December

Even though we are only a few days into December we have already done a lot. Last weekend we went to see the decorated trees at the Eccles center and then went for ice cream. I was given 12 free tickets to the Nutcracker by Ballet West, so after ice cream we took the whole family to their first live performance. Since I had so many tickets, I even gave some to our favorite neighbors, the Minucci's. Hayden was pretty squiggly and Andrew fell asleep sometime before intermission, but all things considered I think we all had a good time.
I am usually done with my holiday shopping by now, but this year has been a tough time all around, so I am not even close to done this year. I was having a really hard time deciding what to get the kids this year, since they have almost everything, but my parents helped out with this problem. They are getting us a Wii for Christmas. (Shh! Nobody say anything until Christmas!) But, now I can go get all sorts of new games and accessories!
It is also tradition in our house to make some sort of homemade gifts for the holidays and this year is no different. One of the things I did this year was make holiday cards that I passed out at Thanksgiving so people could send them during December. We also have been working on a cool little wood project, but I am not going to give too much more of those details away.
The kids are working hard for all of their holiday programs. They will perform a small operetta with the school and their holiday music recitals. We are also really looking forward to all the church dinners and programs going this month. There are three dinners just in the next week. We are also really looking forward to going to the live Nativity procession that a local church performs next weekend.
We are all counting down the days. We have a little thing that hangs with little pieces of the Nativity to hang up each day to count down to Christmas Day and the kids have been fighting over the order they put them up in, because they all want to do baby Jesus. What do you do when you have four kids and only 1 baby Jesus?
It has been a good year and I am thankful for my beautiful family and all of our many blessings!

November

Like everything else in our life November came and went very quickly.

Some of the teachers at the school wanted to have a Veteran's Day program this year. The weekend before plans were still finalized. I mentioned I might know someone who could speak and the next thing you know, I was in charge of the whole thing. So, of course, I fell back on the trusty boy scouts. I had my wolves each say a little thing and I used Ethan's webelo's for my color guard. Although, some people noticed we did not correctly fold the flag (give my poor 9 years old a break!) overall, I think it turned out really well.

The other big even at the school was the the second and third grade Thanksgiving program. They made a stew and all sorts of crafts. They performed a little play and fed the audience. They were really lucky because dad took the day off the work to come and ALL the grandparents came to watch too. Hayden brought home his lines the night before and that was when we found out he had the biggest part, and he did a stellar job. Yeah, my man!

During November most of the family has been battling illness. I been sick all month with a terrible cough. Everyone else has gone in and out sick times. I have been told it isn't the dreaded H1N1, just some other flu, but it has been really annoying. In fact because I was sick we didn't go over to my dad's for Thanksgiving. Nor, did I get to see my grandma, whom they just moved into an assisted living center over the long weekend. The Liddell's didn't seem to mind our illness too much, so we were able to go over to their house for dinner.

I made my turkey the next day and I was so proud of myself because it was really juicy. Hayden even said my turkey was better than grandma's! Maybe someday soon I'll feel more qualified to host dinner at my house!