School Concert

Friday the girls had a Christmas concert at their school and did a wonderful job singing some festive songs. Macy's class actually sang one song entirely in Spanish and as beautiful as it sounded, I have no clue what was being said.

You did a wonderful job Abby and Macy!

Abby with her good friend, Alma.

GNO Par-tay

Thursday night was a GNO (Girls Night Out) with my cousins and aunts, and can I just say I have the absolute funnest cousins and aunts there are! We had so much fun. All of us were laughing so hard that most of us were in tears by the end of the night.

We played dirty Santa with white elephant gifts and while some people brought actual white elephant gifts, others were very generous. My favorite Aunt Linda brought one of her old wigs as her gift and her daughter Laura opened it up. We had a good laugh! Check her out with her new do. Love it Laura!

Happy Birthday Abby

Our little princess turned six today. Wow! I can't believe how grown up our kids are getting. I remember Abby being born, at 2:00 in the morning. She just wouldn't let me get any rest and had to come right smack in the middle of the night!

We had a little party for her today and she invited 4 of her little friends from school. All the girls showed up in their dresses and we had a wonderful princess party. For the first 15 minutes all they wanted to do was twirl in their dresses and dance to music. Too cute. It was a party filled with princess games and instead of pin the tail on the donkey, we played pin the kiss on the frog.

Happy Birthday Abby. We love the sweet little girl you are.

Our Thanksgiving Weekend

Just to fill you in, late, on our Thanksgiving weekend. We had a wonderful time in Idaho with Grandma and Grandpa Udy. The kids ran around like crazy outside with their cousins and it was nice to be in the country and to be able to let them run free.

We first stopped by Pocatello to visit our good friends, the Abercrombie's, and then it was off to see the Udy's. Clint's sister Kathy and I made our annual after Thanksgiving shopping spree and left to get to the stores at 4:00 in the morning. That made for a very long day but we did get some nice deals.

With the Abercrombie's - Clint and his good buddy, Joe

While we were out spending shopping, the guys took the kids into the mountains to get Christmas trees. They loved it! I have to say, Clint did a nice job picking out trees this year and we strapped a real beauty on the top of our van and brought her home. Clark Griswald would be proud!

Thank You Clint!

For several weeks now I have been mentioning to Clint that I "need" to go shopping. Like every other girl out there, I have no clothes to wear. So graciously Clint told me to take the whole day, this last Saturday, and spend some time at the mall. I left the three older kids with him and took Tyler along with me for a day of some well needed shopping. It was wonderful and so nice to be out of the house and to have no kids in tow, except for Tyler of course.

Thank you Clint for letting me have a day of relaxation.

I've Been Tagged

My friend, Sarah, tagged me so it's my turn to share some odd things about me, with you!

#1 - I can not make a decision to save my life, especially when it comes to buying things. I am known to take things back, often. I will buy something and think I love it and the next day my mind has changed. I am actually surprised that I ever made the decision to get married; that's how bad I am with making a choice about something.

#2 - I am OCD about my house being burned down. I have to check the stove, heater, curling irons, etc. every time before I leave the house even if I never even used the stove that morning. I will check, recheck and have been known to drive back to the house after leaving to triple check and make sure nothing was left on!

#3 - I have a major sweet tooth. I have to have some kind of sweet in the house, just something to satisfy my craving. Cookies, candies, cake, anything. I guess that is why I can never get rid of my last 5 pounds!

#4 - Call me an optimist but I always think I will win a contest if I enter. Although I never do, there is always that slim chance that I will win the prize. Because of this positive outlook I often enter contests in the hopes of winning!

#5 - I am secretly obsessed with celebrities and have to know what they are doing. It's like I think we are friends because I always like to know what they are up to, where they are shopping and where they are going on vacations, etc. I enjoy watching the Entertainment Tonight shows so I can have my celebrity fix. Shhh, don't tell!

#6 - I guess this goes along with my OCD, but I have to double check on the kids every night to make sure they are okay. Even hours after they have gone to bed, I have to go in to make sure everyone is tucked in safely.

#7 - I used to be terrified of roller coasters, but now I LOVE them! Growing up I absolutely refused to ride them because I always felt too afraid and scared as well that they would fall apart. Now I enjoy them and will scream the "entire" ride, my sister can attest to that. I am not too sold on the ones that go upside down but the others I am game for!

I am now tagging Becky U., Becky H., Layna, Tamra, Emily, Jo and Stacee

A Fun Halloween

This year's Halloween was filled with lots of fun, activities and too much sugar. Grandma Nana sent the kids each a Halloween shirt which they all loved. Thanks Grandma Nana for thinking of the kids and for the special surprise. Tyler's shirt would light up anytime he moved, and this presented a problem during his nap time. He would wake himself up anytime he moved because the light would set off. We had to have a wardrobe change for those sleeping times!

Our carved pumpkins this year were better than in years past. Our wonderful neighbors let us borrow their pumpkin carving kit which allowed us to create intricately carved pumpkins. I would highly recommend getting a kit. In fact, we later went and bought one to be able to use for next year.

Trick or treating was great despite the rainfall. The kids loved running around the neighborhood with dad while I manned the house. We had so many kids especially during the first hour. I didn't even have time to sit down in between the doorbell being ringed. I just sat on our steps and handed candy out lunchroom style. They lined up and I served them!

