Is It Tomorrow?

Lucy asks me that question a lot, "Is it tomorrow?"  So cute.

Anyways, here are a few pics from my yesterday.  Besides the hours spent on errands and working on a Harry Potter party, here are a few other tasty tidbits that happened:

The sisters serving in our ward wanted to come over and serve me.  That's a hard thing!  I didn't want to give them any gross like, "Go clean my bathroom."  Luckily, I came up with something more fun:  make Jonas' classroom birthday treats.  They gladly did that and had fun, too, I think.

 What fun, wonderful gals.

 They also had to try out the ice rink for a little bit.  One of them, ahem, might have fallen down on her bum.  Awesome.

That evening I got to take Emmy to her first dress rehearsal.  And oh boy was she ever so excited!  She was giddy and joyous and everything cute and sweet.

 There was some make-up there and so I applied some stuff.  She's such a beauty.

 Some glitter for her hair.

There she is with fellow dance and school classmate, Natalee.  They just hung out in this room until it was time for a group photo and then their practice.

She loved the whole evening.  She danced down the halls, to the bathroom, etc., etc.

Oh I can't wait for tonight!  Good luck Emmy!

It's a good thing . . .

I oftentimes think to myself,
"It's a good thing God made kids so cute."

Opening Day . . .

It was opening day for the Maxwell Ice Rink.  The kids were so excited to get out on the ice that they had to grab a little ice-time in the morning, before school.

We all got out on the ice after our FHE lesson.  It was cold, but great.  I mainly had to skate Lucy around which isn't the most fun, but isn't so horrible either since she is so cute!  There were moans and whines from all the kids - minus Lucy - when it was their time to come in.  But, hey, a school night is a school night . . .

I'm such a party-pooper.

 Early in the morning . . .

 See, Lucy is just too cute.

 Emmy, in hockey-helmet and all.

 The boys.

The family - so coooool.

The Winter UN-Sun 10K

I have a good friend that has somewhat recently gotten in to running.  She's always encouraging me to find us a race to do - and I finally came through.  :)  I decided on the Winter Sun 10K in Moab.  My friend Kandace was all on board and, via facebook, we got another three gals (well really four, but one had to cancel at the last moment) to do it with us (we decided to make it in to a girls' weekend - I'm so super glad we did!).

I know and adore Kandace, but I didn't know the other gals much.  One of them I knew a little bit, but not at all for the other two.  So it was fun to meet some new friends.

We headed out on Friday at 1pm and we arrived at our condo in Moab close to 4pm.  I was able to get us the same condo my family and parents stayed at when I ran the Thelma and Louise 1/2 back in June.  It's a super nice place and had a great rate - especially when divided by five.

I was shocked by how much snow there was in Moab.  Crazy!  I think we all were shocked how cold it was, too!  Brrrrrr.

We got our stuff in, started cooking up some homemade chicken noodle soup (Kandace's brilliant idea), chatted, etc.  We ate our most delicious soup and then headed out in the freezing cold for our race packets.  Once back "home" we played Mexican Train and chatted.  But we were all in bed by 10pm - we rock!  (We're also very tired mothers, too.  :)

The next morning we got to the bus a little after 9 and was at the starting point by 9:30.  That was a chilly 30 minutes of waiting around in 17-degree weather.  Brrrrrrr.  I was freezing!  I knew I'd be okay once we started running, but that thought didn't warm me up!

We finally got to run at 10am and ran in some cold temps and snow - it was awesome.  The first mile or two my face was super cold - but the rest of me was fine.  I finally was good after the first couple of miles and enjoyed my run.  All five of us ran it at our own paces.  We all had good times for ourselves, too!  I was super impressed by us.  :)  Two of the gals have little 3-4 month old babies at home and so this was a big accomplishment for them.

After we all finished, we went in to the school and grabbed some stuff,  I drank my favorite after-run drink:  chocolate milk, and we listened to some awards and such.  We were lucky enough to get a late check-out and so we were able to go back to our condo, shower up, pack up, and eat left-over and even-more-delicious-the-second-day chicken noodle soup.  It was the perfect food for a cold, post-race type of day!

