Decorating the Perfect Tree and Pictures with Santa

Stockings are hung on the banister with care.

Going through the lights. All of the strings had half of their lights not working.  We made do, but I think we'll have to throw them all away after Christmas and start over with new lights next year.

The store where Maddy works puts up and decorates 15 trees every year. She has the training and took over the lights on our tree this year.

There is a little more motivation to our Christmas decorating this year. We have volunteered to host the Chewelah Camber of Commerce Christmas party. Barry is the chamber vice-president, and the people who come to the chamber party are people like the mayor, Maddy's boss and other business owners and is basically a who's who of Chewelah. 

This week Makayla (front) and Mackensey (back row) had three choir concerts. Christmas is a busy time for their elementary school choir.

Marianne had to be talked into sitting on Santa's lap. She was very brave (and pretty darn cute if you ask me).

Speaking of cute...

Have a great week! We'll let you know how the party goes.

P.S. This is my 100th blog post. That is something to celebrate! Thanks for reading so we can keep in touch.

The Perfect Tree

Driving around the property to find this year's Christmas tree.

Marianne is a cute backseat driver.

Yes, Mackensey is wearing boots, coat, hat and....shorts.

Yes, the family cat was brought on the excursion.

That's it! That's the one!

I used my new telephoto lens so that I didn't have to walk as far in the snow.

Loading up the pick up.

After setting up our tree we celebrated Mindy's 13th birthday. We now have two teenagers in our family.

Our family has been battling the stomach flu off and on for two weeks now. Here Ben is resting with the cat for company.

Family picture time. 

I realized I haven't posted for a while. Here's a catch-up picture of the kids on Halloween.

Have a great week!

Father's Day Flowers

For Mother's Day the year after we moved into our house Barry bought me two rose bushes from Costco. They never grew, and the following spring I called Costco to see if they would exchange them. They said that they did not get rose bushes that year, but I could return my dead rose bushes for a refund. So I dug them up and did. This year I heard on the radio that Home Depot had rose bushes on sale for Mother's Day. We didn't have a trip planned to Spokane at the time, and we missed out on the sale. In June Barry came home from a trip to Spokane with two rose bushes! Home Depot still had good prices and he bought me two of my favorite color roses. He planted them on a Saturday, which happened to be the day before Father's Day, so I call them my Father's Day rose bushes. They have just thrived and here is a picture of Marianne sitting behind one of them.

I was at the high school with Ben and Makayla when the Medistar helicopter landed at the hospital. Ben asked if we could walk over and watch it take off. I told him that we could go look at it, but we may not see if take off, depending on how long it would be there. We walked the one block to the hospital and I took their picture in front of the helicopter. A few minutes later we were able to watch the medics load up the patient and take off while we were standing just 50 yards away. It was SO cool to watch a helicopter take off while being so close.

Makayla likes to help take the meat off the bones of the turkey.

Barry took me to see the Spokane Symphony play at the Chewelah Peak learning center. Maddy got to get in free by helping set up and take down with the band. She was tickled to see that one of the pieces they played was the same music that they had played in band last spring (Sound of Music medley).

Maddy celebrated her 16th birthday. What a beautiful teenager. She was excited to get her driver's license on her birthday and drove herself to seminary and school the next day. When she came home she walked in the door and said, "Ummm, Mom?!?" I said, "What did you do?!?" Her response, "Oh, no, it's not that. The car is fine. I just had a problem in one of my classes." Whew!

Marianne poses for me. Silly girl!

And they're off! Cross country has begun! Here is Mindy's first race. She beat her time by 2 minutes!

Mackensey smiles as she runs down the hill. She did well on her first race

This picture of Maddy's race was taken at the beginning. By the end she was hot and tired. It was 86 degrees for her race!

Sisters sit in the shade during Maddy's race.

The Monkeys climb trees while they wait.

Barry, Kensey and I watching the BYU game at our friends house.

Barry took his Dad to the BYU game on Sept 11th to celebrate Gerald's birthday. Barry was in Utah for business.

Mackensey won a tablet for getting third place for our school district's summer math marathon using Khan Academy. She worked really hard all summer (the other kids did it to, but weren't as committed.). Here was the picture that was on the front page of our newspaper. She is nice and lets me borrow her tablet every Sunday to use when I teach gospel doctrine. As payment I helped her make a cover from a pinterest tutorial.

 

Have a great week!

Future Missionaries

Last Sunday we went to church with the Jensen family to watch Victoria speak in church. She will be leaving for her mission soon, and she did a good job on her talk. It will be fun to hear about the experiences she will have over the next 18 months. Here is a picture of the Jensens and the Thomasons. 

