Christmas Shinanigans

The kids decided to have a little get together to exchange their gifts with the "BFF's".  We did all kinds of crafts and fun stuff. We started off making little Christmas trees out of pine cones and glitter.

 This is Shelby and her friend Justine working on theirs.

 I honestly didn't think the boys would want to do the crafts, but they actually came over and decorated a tree. Now granted, the girls took a good 25 minutes to decorate theirs and the boys took a good 25 seconds...but Hey, they did it!

 After our first little craft, the suspense was KILLING them, so we had our gift exchange.

 Shelby gave Justine a matching Aeropostale shirt. Justine was quite stoked about this!! Shelby was pretty excited for the 5th Diary of a Wimpy Kid book!

 Preston and Zac! Preston got a bunch of plastic bugs and animals. He really liked those but he wanted to make sure that I understood that the plastic lizard wasn't gonna cut it for Christmas...he wants a real one!!

 I just love these 3 girls!!! Tatum is the one in the green socks and Ryann is in the teal. You know how 3 is usually a crowd with little girls? Well these 3 work perfectly. They can all play for hours with ZERO bickering or leaving one out. They all like each other equally which, let's face it, generally doesn't happen.  We got quite a kick out of Ryann and those socks. She's very tiny, so the knee socks covered her ENTIRE leg with a little extra at the top!!

 I even made home made cookies...from scratch..not pre-made dough....I KNOW, RIGHT??? Stop the presses!!! I'm not a baker! I can cook..but I can't bake to save my life. BUT these cookies were dang good if I do say so myself!

  

Next we did another craft.

The boys weren't at all interested in this one though. They LOOOOOVE to play the Wii together. (Preston wanted to stay with "Jana Miwwett" while the rest of us went to Disneyland this summer so he could just play Wii with Zac all week!)

 What would a Christmas party be without a snowball fight? Well....the weather hasn't exactly been cooperating with us lately on that front, so we decided to have an indoor snowball fight. By snowballs I mean white foam craft balls! (For the record:those suckers kinda hurt when you get smacked in the face with one!!!!) This was towards the end of the fight and Justine was on sensory overload, so she had gone into Shelby's room to play.


The kids had a GREAT time!!!!

Christmas Recital

The girls had their dance Christmas Recital last night. I think they both did such a GREAT job! And were BY FAR the prettiest ones there...(Ok so maybe I'm a little biased... (Oh, before you say anything about Shelby's costume..I know,! Trust me, I'm thinkin' the same thing!)

 A couple of Morgan's friends came (to watch their little sister dance). This is Brylee and Aspen (you'd never in a million years guess they're twins would you? YEP! They are. And their personalities are just as different as their looks!)

 Here's the video. Morgan is front and center and Shelby is front row on the left side (or you could just watch the girl that the video is focused on. HA!)

TANGENT!!!!!

Ok, I'm warning you all there's a tangent coming on... (insert the southern accent that returns when I'm annoyed lol)
People.....If you're gonna put Christmas lights in your front yard, DO IT RIGHT OR NOT AT ALL!!!! It doesn't matter if you live in the dumpiest neighborhood or up on "Snob Hill", if your Christmas lights are done halfa$$ed then your whole darn house just looks T-A-C-K-Y!! And likewise, when they're done right, you're house can look great no matter what neighborhood you live in.
EXAMPLES:
"Snob Hill" : These people went and bought the fancy LED Rope lights (not cheap). The point of the rope lights is so that they're all in a perfect line, correct? So, you're gonna go spend all that money to have perfectly straight lights and then you can't even pull 'em tight so they look decent??? Seriously?

"Snob Hill": Is it just me or does it look like someone T.P.'ed their front yard with Christmas lights?

 REALLY?.......REALLY????????

Now, I'm a firm believer that with lights, LESS IS MORE!!!! I LOVE this house. It's a cute house all on it's own, but I just love the way they do their lights. It's simple and elegant! Kudos to you "Non tacky light hanger people"

 I'm not a fan of colored or ice cycle lights, BUT these are pretty decent looking. (the picture is kinda crappy, but trust me they looked good in person) This house is in a much older and smaller neighborhood but the lights are done neatly and they look good!!!

You know the saying, "If it don't look good, don't put it on the front porch"?   Well, don't put it on your trees, roof, steps, driveways, or anywhere else either!!!!