Then we headed out and had slushy roads for the 2/3 of the drive, then dry roads for the rest.  I super enjoyed hanging out with these gals and sure hope we can make this a yearly tradition!

Here are some super out-of-order pictures.  I didn't bring along my camera, so all of these were taken by my friends' fancy phones.

 What our run looked like.  Beautiful, huh?!

 We all made it!  There's me, Kandace, Sarah, Jeni, and Mary.  We made shirts - on the back we had a monster and a name - I was "weird."  :)

 Sarah and me hanging out at the finish area.

 Getting ready to board the bus . . . it was cold out!

 Driving in Jeni's car to the race - we were excited!

 That night - we all tried on our race shirts.  Very cool.  The shirts and us.  Although I don't look so sure . . .

 A race picture - about 80% of the race photos my eyes were shut.  I wonder if my eyes were open more if I would run faster?!  That guy behind me (whom I followed for the first 5 - 5 1/2 miles) is Bishop Tobler.  A bishop of a ward in our area.  He's done this race for many, many, many years.

Me!  Finishing!  Time of 55:09.

Now that I've warmed up, I can't wait to do it again!  :)

Snow Day

Besides the little incident of me telling my kids that I didn't like them (I didn't at that moment!), our first Snow Day was a success I think!  This was the first snow day that our district has had in over 20 years.  I guess that is what 12+ inches of snow and single-digit to negative-digit temps will do!

Lucy had gymnastics class and then we headed out to go sledding.  It was a lot of fun.  Jonas and Emmy really got in to it - the last 1/2 hour they just kept going down together in all sorts of kooky positions.  They loved it and it was super fun to watch.  Lucy went down for the first half, and then she was done and just stood and watched all the kids.  Miles had fun sledding and then went off somewhere doing who-knows-what - hitting the snow off the trees and the such, perhaps?  Examining snow crystals?

 Wheeeee!  The sled was all broken up by the time we were done!

 Fun times.

 I just had to show a close-up of her face.  How great is that!?

We lucked out and had brilliant sunshine that helped the 14-degree day seem not so bad!

In the afternoon the boys went out front and were there for hours, while Emmy and Lucy played with Lily inside our house for hours.  I think everyone was happy.

 Cool.

Cool.  Literally!  By this time, the clouds had come in, the sun was getting low - it was cold!

Definitely a hot-chocolate-snack kind of day!

School starts back tomorrow. . .

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas . . .

I'm no photographer so you'll have to bear with me, but I did take some pictures of our Christmas decor . . .

 Our Christmas tree hung with ornaments.  I love the Japanese ornaments my parents gave my kids last year.  When they kids got them out this year, they were so excited about them and hugged and cuddled them.  :)

 My father gave us this nativity set years ago.  I love it.  I made the star out of our backyard twigs and some hot glue, then added lights for an added effect.  I like it.

 I don't know why, but I am stricken by these pictures.  I adore them.

Our beautiful banister all lit up.

 Our stockings all hung with care, but not by the chimney . . .

 A fun, musical snow globe!   We got this from Great-Grandma Dee.

Someday I will have a better advent - but this old thing will have to do for this year.  Each day there are 2 candies - one day is for the girls and the next the boys.  The "20" is for the girls - why then, you ask, is there only one candy in there?  Because Lucy stole two from the number "1" tin and thus had to lose out on two of her days.  That sneak!  (In terms of lying and stealing, Monday was not a good day for Lucy . . . )

And, of course, our beloved elf Eljin.  How the kids love him and love finding out where he is each morning (ooops, the second morning he was here he forgot to move . . . That silly elf.).  He is Santa's eyes and ears during this critical month of December.  :)  Our kids totally believe in him . . . all of them.

P.S.  It's also a winter-wonderland outside . . . with over a foot of fluffy white snow.  Which means our kids get their very first Snow-Day tomorrow - that's right, no school for them!!!

