pinata fun

Mark decided to get crafty and so he got the boys to help him make a pinata during the holidays. The paper mache part of things didn't go as well as expected, so he pulled out the duct tape to finish it off. Once it was deemed strong enough, he wrapped it in yellow crate paper, cut a green spikey top, stuffed in a bunch of candy, and our pineapple pinata was ready for action! We started with little people at bat first -- that's Matthew (above).
Then Jacob:
And now for the big guns...Ryan broke through to the candy! Wahoo! Candy for all!

totally on two-wheels

Matthew can ride on two wheels!! Wahoo!! He hasn't really liked his bike much because he does so well on his scooter, which he's been riding for a year and half at least! This summer we put training wheels on the bike hoping it would peak a little interest for him. He tried a couple of times and just didn't have any interest. With the weather being so nice these days, I decided it was time for him to get rid of the training wheels and learn to ride a bike like a big kid. Mark & I took the training wheels off and took him up the street a couple houses. We set him on the bike, turned him toward home and gave a gentle shove. That's all it took -- he was off! A couple more times and he was riding around like a pro!!

Now he totally loves his bike! Everyday he wants to practice riding. We even took him over to the bike trail and he did awesome! Way to go, Matthew!!

tubing

We decided to go in search of snow. We found a little patch up near the summit at the tubing park. The snow wasn't great, but we had fun tubing for a couple hours. First you had over your money, then pick a tube. They have little ones for little kids and bigger ones for bigger kids. Everyone has to have their own tube, although you can hook tubes together to slide down if you want. This orange tube was just Matthew's size! Next, you hop on the conveyor belt and get a ride up the mountain!
The conveyor belt makes the first stop and little people, or anyone wanting a shorter tubing path, get off and take a ride down the hill. Loved it! If you want to go further up the mountain, you hop onto your tube and the lift guys hook you up to the tow rope to go all the way to the top! This is Mark & Matthew:

So fun! Two hours is perfect timing -- long enough to get in lots of rides, and short enough not to get bored. A few more pictures:


Hard to tell, but there's 3 boys piled on there! After tubing we decided to take the long route home and stopped in Heber at Dairy Keen for lunch and then went over to visit Will & Laura before heading home. A fun day was had by all!

things to do after christmas

Ryan finally started to feel better a couple days after Christmas, so he pulled out his catapult kit and built it. Then started to flip the little bean bags around. Since the weather has been unusually dry and sunny it was good bike riding weather. Jacob took his new bike for a spin and then we even headed over to Legacy trail for a real ride. This was our first time on the trail - finally - and it was fabulous! Can't wait to go again!

christmas presents

So I have these images in somewhat the wrong order, but oh well, I'll just go with it! Above is the completed Lego space shuttle that Jared received from Santa. He loved putting it together and it took him only 1 day! (I was hoping it was going to keep him occupied for several days!) The shuttle comes off the launch pad and there's a whole bunch of cool stuff inside the shuttle too when he opens it up. This is one of those Lego projects that should NEVER be disassembled. It is definitely more a model than a toy.

Jacob got a ukulele. He has been learning how to play it at school. He's pretty darn good at it too! I had no idea he knew that much until he picked it up and started playing a few tunes for us. Wow. He is really enjoying it!
Ryan got a cell phone. He was very excited to finally have his own. We bought the phone, but he has to pay for the minutes. Unfortunately, Ryan had a very bad sore throat and cold during the holiday. He was pretty miserable. Poor kid.
Jared also got a phone. He's had a very basic phone for about a year, but this one is a bit fancier with a slider qwerty keyboard. Same rule applies here -- we gave him the phone, but he pays for the service.
Jacob got a new bike. It's got gears and is big enough to last for quite a few years. This year was a good year to get a bike since its been so dry. There's no snow, so he was able to get out and ride.
Matthew got a batman plane and a green lantern plane. Both toys shoot projectiles. Wahoo!
Because Christmas Day fell on Sunday this year, our morning started pretty early. The boys woke us up at 5 a.m. and we headed downstairs to see the santa gifts & stockings. After playing with those for a bit, we opened our gifts to each other. We ate a quick breakfast and got ready for church. We decided to attend G&G's ward, which started at 9 a.m. -- which meant we left here at 8! I love having church on Christmas because it helps me remember the real reason we celebrate Christmas -- the birth of our savior, Jesus Christ. Grandma was in charge of the choir program after the sacrament and it was very nicely done. After church we headed over to G&G's house to open gifts, eat lunch, and play with cousins. A very nice day indeed.

PS. We always get "matching" new pajamas for Christmas. I simply didn't have the time to sew this year and I couldn't find any fabric to be excited about, so if you notice in the pictures, we have a plaid theme going on. Each person has different plaid pants and we all have navy blue shirts.

christmas countdown

Matthew brought this Christmas countdown poster home from preschool. He has loved creating Santa's beard through the month of December!

upside down

Matthew has taken a liking to being upside down. Anywhere, anytime. He just flips over. His personal favorite place to be upside down is on the stairs.