Merry Christmas!!

The Christmas decorations are FINALLY up!! 

We added several new decorations this year. I'm soooo in love with all of them:

Morgan wanted to know what this saying meant and I explained it to her. She said, "I still want presents though!" HA!

 Next is my new shelf. I love this cause I can use it year round for all kinds of stuff!! Oh the decorating possibilities......

 

So there's a sweet story behind the little Willow Tree in this picture. When I first started collecting these, I saw this one and randomly told Chris that I wanted it when we got a house one day.  It's called

Mi Casa su Casa. So a couple days after we closed on our house (close to 2 years later), he came home from lunch with a wrapped present and it was this Willow Tree. He'd remembered after all that time!!! And it's not as if he shops at places that sell Willow Trees either, so he had to make an effort to go get it! Not gonna lie.. I GEEKED! OUT! over this one! I'm a sucker for things like this! It's seriously my all time favorite gift that he's ever given me!

I picked up this little shelf at my co-workers consignment shop... I flippin' LOVE this thing... don't know why, but I do.  It wasn't even for sale. She was using it as a display, but I made her clear everything off of it so I could get it!

  

 The whole living room. Yes, the Nativity is still my FAVE decoration overall. I only get to put it out for 1 month a year, so I got all kinds of excited about it!

 I love how Morgan snuck that bright shiny "M" right there in the front. I didn't notice it until I was adding these pics....she's a dead woman HA!

 Does anyone else get tired of trying to sort through all the presents to find the neighbor, friends, or extended family gifts? Well this year, we got these cute little trees for those! They're off in their own little corner so they're easily accessible whenever those people pop by or we're going to be seeing them! Plus it keeps the kids from handling them during their daily plunder through the gifts. I swear, every year, my kids fiddle with these presents as if they're hoping that the name on them will just magically change to theirs or something.

Christmas is my favorite time of year.  Despite all the chaos and things going on, there's just something about the season that makes you want to smile.

ALL SHE WANTS FOR CHRISTMAS IS....

HER 2 FRONT TEETH!!!!

The girls danced at the Talon Craft fair last night. I just had to post this because there's a little boy at 1:40 that has had us CRACKING UP!!!! The look of horror on his face when the girls go down into the splits is hilarious!!
(ok so maybe we're easily entertained)You have to double click on the video to bring it up on youtube.com so that you can see his face.

Welcome Rebecca

For our schools Fall Fundraiser, we sold Little Ceasars pizza kits and Sports cups/popcorn buckets. Since we have 3 kids in school, we've started combining a lot of our efforts. For example, Preston gets all of the Lin's receipts, Shelby all of the Box Tops and Morgan got all of the Fall Fundraiser sales. (each year, we'll rotate) Morgan sold $501 worth of pizza kits and cups/popcorn buckets and won 3rd place for the entire school. The prize she picked out was an American Girl Doll.
Let me tell ya... it was quite the process picking out exactly which one she wanted. She wanted one that looked similar to her, but they don't make one with BOTH green eyes and short brown hair... needless to say, we went through a few tears because in her little mind that meant that combination was weird... sheesh... girls! Finally, we found one!!!!! It's actually one of the regular characters. Morgan picked "Rebecca" .
If you aren't familiar with American Girl, it's a book series. Each character represents a young girl living through a different period of American history. For instance: Addy is a young slave; Felicity is from the Revolution; Kit-the Depression;Molly-World War 2 etc. Rebecca is a young girl growing up in New York City in 1914.
Shelby loved the books when she was going through her American history craze. I think they're great because they're fun but still have something to teach the reader about what it would have been like to be a little girl during those periods.
Morgan hasn't really gotten into the books (mostly cause she HATES reading... wonder where she gets that from...) but she LOVES the dolls. She was SO excited when she got home from school and it was on her bed. (I couldn't find my camera, so you'll have to deal with cell phone pics..sorry. And she'd just come from dance. Don't want ya'll thinking I let my kid run around half naked in this weather)
Morgan was so sweet with her. She wanted to change her clothes for bedtime, so I dug out a pair of Morgan's old newborn jammies. We'll have to get some that fit Rebecca later, but these work for now. When it was time for bed, she read the book that came with her, "Meet Rebecca", out loud to the doll. I was listening to her read and noticed she was replacing "Rebecca" with "you" as if she was telling the doll a story about herself. It just melted my heart!