Our Christmas Tree Hunt, 2013

After my nice, long run on Saturday morning, and a couple of hours for Ben in back working with Randy on the rink, we got ourselves ready for the hunt.  Our Christmas tree hunt.  It's a little early, yeah, but it's the only weekend we could do it!  It turned out to be a great day.  It had been cloudy and foggy in Montrose for the past two days, but once we started climbing in to the woods, we had blue-bird skies.  It was great!

 There was plenty of snow to make it hard for Lucy to walk in.  :)

 So pretty.

 Snow angels.

 Ben, saw, and little Lucy in the sled.

 And there she is - our Christmas tree!

 Lucy was cute and was very interested as Ben sawed down our tree.

 Snow babes.  :)

We tried to go to the 4:30 showing of Frozen.  But after standing in line for about 10 minutes, the tickets had sold out (we had finally made it to the ticket counter - bummer!).  I was really bummed, but felt even more bummed for our kids.  They were sad, but were fine.  So instead of watching a movie, it gave us time to decorate our tree.  Fun!  The kids were all excited about the ornaments.  And here is our lovely, wild, decorated tree:

 Lookin' good.  :)

It looks much better without the flash, but a little blurry.  I needed a tripod.  Anyways, I love our tree!

Happy December 1st!

Thanksgiving

 On Wednesday, after being home all day with the four kids, I told them we were going to go on a bike ride to feed the ducks.  I told Miles that the neighborhood turkeys might be out, too!  I was right.  Isn't he/she ugly?  Oh, and apparently I have passed on my totally-scared-of-birds gene to Emmy.  Holy Moly, she's got it bad!  At first she started screaming as the ducks came running up to us for food.  Then she pretty much went ballistic when the turkey came over.  I do not exaggerate with the word ballistic.  I finally had to take her away while the boys finished feeding the animals.

 I think they were pretty excited about it.  I think Jonas would have been scared if Miles wasn't around.  :)  But they liked the turkey and rode by the house where the turkeys live and saw a couple more - including the huge white one.  Emmy and I had to take a different route (oh, and Lucy, too) so as to not go by the ducks and turkey again.  :)

Then Thanksgiving Day!  I went on a great run in the foggy mist.  It was awesome.  Then I just spent the day getting ready, visiting a widow, trying to invite another widow over for dinner (she wasn't home), etc.  Ben and Randy Gerke spent their days (and the day to follow) working on this:

 The Ice Rink 2013.  Bigger and Better.  :)  It's looking good.

 Here is our table set-up.  Mostly made by Miles.

 He did a lot of origami.  I found an origami pilgrim hat online and he looked at it once and then had it down.  All the girls (and ladies) got the pilgrim hats for their place-setting.  Cute, cute.

 The baby turkey Miles made (he made a big one out of newspaper).

I made the Indian feathers for the boys' setting.  Miles made some other origami thing - a utensil holder.  The kids also got to draw and decorate our table.  Fun.

We had the Gerkes over - Randy and Kay.  They are wonderful and we had a really good time.  The kids even convinced them to stay and watch our traditional Thanksgiving Day movie, "Jack Frost."  (The really old one.)  Oh, we also had some yummy food.  :)

One thing I'm not thankful about though:  that I didn't get a single picture of people on Thanksgiving.  So lame.

It was a nice day and all was well.

Our Sister Missionaries - and perhaps future Sister Missionaries

Sister Bennet, Sister Lucy, Sister Emmy, and Sister Betts.

Aren't they all just so beautiful!  :)

EXTRA! EXTRA!

My kids have been showing up in the papers as of late:

 Lucy made it on the front page of our local paper, the Montrose Daily Press.  There was an article on this activity we attend each Friday at a Lutheran church called Mostly Music.  We've been going to it for years and it's wonderful - as is Miss Jessica, who leads it and is the Pastor's wife of the church.

Miles made it in the Telluride paper, The Watch.  This picture and caption is about the Earth Group/Energy Group that Miles is a part of.

Extra, extra, read all about it!