Birthdays!

Today is Matt's birthday! And man is he old! Well, 3 years older than me and that is all that counts! It has been a quiet birthday, which is suppose how they all are after you reach 16! Anyways.... it is funny, but not haha funny, but funny that today I worked so hard making practically a million cupcakes to bring to Matt's work as a surprise that I am now completely exhausted and in a kinda grouchy mood! Typical.... the cupcakes turned out fabulous, but it all turned out to be a 5 hour event! And I made cupcakes for one of my closest friends whose birthday was yesterday. So like 4 dozen cupcakes in 24 hours! All from scratch, even the frosting. Martha Stewarts Living Magazine in the Febuary one, has the most amazing cupcake recipes! So they all tasted and looked like a million bucks, if I do say so myself. But have left me feeling pooped. If we had money, I would have ordered dinner in cause I didn't want to make it and stand at the kitchen counter any longer. I do feel bad though cause I wanted tonight to be a good one for Matt cause we weren't doing anything super exciting for his birthday- dinner, cake and ice cream and us singing to him was about it- and to not have been be in the most-love-you-you're-the-best-husband-ever mood doesn't make the night even more fun! He even didn't get any exciting gifts- just clothes, which he got this past weekend not wrapped and with the tags still on them. But the kids, with my help, did get him a "World's Greatest Dad" pin to wear at work! Anyways....... probably making it sound much bigger than it is! I do hope he, and he said he did, have a wonderful birthday! Nothing makes you feel better than having poeple remember it is your birthday! And I do love Matt and am grateful to spend another year of his life with him!

Out of the Snow, Into the Sun!

I struggle this time of year with the winter blah's-that is what I am politely calling them when around other people. I get in this yucky, never want to leave the house, only want to eat, really grouchy to my husband phase. So after having a crummy week/weekend and having no patience with anyone, I told Matt I was truly doing crappy! He suggested we try going to St. George for the weekend. Matt's parents have a little 2 bedroom condo down there which we could stay at. The only hiccup was that Matt's parents were snowbirding there and were we going to drive each other crazy for a long weekend in such a small place. Before when it was suggested, I had said yes! But I was desperate to get out of the snow, which was still a foot deep in my front yard, and the cold and smog! If it was too much we could leave first thing Sun. morning!
It helped the week go by quickly, which I was grateful for. We decided not to tell the kids just incase we decided we couldn't go. And we almost decided not too cause Ella got sick on Wed. and Thurs, but luckily seemed mostly over it on Fri. So.... we went!
We left mid morning, much to Matt's dismay becuase we had set a 9 o'clock leave time and he gets bugged if we leave late, even if no one, including everyone else but him, cares when we get there! The car ride, was long enough for sure, but not long enough where I was starting to threated the kids within an inch of their life! That was nice. We got there mid-afternoon and from that point on we didn't do much of anything we didn't want to do! It was awesome! We played some games we brought from home, cause I didn't think they would have too many kids things to do- I also brought coloring books and some regular books to read at bed time! We watched a little tv, we swam in the community pool every day, which the kids loved. Carter and I brought our bikes and so we rode around the neighborhood! That was so fun! I hadn't been able to really try out the bike Matt splurged and bought me for christmas. It was so nice to get out in the 60 degree weather and see how fabulous my bike was. And I was not disappointed! Carter was a little out of shape though, well me too, but at least I didn't have to walk my bike up the hills like he did! That is what a yucky winter does to the best of us! We read books and went for walks. We did a little bit of shopping and ate lunch out at In-And-Out! Matt and I went on a date Friday night! The kids loved being with their Grammi and Grandpa who spoiled them with Lucky Charm cereal and candy and pop tarts when ever they wanted. Grandpa gave enough 'constant kisses' to last until they come home! Even Lincoln loved Grandpa by the end of the trip often reaching his little arms out for more kisses and hugs!
It was really such a wonderful, relaxing, enjoyable weekend! We needed to just get away and hang out and not worry about grocery shopping, or errands, or church stuff. It was awesome! I am so glad to have gone. I think we all were. Ella was crying today that she didn't want to go and asked several times if she could stay with Grammi! It helped my feel better and hopefully get through the next few weeks! And I am hoping it helped me just want to spend more time with my kids cause I had a lot of fun just doing all that little stuff that seems to get brushed aside in the business of keeping house and the family schedule! Carter summed it up best when he said, "This was the best weekend ever!"

Recommitted 3.... well, I think it is 3!

So I am going to recommit myself again... I think to simplify it and make it easier on myself to actually post, I think I will forgo the pictures, unless I just have something incredible to share because I have to say I am not the hugest picture taker and I have felt the need after viewing others blogs to have a picture with every post because they have pictures with every post, and I was feeling the need to keep up! But I did have the slowest interent and so pictures took forever to upload, so I am hoping that if I don't feel the need to include a picture with each post, I may feel more motivated to post! We will see..... maybe one day I will be able to take 'write on blog' off my weekly to do list cause I want to do it rather than feel like I should do it! I hear it is wonderful! I do even know poeple who have 3 blogs! I can't even do one- how can they have 3? Anyways.....Did you notice I said, 'did have the slowest interent'? Some how our internet company sent us a letter saying that we could get faster internet for free!!!! For Free! Nothing is ever free! But our speed is like 10 times faster than before, which was a snails pace, so now we are moving at the speed of a quick worm! It is awesome! Another good reason to recommitt myself for the third time to writing on my blog!