GOBBLE GOBBLE

When Morgan was a baby, she had this little beanie baby. I'd hold it in my hand and tickle her neck saying, "Gobble! Gobble! Mama's little tukey." She would LAUGH hysterically every time. That precious deep belly laugh. I swear there's no better sound in the world! Even now, whenever I come across it I have to tickle her chin and she still cracks up!
Each month, a grade is assigned the bulletin board in the main entrance of the school. Each student gets to design something for it. This year, the 2nd grade is decorating little turkeys for the board. Here is Morgan's contribution... She started with Reeses Pieces for the feathers and Twizzlers for the gobbler...
Colored the rest... and added an M&M for the eye...

FINISHED!!
Her paper turkey is darling, but it's nothing compared to "Mama's Little Turkey."

I'll go, but I'm not cheerin'

Ya'll know that I am a die hard Gator! Through! And! Through! Cheering for other college teams is just simply NOT allowed in my house. However, Chris got us some free tickets to the SUU game, so we figured we might as well use them. (Hey, SUU isn't even in the same division, so it's alright! )
Ok now, here's my problem with SUU sporting events...especially football. My tiny little podunk high school stadium is bigger than Eccles Collisuem. I'm sorry, but the T-Birds are basically a glorified high school team. Chris says I'm a football snob and I have to admit..HE'S RIGHT!!! But really, let's compare.... THE SWAMP!

SUU

hmmmmm..... SUU's colors are red and white and they were playing Dixie State... I swear I felt like I was back in high school watching a Williston vs. Dixie County game...

Sometimes the view here isn't half bad though..... heehee

Me and my honey.... Morgan caught a "tamborine" that was thrown into the crowd by one of the SUU cheerleaders. (mmmhhmmmm... glorified high school team...) How sad is it that she didn't know what a frisbee was? Bless her heart, she started slapping the frisbee on her hand and then said, "Mom it's doesn't work..." Shelby looked at her in complete disbelief and said, "Seriously?"... oh mercy.....
Morgan had a blast, Preston played video games the whole time and Shelby looked like she'd rather be ANYWHERE but there!!! The final score was 52-0 SUU!

Braithwaite Art Gallery

This morning, I went with Preston on a field trip to the Braithwaite Art Gallery and a tour of the Shakespearean theaters. Have you ever been anywhere with 40 Kindergarteners???? Um... yeah... HA! Actually, for the most part, these kids were EXCEPTIONALLY well behaved, for 5 and 6 year olds.
I've been on this same field trip 3 times now. Every time, the kids have LOVED it! Half the kids went to the gallery and the other half went on the theater tour. Then they switched.
The kids are learning how to make prints..AKA stamping...
After the stamping activity, they got to draw a picture on a wall....yes, you read that correctly... a bunch of 5 and 6 year olds were encouraged to color on the walls to keep them entertained. Obviously whoever came up with that idea doesn't have little kids... I'm not criticizin', I'm just sayin'....
Preston's contribution to the mural.. A Crocodile
During the theater tour, the kids did a few acting exercises. Preston and his partner were supposed to be "mirroring" each other... yea... they didn't quite get the concept. lolPreston was so much fun today. He was sweet and well behaved and he even got a little snuggly! I always love it when he gets that way, cause let me tell ya, it doesn't happen very often!! I'm so grateful that I have the type of job that allows me to do things like this! I can't imagine not being able to be there for these little things.

Halloween Part 2

The kids had a ball tonight. We only went Trick or Treating around the neighborhood and to the subdivision across the street, but they made out like bandits! Shelby was a Vampire, Preston Dragonoid from Bakugan, and Morgan was the Mad Hatter.
How stinkin' cute is she? I just love her to pieces.
So the fangs only lasted through this picture before the started gagging her... Oh well. I think it's really funny that her vampire costume came with a cross necklace HA!
Every time I tried to get Preston to do anything. He'd yell, "TRICK OR TREAT HAPPY HALLOWEEN PUNKIN" He even said that at every single house he went to.
Hope everyone had a great Halloween. Ours was busy, but AWESOME!

