North Pole Radio Hour

London joined the 5th Grade Choir this year and had tons of fun. They've been practicing and rehearsing this hour and a half show since October and finally got to put it on. They did it twice during the day for the other students and once at night for all the parents and grandparents. It was so stinking cute and so much fun.

London even did a little Ballroom Dancing as his part in the show. Way to go London! I'll get a video on her soon.
The kids only complaint were the costumes. Not that they were funny looking but that they were HOT. At 75 degrees outside and 80 in, this is not the typical outfit you would wear.

Christmas Decorations

We finally got all or our lights up outside and I was admiring the effect during the day when I noticed our 2 front trees were decorating our house too. Notice the red and green. I just thought that was cool.Christmas light photo forthcoming.

What a wonderful year of piano we have had. Aspen and London both switched teachers half way through the year and they continue to excel and move forward in their amazing talent. Both of them love to play.

London has had the opportunity to play in Sacrament Meeting, at Church, a few times now. The Priesthood can not wait until he turns 12 and can help accompany them. Aspen is quick to plunk out a tune to anyone who walks through our front door.

We are so proud of our 2 little pianists, and hope you enjoy their Christmas Recital as much as we did.

Nutcraker

Aspen and I have attended the full showing of the Nutcracker for 3 years now, and if you count the partial shows they did in Hobbs, NM this would be our 5th year. We love it, it's so fun and Aspen adds to her Nutcracker collection every year. Isn't this years just the cutest, fattest little guy you've ever seen. Apparently a lot of folks want to buy themselves a Nutcracker.

But really we do go to see the beautiful dancing, and hear the wonderful music. One of these years I really would like to see it professionally, like the Houston Ballet. But until Aspen's old enough to not fall asleep by the end I'm not going to shell out the money for those tickets. In the mean time we'll just keep enjoying the local productions.

Chiminea

I have wanted a Chiminea for forever. We just inherited one and I love it! Jared even loves it. We made quick use of it to have Hot Dogs and Smore's for dinner. So healthy, I know. But rather tasty. If anyone out there is debating of getting one of these, do it. It's the best camp fire you'll ever own. The smoke goes strait up the chimney, instead of in your face. And if the wind is blowing, it's no worries because your fire is protected. And if you'd rather have your Hot Dog smoked instead of cooked, just hold it over the chimney. It's a win win all around. :)

Schlumberger Family Christmas Party

On Phoenix's sick day Jared took the other 3 kids to his work Christmas Party. They had such a good time. Here's a few shots that Jared took with his phone. I was rather impressed.

London and Sicily feeding the goats. I love that she's trying to make them eat straight out of the cup.We had pet chickens as a kid, so it always makes me laugh when they have these in a petting zoo.
Love, love, loved this slide. Up and down a million times. Was even brave enough to go down Superman style, head first on her belly.
But apparently not everyone liked this slide. Zoom in on this little boys face, then the adult man next to him. Stinking funny.
Train rides are the best. She was so brave to do this on her own, smiles all around.
The favorite part of the Party. "SNOW!!!" Really it's like snow cone snow shot out of a snow machine. But you can still have snow ball fights with it. The kids had a blast. That's London there in the red pants.
I think it was around 70 degrees this day. So that snow turned to ice pretty fast.

Tracfone

I just need to rant a little bit about my stupid phone. My phone died about a month ago and I have yet to get my new phone to be working. I ordered the new phone, received it, talked on the land line for ever to get it to work. It turned on but would not make or receive phone calls. So they said they'd send me a new Sim card to make it work in 3-5 business days. That was 2 weeks ago. So I called again today, was on the phone for 52 mins for them to tell me my Sim card had not been sent but that they are sending me one now. AAAAAUUUUUGH!!!

I HATE TRACFONE!! But I'm just to cheap to go another route. SO FRUSTRATING!

Ear Infections

"I'll be home from School today... just you wait and see... please have drugs and Drs with plugs to fix you and me...."

Phoenix has had a cold for a few days now and started complaining about his ear Saturday night. It faded out though by Sunday afternoon so he went off to school Monday morning with no problems. But Tuesdays school day has been cut short. We went to the HEB RediClinic and got some amoxicilin from the Nurse Practitioner.

Not contagious, I was told, so don't worry Mom's when you see him at school tomorrow. That is if he's feeling up to it. Poor little man. It's no fun being sick around Christmas.

Gingerbread Pirates

Run, run as fast as you can...you can run away from the Gingerbread Pirate.

I know that doesn't rhyme but if you know the tune to that song we are long lost soul mates. Or one of my siblings, whichever. :)

Phoenix's Kindergarten Home Work gets funner and funner. With this newest season we got to decorate us a little Gingerbread Man. And after looking through all our glitter and ribbons Phoenix decided on a Pirate. ARRRRRR!! With real treasure and everything. And his sword is made out of Popsicle sticks. He's just so cute I had to share.

First Tooth for Phoenix

If you've been with us for a while you'll know this tooth has been loose for ages and ages. Well it was finally at the stage for the string pull. You know you're there when the tooth can lay down flat in both directions.

So here's what you do, Daddy ties the string around the tooth, towards the base of the tooth. Our Daddy has mastered this technique as this is probably the dozenth tooth in our house to come out this way. Next you tie the string, dental floss in this case, to a heavy door.

Make sure the string is not too long, or it will not matter how hard you slam the door, it just will not pull the tooth.