O Christmas Tree!

Matt was very kind to me the evening we got our Christmas tree. He could have been really bugged, or said things, but being the better person than myself just smiled and laughed to himself about my particularness! And I say that because we went to our sister-in-laws family house where they sell Christmas tree, the same place Matt went as a child, to get our tree. After we had picked out, paid for and tied the tree to the roof of the car, I decided the tree was too small and we needed to get a different tree, one I had shot down previously! So we got the guys to come take the tree down and luckily there wasn't a restocking fee!! hahaha! We needed more money than we had brought, so we had to go back to the ATM and then went back and got the better, bigger tree!

The better story is that although exhausted at about 11pm Sat. night I got a second wind and decided to put lights on the tree. We did promise the kids the tree would be ready to put decorations on the next day, so it needed to be done. But after about 2 hours and 5 strands of lights later, only a little more than half the tree was lit! So Matt being the wonderful husband he is went to Walmart at 1 in the morning and got 5! more boxes of lights! Needless to say, I didn't finish the tree that night and we went to bed at 2! I finished putting the lights on Sun. morning, although one of the boxes was the wrong type and there is a small bare spot on the tree, but at this point, I don't care!

So last night we invited my sister, Mary Beth, out to help us decorate the tree. I made some pumpkin chocolate chip cookies right beforehand, so we could treat ourselves when we were done. And we played some classic Christmas music and had a lot of fun trimming the tree!

The tree is up a little earlier than usual, but we did feel it was the best time for it to happen. I am glad though too, cause it definitely feels way more Christmasy with it up! And it is pretty and makes the house smell good. Now if I can figure out a way for those under 2.5 feet(Lincoln) to stay away from it, it would be awesome!

Christmas Lights.... And Matt's Pride!

The morning of Thanksgiving Matt put two strands of Christmas lights out on the front of our house. Just over the porch and garage. It looked okay, but very lacking, but what do you do? So the guy down the street from us put his Christmas lights up..... way more than two strands and all around the second story of his home. Upon driving by this Matt declared, "If Kevin can do it, I am so going to do it!" After some talking about it and not coming up with a way for Matt to get up that high, I prodded him, several times actually, to call Kevin ask him for advice, or at the very least to borrow his ladder. So after telling Matt Kevin's number and reminding him to call, he did. Matt said he was only going to ask for his consultation, but as it ended up Kevin was going to be coming up in an hour to help. Sooo.... Kevin comes with ladder in hand and "helps" Matt with the lights. Helps is all relative because while it is true Matt has never hung Christmas lights besides on the gutter and did need to be shown how exactly it all worked, but Kevin basically did everything including take the screen out of the window! So once out on the roof, Matt helped Kevin by basically staying out of his way. Matt stayed as far away from the edge of the roof as humanly possible and rocked himself while in the fetal position till Kevin said he was all done! (although in the pictures it does look like Matt is actually helping) Now you may think I am being mean about Matt, but he was actually the first one who said this! And Kevin is so nice... I kept telling him I am going to bake him a pie, which I actually did this morning... But he kept saying he was glad to help. That night in bed I asked Matt how he was going to get the lights off the tree- he said he was calling Kevin! And poor Matt, fearful of heights and not known for being graceful, probably best he stay off the roof. I said next year, we are not going to ask Kevin for help, either we don't put them up, or we hire it out.

The HOLE....

Anyone who has been to our house has seen the HOLE! It is a product of the mortgage fall out. A builder dug out the foundation for a house in the lot next to ours, but something happened, who knows what, and thus here we have the HOLE! When we first moved in in April, Matt was adamant that Carter didn't play in it, or even near it. The hole was about 10 feet deep with two HUGE piles of dirt next to it. It was a prime little boy play area, but scary. Well, we gave in quickly when we realized that all the other little kids in the neighborhood were always on it! How could we say no? Well, that HOLE sat there untouched.... And then at the first of Sept. Matt when to city council about it and told them about the HOLE! They said the would contact the owner and get a fence up around in it no time. Yeah, well that never happened. And I was kinda glad cause I didn't want some ugly fence up next door. Plus, would that really keep these crazy little boys out of it, or would it make it more of a game by seeing who could climb over it the fastest? But at the end of Oct. on the news one night Matt and I saw a story about a little Toole boy who died after his family and him built a a tunnel in a hill similar to the one we had next door and it colapsed while he was in it. I felt so bad, but I was also MAD!!! This could be our little boys, if that HOLE was not filled in. So we, my neighbors, and I sent mean emails and phone calls to all the city council members and mayor. Although I am not the suing type, I told them if anything happened to my child, I would sue the city!! We sent them links to the news story..... And they finally responded!

The pics above are of some of the boys, Carter included, watching the HOLE we filled in! It was exciting to see the bulldozer work its magic! Now we don't have a hole, but the boys have put the dirt lot use and built a little dirt bike track on it complete with some very minor "jumps"! Never an opportunity missed to be a boy! And I love it!

Family Portraits!

I am not speedy with the post- Always about a week or two behind!

I finally downloaded the few pictures I have of our family pictures taken- I am still trying to locate my super sister-in-law who took them and get the rest, but below are a few that were taken! Some of the better ones!