Ross

This is our new for this year Christmas Advent calendar!  How cool is that?  It's made out of match boxes, brown paper and scrap booking fodder.  We stash candies and papers with activities into each of these boxes and take turns opening them.  We did things like secret santa, sing a carol, buy sibling gifts, watch The Forgotten Carols, make Greek Christmas cookies, and many other simple and fun things.  It was a huge motivator for Brett and I to keep on with the many activities we love to do with our children and we can tell it's going to continue to be a part of our Christmas time traditions from now on.

Two different points of view on Christmas "vacation"

Mom:" Yes!  I can go to my gym class, come back home, and still sleep another nearly 3 hours until 9 am!!!"

Kids:"Yes!  We can wake up at 7:45 as usual, except instead of going to school, we get to stay home and mom will entertain us every second of the day with activities and treats and sugar plums, and snowman building, and crafts!"

And they are actually disappointed when I try and make them understand that life happens even on Christmas "vacation."


In there defense though, Lauren did get up, clean her room, and go into the kitchen to scrub the dishes in the dirty side of the sink, then come upstairs to wake me up, you know, because I wasn't already awake from all the noise she was making, to tell me what she had done.  Somebody was listening during Family Home Evening when Daddy said they would get a treat next Monday for completing their homework: do a kind deed for someone.  Sadly, the most kind deed she could have done for me would have been to let me sleep another hour.


Incidentally this was a scene that played out at my house:  "Lauren!  Ethan!  Lily!  Come here this instant!  Now watch what I do."  I open the door.  I close the door.  "Did you notice how I didn't push the door hard when I shut it, but I pushed the handle down and quietly shut the door?  Good, that's good.  Now let me show you how LOUD it is the way you do it."  I open the door.  I slam the door.  "Can you tell a difference?  That's good, I'm so proud of you.  Now we are going to take turns opening and shutting the door correctly."  And we did.  And they successfully learned the art of sarcasm.

All of this reminds me of a song, "And mom and dad can hardly wait for school to start again."  And to think I actually used to consider homeschooling.  Ah, the ignorance of inexperience...

I couldn't have planned this trip better! We had the most beautiful snowy trip, the kids did great, and Brett had an awesome birthday!

The next morning we decorated our tree.  Tyler thought banging the ornaments together was the best part.

Then the kids surprised us by setting the table for dinner.

And here is Brett just after the Zeitgiest race.

So I abandoned my family to their camp out movie night in the living room and ran away with the laptop upstairs.  All alone.  By myself. Ahhhhhhhh.....

I have been a most lazy blogger lately.  I really do have some pretty fun things to blog about and pictures to go with them, but those are down stairs with my camera and would require more movement to get than I am willing to make right now, so I'll settle for writing down a few things before I forget them. I'll go from oldest to youngest and would like to point out that the age gap between number one and number two is significant.  He's 32 and I'm only 27.

Brett-

• He recently ran his first half marathon and did great!  He ran it in 1 hour and 55 minutes.  I think the most impressive part was that he did not feel well.  His stomach had been upset for the last two days, which is crazy because he's weird and never gets sick, but he still ran it like a champ.  He finished at number 287 I think out of about 1200 racers.  I've got to give it to all the old guys though, I think every top runner in the 60 year old range beat Brett.  Go old guys!
• Brett probably broke his toe last week at work.  Good job Bob.  And he wonders why I have dreams all the time about him getting hurt and then Super Cheri has to go to the rescue...

Cheri- 

• I have just completed my English class with an A and only have one last test next week in my Comm class until I'm done with my first semester back to school in more than five years!  I'm determined to keep my 4.0 average.  I have something like a 98% in the comm class and I'm fairly confident that I'll get another 100% on this next test.  These weren't exactly the most difficult classes in the world. 
• I made our family the cutest advent calendar ever that I will take pictures of and share later on.  The kids think it's the best idea since sliced bread.
• I also started physical therapy this week to try and get my knee healed up.  My goal is to be running again by my birthday.  Everyone cross your fingers.

Ethan-

• We have caught him staying up in his bed late reading books lately.  He just completed reading a Hardy Boys book entirely on his own!  This is probably a 5th grade reading level 200 page book with regular size 12 type in it.  I was so surprised when I went in one night to find out why he was still up and he showed me he was on chapter 12!  Not bad for a 7 year old.  He has summed up the book for me and has already started on the next one in the series.  So thank you Aunt Joyce for buying those for him and teaching my first born son to love reading as much as I do!!!  He's mostly an A student and does so well in school, but the fact that he's exploring how much fun reading can be on his own makes me more proud than anything.  Now that we are done reading the HP series, we are off and reading the Percy Jackson series together.  He's not nearly as engaging a writer as JK Rowling, but I'm hopeful that the reading gets a bit more fun.
• Ethan's best buddy from Twin just got baptised last weekend.  We went and I am a bit in denial that it's going to be Ethan's turn in just a few months.  I just can't believe it.  I've asked him if he is going to get baptised and he says absolutely.  He's excited and I'm so glad he's making this choice.
• Ethan came home with a BYU beanie on the other day.  Apparently his teacher found it and decided to give it to one of the Mormon boys in her class, hahahaha!  I laughed pretty hard about that.  I wasn't sure whether to burn it or let him keep it, ha!  But despite the fact that it's a cougars hat, it's pretty dang cute on him. His dad tolerates is well and only makes him take it off for dinner.  I'm pretty sure he sleeps in it.  Well, you know Brett likes to make fun of BYU, but in reality he really doesn't care.  I was all signed up to go and all when we met, so he'd better not care too much.