Halloween Part 1

Yesterday was just slightly on the other side of ridiculously insane!! This year, Halloween was "my baby". We've been planning and trying to get everything pulled together for weeks. Thankfully, things worked out so that I had this whole week off to work on things. Each kids class had a little Halloween party. I love seeing all the different costume ideas. There are some VERY creative moms out there!!
Preston's class. His teacher is the clown and the teachers assistant is the Devil. (She was so flippin' creepy!)
Mr. and Mrs. Fuson with Miss Forbush the student teacher. (Morgan's teacher)

MOGO... SOOOO CUTE!
Morgan's class.
Unfortunately I wasn't able to make it down to Shelby's class this year. Things got a little crazy from that point on.....
I decided to mix the Halloween carnival up a little this year. In the past we've always done typical carnival games (fish pond, toss games etc) I didn't want to get rid of that because the kids LOVE it, but I wanted to add some stuff for the older kids. We had 7 games plus a "Mad Scientist". We have a dad that teaches science at SUU, so he came and did all kinds of cool science tricks for the kids. (I was cramped for time so I wasn't able to get a ton of great pictures.)
Here is Morgan at the fish pond. The carnival ended up being her favorite part. She and her friends spent most of the night trying to get as much candy as possible at the games.
Last February, the PTA President decided to have a Family Dance. The kids had a ball so we decided to add it to the Halloween mix. We got one of the teachers to DJ it for us in the gym. This was BY FAR Preston's favorite part of the whole night. HE ROCKED OUT!!! It's fun to watch my kids "hang out" with all of their little friends. They each have their little groups. It's cute! Here is Preston with his friends Daxton and Amaya. (Yes, Preston has a friend that is a girl, but he's very quick to tell you "she's not my giwlfriend.. she's just a friend dat's a giwl even dough she wikes boys stuff." ...she's a total tomboy hahaha )

Shelby and her friend Maddie at the dance. (Her dad is the scientist.)
The big thing for the night was the Spook Alley. It took LOTS of time to plan, but I think it was WELL worth it. Once again, I didn't get the greatest pictures but here are a few (keep in mind that the flash lit up the room, but the lights were all off and we had black light highlighting everything, You couldn't really see the school walls that you see in the pictures.)

This was the first thing you saw when you walked in. The snakes eyes lit up and it played music. We're the "Rattlers" so I thought this was PERFECT!
Next was my Zombie (AKA Jana Milletts new BF..sorry Coby HA!) Between the snake and this, quite a few kids turned around and left! HA!
After that, they turned a corner and had to duck under spider webs. As they were crouched down, a giant spider came out after them.... around the next corner, there was someone with a shopvac blasting them with air. (I have to say Mr. Carter was AWESOME. He actually chased them with the hose, screaming at them) Next was a witches kitchen. One of the teachers dressed up like a witch and cackled as the kids went by. She was GREAT!!! (I would have been screwed without Jackie's help throughout the day! She's amazing!) Next they had to crawl through a tunnel that had strobe lights and things dangling down on top of them.
After that, there was the crazy surgeons O.R. (This is Amaya's dad and one of Morgan's soccer coaches.) This is how he waited for the kids...
Then he'd walk around and throw bloody body parts around as they walked by. He was great!
After leaving the Dr.'s office... they entered the graveyard... (much like what happens when you leave one of our many local Dr.'s offices).... As they walked by, they were focusing on the graveyard and shying away from the coffin.. so we had someone with these fake hands grabbing them from behind....
That, of course, would push them towards the coffin and Chris would jump out at them....
As they ran from Chris, my friend Jana was hiding behind the scarecrow and sprayed them with silly string (she ran out of silly string and resorted to wearing Preston's mask and jumping out to scare them) ....
At the end we had a big candy bowl waiting for them....

Between Mr. Carter (a teacher at the school and Morgan's friend Lainee's dad), Ryan (their soccer coach) and Chris... Morgan and her friends got a HEAVY dose of scare!!!!! At one point they decided to fight back and took a can of silly string with them. They thought that was the funniest thing EVER!!! After a couple of times, the older kids decided that the spook alley was "not scary" but they kept going through it over and over again because, "it's not scary, but it's still fun."

It was a lot of work, but it came together great and the kids seemed to LOVE it! Well worth all the stress!