Crazy kid!

francine

My dear friend Francine passed away this week. Her funeral was today. She was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer about 18 months ago. Because she was in her late 80's, she opted not to treat it and let nature take its course. She really didn't experience too much setback to her daily activities until about 5 months ago and then things gradually started to slide. Her last 2 weeks have been especially uncomfortable. She was an amazing lady in many ways, but I most appreciated her ability to see a service opportunity, not readily realized by others, and then seize the moment. She spent many hours reading to friends who couldn't see the printed page anymore, walking with people who had physical disabilities, and for me -- spending time with my children so that I could have the opportunity to learn to play/practice the organ at the church. Matthew especially loved the Monday mornings when "Sis. Holt" would come play with him while I went to the church to practice the organ. She loved that time with Matthew too. Francine especially enjoyed music and walking. She was a very good organist and has played the organ since she was a young girl. I often saw her out for her daily walk early in the morning when I was out running. A spray of flowers beside her casket featured a book of organ music and her walking shoes. It was a beautiful tribute to a wonderful friend!

christmas house making

After Rachel's baptism earlier this month, all the kids gathered to decorate "gingerbread" Christmas houses. Above is Devin, Chase, Ethan, Jared (who's too old for this kid stuff), and Ryan. Here's a few more random pictures of the event:

Jacob & Katie

Matthew

Chase

Morgan, Rachel, Katie, Jared, Matthew, Jacob

Jacob & Matthew

A good time was had by all!

we are santas elves

Right after Thanksgiving we pulled this charming little elf (the toy) out of one of the Christmas decoration boxes. It sings the song "We are Santa's Elves". Which is delightful if only played once in awhile. However, Matthew couldn't stop playing the song over and over and over and over. It thoroughly annoyed us all. We suffered through a few days of this thinking Matthew would lose his infatuation with it. Wrong. The elf went back into the storage box before the month of December ever began.

all i want for christmas is...

my two front teeth!
Jacob actually lost his second front tooth in November, but I'm just now getting around to posting the photo, which combines perfectly with the Christmas season!

triple J

Jacob, Jr. Jazz = triple J Jacob's first session Jr. Jazz is almost over. Last game is Wednesday. He's a pretty good little player -- he is surprisingly agressive on defense. One particular game this year he had to guard a big kid and he was in the kids face All. The. Time. I guess he learns that from playing with older brothers. He has been an all-around consistent leader and player for his team.
Mark has been the coach for Jacob's team this session. It is a definitely a time commitment, but a good opportunity to do some worthwhile community service and spend some time with Jacob.

round 2

Another wind storm was supposed to kick up Sunday night, so everyone went into "prepare" mode. Notice I did not say "panic" mode. We had sacrament meeting two hours earlier than usual and it only lasted for about 50 minutes. Then everyone went out to spend the rest of the day working in the neighborhoods. The whole city did this. Debris was cleared up and hauled to drop off points, roofs secured, and any other preparations were made for the storm. The National Guard was called in to help with the unloading of debris. One of the debris drop off points was the city park right by our house. There was a constant procession of vehicles on the road all afternoon. The debris pile at the park (one pile of green and one pile of other) is literally a mountain range. Amazing. We decided to prepare by pulling out the basketball hoop, so the wind wouldn't finish it off. Surprisingly that was about a one minute job! We pulled the slats out of the fence, again, too. We charged phones and ipods. We filled pitchers with water and put batteries in a radio. We moved garbage cans and lawn chairs in the garage, again. The wind kicked up a bit around bedtime, but never really got going. The gusts that were predicted never really happened. Not sad about that! Now, to put all those slats back in and decide what to do about a basketball hoop...

wind storm

Wow! What a wind storm! We had wind for a solid 9 hours with gusts up to 102 mph! Our little neck of the woods seemed to get the brunt of the storm. We are all fine with little personal property damage -- our siding, roof, and shed are all intact. I can't say the same for many others in the neighborhood however. With winds predicted to be strong we took what precautions we could and took slats out of our fence, put garbage cans and lawn chairs in the garage and outside toys and such in the shed. Our fence sustained the most damage -- it is leaning a little more than usual and a large branch from our neighbors tree fell on a section of fence near the shed putting a nice dent in the top horizontal post. Our basketball hoop is also leaning now, but still usable. Our roof and siding stayed intact, and our trees stayed in the ground :) The winds kicked up at about 2:30 a.m. and we lost electricity. We laid in bed listening to the wind and hearing objects hit the house. We saw what looked like lightening light up the darkness every so often -- it was really electrical transformers blowing up! The house shook occasionally, feeling like an earthquake, and we heard lots of odd noises and bangs. At one point I thought I heard the siding being ripped from our house, but apparently it was one of the neighbors decks being obliterated. Most every house had trees uprooted, with some landing on homes or cars. A couple homes had broken windows. There were tons of lost shingles flying through the air. I watched one of the condos lose half the siding from their home. One trampoline came to a brief stop and was rescued on the fence across the street during the storm. It was in shreds (metal posts too), by the time the owner and about 10 others worked to rescued it. Mark and Jared helped a few neighbors pull some trees from the roofs and rescued a neighbors trampoline from the fence between especially strong wind gusts. The wind finally started to wind down around 11:30 a.m. and we were fortunate enough to have our power back on around 2:30 p.m. The kids have been out of school for two days. One of our neighbors has access to a dump truck and wood chipper, so he and everyone who is willing to help went through the neighborhood and cleaned up the trees yesterday. We have good neighbors. We are so glad that our next door neighbors followed the prompting early in the spring to remove two large trees that were situated between our homes. Had those not been removed, we would have been in some serious trouble. We are grateful that everyone is safe and glad to have this storm over!

PS. Ryan had a lot of fun riding his ripstick in the wind! He really got a good ride with the wind at his back. And then he hit a rock and banged up his knee. Game over. (He's fine though)