Lauren-

• She is doing awesome in Kindergarten!  She is becoming a great reader.  They have a list of things that the kids have to be able to do before the end of the year.  You practice them at home with the kids and when they are done you send a note in and the teacher tests them.  For each completed task they get a paper popcorn in their paper buckets on the wall.  Lauren has gotten all of her popcorns already.  She's also doing great with spelling.  She's writing us all sorts of notes lately using all the words she knows and all the ones she can figure out.  She's just such an enthusiastic learner, I love it!

Lily-

• I have many different nick names for my Lily Bum.  My usual is Monkey.  If you know anything about Lily, you know that she loves to climb.  Tonight we went rock wall climbing out our gym and Lily drew a crowd of people coming to watch the tiny baby climbing the rock wall.  There is this one spot that's just right for her and she goes all the way to the top.  Fearless.  I love her spirit and how she is so clever, but at the same time it scares me.  I have to watch her carefully and man can she wear me out. 
• Lily is also expanding her vocabulary like crazy lately.  I die laughing at some of the things she says lately.  She's kind of funny with how she's pronouncing things now.  She wants to do it right and say her words very clearly, but she ends up rolling her l's a lot of the time.  It's hard to explain, but it sounds almost like she has a candy in her mouth she's trying to talk around.  I wish so much that I had a video camera!  Maybe for my birthday???  [hint]
• She's potty trained.  Yes!  She was obstinately refusing to have anything to do with the toilet forever so I told her that once she had her birthday all her diapers were going away because you're not allowed to wear diapers once you're 3.  She said okay and that was that.  Potty trained, the end.
• She's been getting in bed with Brett during the night every night for the last week and he's a sucker so she can.  She NEVER comes to my side of the bed, wonder why?  Anyway,I had a talk with her a couple days ago and said she was no longer allowed to do that.  That night when Brett was putting her into bed while I was at mutual she told him she wasn't allowed to sleep with him anymore and she hasn't come up to get in bed with him since.  Haha, I think this is hilarious.  There is a lot more going on in that sweet little blond head than I realize sometimes.  She's a sneaky little brat sucker.

Tyler-

• Oh my Tyty!  I'm so in love with that little baby.  I love his floppy little ears that stick out a bit, I love how he hugs me so much, I love how he wants to hold my finger and walk every where with me.  I just get gooey inside thinking about him!  It's pathetic and I would probably puke if I heard any other mother talking about her baby that way, but there you have it.  Brett makes fun of me and says that Tyler is going to be my baby precious just like his little brother Brad is baby precious with his mom.  I say whatever, I love all my kids exactly the same.  Tyty is still my baby though, he's so tiny and so sweet!  Every Thursday night when I get home from school around 10ish, Tyty and Brett are sleeping together on the couch.  I got a picture of it the other day and can't wait to share.  They are adorable.  I swear all three of my men are the cutest things around.  It's no wonder that Brett's mom dressed him up as a girl once when she despaired of ever having a girl. 
• Tyler is turning into his big sister, Monkey #2.  Yippy skippy. 
• He's at the terrible Christmas tree/present destroying age.  I keep telling myself that this is the last year I'll ever have a baby at this stage again, which makes me both sad and excited at the same time.

Alright, I think I got all the important things I don't want to forget.


PS  We are all praying for our Aunt Peggy.  We found out she had a brain tumor just before Thanksgiving.  She had a successful surgery a few days ago and is recovering well, but the tumor was cancerous.  It breaks my heart that she's having to go through this but we are all praying for her and love her very much.  She's the sweetest most kind person.  My kids are remembering to pray for her in their prayers and I am as well.  If anyone feels inclined, please remember to pray for Aunt Peggy to get through whatever the doctors decide is best for her.  From what I understand, they got the best news they could have hoped for when it comes to the cancer and I for one feel very confident that she will make a full recovery.  And I think we'll all realize a bit more how special she is and how much we appreciate her.  Love you Aunt Peg!

 This was the very beginning of the more than 4 hours it took me to dig 9 inches of snow off of my entire gigantic driveway.  I've got too much driving space here.  I have one pile of snow on the side almost taller than me! The kids were sledding down it.




Disclaimer: for anyone who might think Tyler should have been inside, you didn't hear the crying and wailing when I made him go inside for a little bit to warm up.  Holy fit!