I was good and would have a great Christmas.   I think Austin should do all my jobs until Christmas so Santa will come to him."  Wow nice of him to think of his brother.  Somehow I think Santa got my two boys mixed up...but I will never be able to convince of Conner of that. 

Just when things are up...must they come down!

Life goes in funny cycles. Everything can go fantastically in your life for days, weeks, months...but you're always, somewhere inside, thinking....things are going to change. All of a sudden boom you are in a negative cycle. Nothing can seem to go right! Things from an outsiders view may still look great. Usually we try to keep our depressed moods and problems from the world. We keep them to ourselves just waiting for that new cycle to appear. Well just in time for the Holidays some problems have arrived. YAY! Guess I'll just bunker down and hang on until greater times ahead! I'll just keep on my smiling face and hold in that frown trying to come out. Because let's face it, I'm better at being Happy, or appearing to be that way, than sad!

Scott and I hit 20 years this week!

I have to brag for a minute about my sweetie Scott! He is the best thing that ever happened to me.  We have had our downs but they have been few and far between.  Here are my top ten reason I LOVE SCOTT

1. He has so much patience with my absent mindedness and all my other flaws.  I could never be married to me.

2. He tells me I am the prettiest girl around and still flirts with me all the time.

3. He works freakin' hard and never gets angry when I come home with my latest shopping spree items.

4. He is soooo dang funny.  I tease him all the time and tell him I've heard all his jokes before but I can't think of a day he hasn't made me laugh.

5. He is a great Dad.  Our kids respect, love and have so much fun with him. He would do anything for them and does everyday.

6.He always lets me pick where we go out for dinner. I'm always watching what I eat and he will go anywhere I suggest.  He is more than willing to hit Apollo Burger or Training Table if I'm having a weak moment also.

7. He lets me have the remote.  Not many men let the wife be in charge of this little devise.

8. Every morning he wakes up and gets ready for the day in his office so he doesn't wake me up.  If he knows I had a bad night he will close the door and help the kids get ready and let me sleep. Even if it means going in a little late.

9. He still opens the door for me.  He carries everything everywhere we go.  He treats me like a princess after all these years.

10.  He is my best friend.  I tell him all my silly problems and he acts like he cares.  We have learned to work together through our problems and come out stronger in the end.

Love You Sweetie!  Happy 20th!

"Good Things Utah"

On Friday I made my friends go see a taping of "Good Things Utah".  I Tivo this show everyday and watch them on Wed and Sat. while I do wash and clean house.  Reagan and Nicea are my friends and it was so fun to go up and watch the show live!  I love my friends for going with me and cheering loudly ( even though none of them watch) 

Thunder

Jess tried out for a professional dance team the Thunder and she made it!  YAY!! Jess gets to dance again! This makes her Mom so happy.  I have seen how much she misses dancing and can't wait to see her.  The Thunder is a new professional arena football team that will be playing down here in Orem.  She will be dancing with 6 of her girlfriends who also made the team.  It sounds like a blast.  Way to go Jess!

Family picture day!

VOTE TODAY!!!

Scott, Jess, Dananca I went to vote at 8:30 am today.  We had a family night lesson last night all about voting for Jess and Dan's sake.  I really studied a lot of the candidates and knew exactly how I was voting except the president.  For the first time in my life I really struggled with what I wanted.  Neither candidate has convinced me that they are deserving of my vote.  In the end I voted with my more conservative side but for a moment I thought about straying. It was really fun to vote with Jess and Dan.  They were very excited to vote and had studied up before the big day also.  I even made them pose for a photo ( this thrilled them)

I love our friends

So for Halloween we had a dress up Adult Party.  We not only dressed up but met at Mimi's cafe for dinner. Everyone that showed up dressed up and looked great.  Halloween has always been one of y favorite Holidays.  It is just so fun to be someone you are not for a day. The disco queen in me came out for a night and it was a blast.

High School Musical 3 came out today.  Our family went to the opening show this morning together to check out Jess on the big screen.  Yes you can actually see her a lot in this one. ( no hard searching like in the other two).  We got this picture of Jessi out of people magazine this morning. We hope to see her dancing a lot more soon.  Love you Jess.

Football Season!

I love Football season. I've been a fan my whole life. I remember watching football all day Sunday and Monday night my whole childhood.  I loved the Dallas Cowboys.  It has been so fun this year to watch Austin play with Timpanogos.  Even though he didn't play as much as he would of liked, he really enjoyed the season and being a part of the team. His last game is this Wed. night.  I have watched Austin play every Thursday, the Timpanogos varsity team play every Friday, BYU play on saturdays, and then Dallas and Denver play on Sunday.  Even though all my teams ( but Austin's sophmore team)  are sucking right now.  I still love it all.

Mexico

Scott and I had the funnest trip ever last week. We went to Mexico with the Wikeys for our 20th anniversary. We had an adventure every day. A quick recap and some pics.
Day 1 --Lay on the beach, join the great grandma water aerobics class, play name that tune, eat nachos and have pina coladas by the pool.
Day 2-- Lay on the beach, kayak on the ocean over to Lovers Beach, eat at cafe on the beach.
Day 3---Wake up at 3 in the morning with food poisoning from the shrimp and lobster. Lay in bed running to the toilet all day. Watched movies and read. Even though I was sick and couldn't play, very relaxing day.
Day 4 --Lay on the beach, Barter for Silver, go parasailing with Lisa.
Day 5--Lay on the beach, Rent ATV'S and went on a tour.
Day 6--Lay on the beach, GO TO THE ZIP LINE AND ZIP LINE 8 TIMES OVER A CANYON. SO FUN!!!
Day 7---travel home, see my kids...