Happy Thanksgiving!

We had Thanksgiving dinner at our house this year. It was wonderful. I love having a house full of family. Aleesa and Nate started things off with dance dance while everyone was arriving. They both are very good and very competitive. We had a beautiful dinner. Everyone contributed resulting in plenty of food and lots of variety. Thank you for being so generous. After dinner, the kids took off in various pairs to the toy room, bed rooms, and outside. The girls got to visit and play games (Thanks Dianne for bringing such fun games). Some of the boys started a movie downstairs, and some started the various nintendo selections. As the day evolved, Nate, Lance, Mike, and Dianne ended up playing nintendo for hours and hours. It was like they were kids again. We did get to have cousins sleep over, which my kids thought was fabulous!












We stayed up until well after midnight and set the alarm clocks for 4:00 am. We couldn't miss Black Friday. This was Mike and Brooke's first year to attend the crazyness. Nate and I are old pro's, so we were excited to initiate them. We had a great time and were able to get everything we needed. We did have strategy and planning. The only thing we forgot were the walkie-talkies. Black Friday was a success ending in a delicious breakfast at IHOP. It is always a requirement of Black Friday to end by going out to breakfast.

Tonight we are finishing the day by watching movies (per redbox!) and eating leftovers. I overestimated our families homemade roll eating abilities. I made 150 rolls and have 100 left over!

Tomarrow is Christmas tree cutting day, and the kids know it. They are so excited to get out everything and decorate.

Our family is having a fun filled holiday weekend. Thank you to all our family for sharing in the holiday with us. We love you and are Thankful to have such a good family.

Aubrie did it!!
She danced at a performance. She is in her second year of dance, but has had stage fright so far. I have not wanted to force her. I have tried bribing her. I want her to dance because she loves it, not because I made her. When they were performing she got scared and stayed by me in the front. Then after watching them, she got up and ran out and joined them. She did not do the entire dance. She said it looked like her friends were having so much fun. Afterward she told me, "It was actually fun!" I told her of course it was fun. That is why you should dance. It is fun. As you can see from the pictures, she really likes her dance costume too.This is Aubrie and her friend. They are so proud of themselves.

As you can see, She feels very pretty, nervous, excited, happy.

They are so cute! I was hoping to get pictures with some of her other co-dancers/friends/cousins. Aubrie usually does not allow pictures. I am shocked she took any of these. This is a big deal! This is all she let me have. I love everyone of them.

Twilight is here!

Everyone is excited to have an evening at the movies. The general overall reaction I got from everyone is that people really liked the movie. Of course, if you are a Twilight addict, you noticed the differences from the book. That is always how it works when they make a book into a movie. Only one person I spoke to said they did not like the movie. I personally found it very entertaining. I was excited to see the story from the Hollywood point of view. Many things were as I imagined. Many things I pictured differently. I think it is fun to have something to countdown to and be excited about. Here are some pictures of people I knew who were at the show today too.P.S. I can't wait for the New Moon movie. Yeah Jake!!

This is just us being silly this evening. I asked the kids to:










Give me a nice smile.

What little angles














Be silly, silly, silly















Isn't it fabulous being a kid












Give me an angry face















Look out these kids are scary!

Happy Birthday Grayson!

Grayson will be 3 years old on Wednesday. We had a little party today for him because Grandma Pam had come over for the primary program. He has felt like it is his birthday for 3 days now. It will continue to be his birthday all this week too.
Birthdays are Great!
He is loving all the attention and presents.

Today was the primary program for sacrament meeting. The kids have been practicing their parts for days. They were very excited, and did very well. At one point, the kids next to me were giggling. (I was sitting on the stand with the kids) I should have become suspicious right away, but I didn't. Finally my husband caught my attention and he was pointing at his mouth then at Aubrie-who was right next to me. I looked over to find out she was wearing glow-in-the-dark vampire teeth from Halloween!! Her smile was huge, she was singing and showing them off. Usually kids don't pull stunts when their mom is sitting right next to them, but Aubrie has always been bold.

Here is something to look at while my blog is still under construction.

These are pictures off of a friends blog. They are entries in a jack-o-lantern contest. They are great.

Enjoy!