Macy and Abby wore their Chinese outfits Pops brought back from China while Blake insisted on wearing my old jailbird costume from when I was a little girl. He refused to wear anything else. And then there was Tyler, our little Spider. He did not like wearing his costume. I think it was on him a total of 15 minutes!

Tyler enjoyed his first Halloween treat, a sucker! He "loved" every minute of that sugar on a stick.

We hope everyone enjoyed their Halloween!

A Fun Weekend!

Clint has successfully completed another marathon bringing his total to 11. Last weekend we packed the van, headed to St. George and watched Clint and his brother Mark complete the St. George marathon while over 6,000 others ran as well. It was a crazy mass of people and to top it all off, it rained the "entire" race. Despite the horrible weather conditions, both Clint and Mark had their personal best. Way to go guys!



We enjoyed the rest of the weekend with Mark and Becky and Luke and Jill. One of the afternoons we had a picnic lunch at the Town Center Park in St. George and then ice cream at Judd's. If you want a blast from the past, Judd's is the place. It is a quaint, old pioneer store with all of it's charm still in tact. While at the Town Center Park the kids splashed in the water there and got completely soaked. They didn't seem to mind.

Hmmm...too many flavors to choose from

All soaked but still smiling



We absolutely enjoyed our time with both Mark and Becky and Luke and Jill. We were lucky to be there when the weather was actually beautiful. It's always nice to get away and to be able to spend time with family!

Skipping with Aunt Jill on the way to Judd's for a treat.

Lost In David's Head

Saturday afternoon we went to the Corn Maze at Thanksgiving Point, and this year the maze was in the shape of David Archuleta. While navigating through the maze, they had his songs playing as well as interviews with him. As much as I like David Archuleta, I was ready to break free from his grip. We were soooo lost and never did find our way out successfully. I think we ended up somewhere by his ear when we decided we were never getting out. We took a few "homemade" shortcuts and eventually made our way back to the entrance. Despite several missed turns and headaches, we had a fun time as a family.

At Thanksgiving Point not only did they have an incredible corn maze, but a pumpkin patch where the kids each picked a pumpkin, a huge in-ground bouncing pillow, pedal karts, a place for the kids to mine for "gold," and Abby's favorite, the Pumpkin Princess!

Growing Up!

Saturday marked Blake's 4th birthday! My little boy is growing up and he truly makes my heart happy. We had a small celebration for him and ended the day with a trip to the movies to see "Kung Fu Panda." The whole movie Blake was making karate chops moves and yelling "Hi Yah!!"

Thanks Nana and Pops for the basketball hoop. It was a perfect present for him.

Happiness Is...

a sweet, special, innocent, cutie patutie, baby boy!

(does anyone other than me see any resemblance to Shiloh Jolie-Pitt?!)

First Day of School

Abby has been so excited about being able to go to school everyday. This year she started kindergarten and LOVES it! The girls are enrolled at a charter school by our house and have to wear uniforms everyday. But they love the school and love the friends they are making.

Blake is going to preschool again this year and actually gets picked up by a bus. I wish I would have captured his excitement as he skipped to the bus and got on with the biggest grin you have ever seen. Priceless.

My kids are growing up! :(

Coming To An End

With school starting on Monday, the summer is officially coming to an end. We have had a wonderfully relaxing summer and enjoyed being able to swim just about everyday. I thought I would share a few pictures of our summertime fun. Swimming was definitely a highlight as was the hike Clint took us on one afternoon. We visited the Temple Quarry where the early pioneers got the stone for the Salt Lake City Temple. It was a very interesting place to visit and you can still see many stones that were cut for the temple but had been left. They have the marks from the tools used by the pioneers. The kids loved looking for these marks and got so excited when they found one.

We've Moved!

Who knew living in a hotel would be so sad to leave. All of my kids, and myself, shed some tears as we said good-bye to our new friends at the Marriott. Everyone there was so kind and generous to our family. We loved the Marriott!

Now we are back to having a mortgage and responsibilities and making my own breakfast! We are still digging through boxes but love our new home and our neighbors are fantastic!

The ward is going to take some time getting used to. There are 4 nurseries and about 270 primary kids! YIKES! But everyone is so kind and friendly. :)

We would love to have visitors, so if you are ever in the area, come see us.

The sign of a good baby....

is one who does not scream his head off when his parents accidentally lock him in the van for about 10-15 minutes by his lonesome.

Yes, that is what happened to Tyler yesterday evening. We were invited to a friend's house last evening for some refreshments and we successfully got 3 kids out of the van, but left the fourth inside with the keys by accident. Ooops!

Our nice friend drove Clint back to the hotel to retrieve the spare keys, and about 15 minutes later we saved Tyler from the van. He didn't even make a peep, but played with his toys until we could get to him.

I love good natured babies!

Family Movie Night

The last two Fridays we have had "Family Movie Night" here at the hotel. The first week we watched "Miss Potter." Loved that movie! And just this last Friday we watched "Nancy Drew." Another very family friendly pick. We all get comfortable, pile together on the couch, eat an unhealthy amount of popcorn, and enjoy a movie together. The kids love it, and it has really been a special time to share together.