Becca took our family picture. 

We stayed after church for lunch with the Jensens and to play with cousins. Mindy and Marianne fell asleep on the way home. When Marianne woke up she started crying. I asked her what was wrong and she said, "I miss Sam!"

driving home

Since Maddy drove and Barry sat in the passenger seat, I got to sit in the middle row with Mackensey and Makayla. 

Have a great week! 

Take Me Out to the Ball Game! (or not)

Maddy bought her grey maxi dress. It is so cute and comfortable I looked on Pinterest and found a tutorial for making a tshirt dress using your favorite tshirt to make a pattern. I made one for me, then helped Mackensey make one.

I took the four youngest to the horse show while Barry took the two oldest to do baptisms for the dead as part of the youth temple trip.

Maddy learns how to drive on ice with the "skid monster". She took the driver's test this week and passed it! Now she just has to wait until her birthday on Sept 18th to pick up her license!

We went roller skating as a family for Mackensey's birthday. Marianne started out the day with the walker on wheels.

By the end of the day she could skate on her own!

Barry made Mackensey's birthday cake. It is a twix cake. The smaller one is gluten free from Maddy and Mindy. It had a layer of cake, then a layer of caramel, then chocolate frosting. Yum!

I drove the fourth year girls out to the river for girls camp. Fourth years get to go on a canoe trip the first day of camp. Mindy drove to camp with the other first years. She was nervous about going to camp because Maddy had told her that every morning they have people come up and claim their lost and found by doing embarrassing things (singing "I'm a little teapot" solo, or barking like a dog while everyone sings, "who let the dogs out.") Thankfully they stopped that tradition this year. Mindy (and I) was also nervous because they were serving Cashews for dinner one night, and Mindy is highly allergic. We sent her with an epi-pen and trained her leaders how to use it. Maddy looked out for her and everything was fine. On Wednesday night there was a really bad windstorm and the camp was without power for the rest of camp. They said it wasn't too bad.

While Maddy and Mindy were gone at girls camp I took the youngest four to a park and pool in Spokane.

Makayla and Mackensey enjoyed using the diving board. 

Ben at a pool party for his friends.

Mindy and Mari at the party (they invited all of the kids).

Riding bikes around the church.

Marianne can finally ride a two-wheeler! (with training wheels)

Marianne at the wave pool at Silverwood theme park. This was the closest we got to a beach this summer.

Rides at Silverwood.

Barry and I took Mindy and Mackensey with us on a date night to the Spokane Indians game for their $1 night. Unfortunately they were sold out. We went to Costco and had dinner there.

I flew out to Las Vegas, then drove to St.George for my grandfather's funeral. My parents and all of my siblings were able to make it. It was a very nice service, and it was fun spending time with my family.

Here is a sister's shot. My mom with two of her sisters, and her two daughters.

We toured a lot of historical St. George, and went for a walk two block from my grandparents house to see the rock art done by the Indians.

After spending a few days in St. George, I flew to Idaho Falls. Barry packed up the children and drove 8 hours to pick me up at the airport and we drove the rest of the way to Utah for my family reunion. We arrived a few days early to visit with Barry's dad and his wife Sharon. Ben enjoyed collecting snails.

We met up with cousin Andrew who recently returned from his mission. We hiked the Y trail together.

What a beautiful view. 

17 years ago Barry asked me to hike the Y with him. At the top as we looked over the lights of Provo, we had "the talk". You know..."I really like you."  "I like you, too." It was fun to share the hike with our kids that started it all!

As part of our family reunion we went to Seven Peaks water park in Provo, 

'

Uncle Jesse, Grandpa, cousin Joanna and cousin Emma and Mindy. Marianne just saw me post this picture and she says, "I like the 'give me give me give me gummy gummy gummy" grandpa.

We hiked to the fifth water hot springs. They were nice and warm. It even rained while we were in them, but the rain didn't bother us.

Hiking to the hot springs was all up hill. On the way down we ran most of the way. The kids were ahead of us, and we rounded a bend to see that Ben had fell and cut open his knee. Thankfully my Uncle Maynard is a doctor and we were able to stop at his house on the way home from the hike and he gave Ben four stitches while Ben sat on his kitchen counter. It is healing up nicely.

As you can see we've had a busy and fun summer! We have one week left until school starts the day after Labor Day. We are blessed to have good kids and wonderful extended family to spend time with, making memories. Have a great week!