When the string is short enough and your child really has no idea what's about to happen, tell him to slam the door and the Tooth Fairy will come.

The end result is very little blood and the cutest little holey smile you will every see.

Beauty Shop

While babysitting Kayla Fineour I came upstairs to find this. I thought for sure they were cutting each others hair, what a great babysitter I am. But come to find out they were just brushing and combing and doing ponytails and bows, they even had the spray bottle to get the fly aways down. GIRLS!!! They're never too young to be girls. Notice the blanket draped on Sicily. Just like the cape you wear at the Hair Salon. They had it on proper on Kayla, up to her neck and covering her shoulders. So funny!

Cub Scout Egg Drop

To teach the boys some basic Engineering we were asked to bring packing materials and see what would happen. We brought the hugest sack full of plastic sacks known to man, and they all got used up. Thank goodness.

This is London's 2nd drop, he made it through the 3rd but not the 4th. His raw egg was encased in packing peanuts and plastic sacks, then all stuffed into a cottage cheese carton. But alas, it did not win.
This package was made by a little sister, ironically enough this too was in the 3rd round before it exploded before hitting the ground.

And the one we all thought would win. A 2 ft tall teddy bear wrapped in packing tape with the egg in a Ziplock in the middle. It broke on the 4th round. You can see London there in the orange, ducking away from the teddy.

The winner made it through the 10 ft drop, the 20 ft drop, the 20 foot toss, the 20 foot chuck, the football Quarter Back pass and even a Kick Off and still did not break. They finally let the boy, Liam Moss from our Ward, stand up on the ladder and just break his egg for fun.

It was a good night for Scouting.

Good Friends

I love having company for the Holidays. There's always somebody to play cards with and you can't pass up the adult conversation. Somehow I missed out on pictures of Rachel from this visit, but we did get Mike and the kids.
And you can't miss out on an opportunity of a picture like this. 3 little kiddos sucking on their thumbs. So cute.

Turkey Lurkey

I just love Kindergarten Home Work. Phoenix brought home this outlined Turkey that we were to decorate as a family over the weekend before Thanksgiving. And this is what we came up with. Isn't he cute?! Phoenix was so proud.

Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving this year. No family, but plenty of friends. My roommate from college, Rachel Ward Gonzales, just moved from Utah to Fort Worth, Texas, so her little cute family drove down for the event. Then we had Angie Wards family and Brooke Nelsons clan over too. I think that totaled 8 Adults and 16 kids and 2 dogs, it was awesome.

Needless to say we needed a big turkey. Now, I'll be honest, I was so caught up in the company that I didn't take hardly any pictures. So this is not actually My turkey, but it looks about the same. I bought a 21 lb turkey this year, it was HUGE. But there was plenty for eating and leftovers for everyone. We're still working our way through Turkey Noodle Soup and it's been over a week.

But I did manage a picture of pie, cobbler, carrot cake and cheese cake. That's all you need for Thanksgiving, Turkey and Pie. YUM!!!

Oh and of course...FOOTBALL!!! We Moms and kids ate at the table, these Dad's enjoyed their dinner in front of the TV. :) You gotta love those American Holidays. :)

Thanks everyone for coming. It made the weekend so much fun. And you don't miss your family so much when you have such good friends.

Rake the Leaves

I sent Aspen outside Thanksgiving morning to sweep the leaves off the front porch so they wouldn't all get tracked into the house when our company came. She was all excited and set out with such good intentions.

About 10 mins later I figured she'd be done so I went outside to check. She was not on the front porch, the broom was but she wasn't. Instead she was across the street raking the neighbors front yard.

Mom: "Aspen! You're supposed to be sweeping the porch."
Aspen: "I know, but I wanted to rake their leaves."
Mom: "Well, come sweep our porch and Then you can rake their leaves."
Aspen: "Oh...ok."

Don't you just love those random acts of service.
The raking wasn't so much to get it off their grass as it was to bury her bike.

And her partners in crime. Sam and Sophia Strathearn. These 2 with Aspen makes for an interesting afternoon.

Dog Sitting

We were given the joy of dog-sitting over Thanksgiving Break. Jared's boss was going to Kansas and his 13 year old daughter didn't want her puppy in a cage the entire time they were gone. So Jared offered to watch him, and we got 2 dogs for the weekend. They got along beautifully. Sicily had a hay-day dragging poor Bailey and Beaux all over the house. Bailey was put in and taken out of his kennel more times than he could count. But he had some good doggy time too! Look how filthy those 2 are. It rained Thanksgiving night, so this is what happened on Friday.

And after a nice little bath, in which he went from black to pink to white, he was clean again. And loved on once more by little Miss Sadie. She even joined Bailey in his kennel for some petting time at one point.
We just love having visitors. Doggies included.

Turkey Trot

I've wanted to run in a 5 K for quite some time now, but always find some reason to chicken out. Well this time I was no Turkey and in the end signed up not for a 5 K but for a 5 MILE. Yep!! 5 MILES!!! Crazy eh?

It was awesome. There were over 1000 people in the race, it was held Thanksgiving morning and allowed me to eat whatever I wanted that afternoon. :) Though after running 5 miles I really didn't Want to eat anything.
Here's the race website with photos of me in the actual race. Personally I think I look a bit of a dork with my bug eye sunglasses on when I run, but that's ok. I did it, I ran the entire time, and I finished.

Oh! By the way, I finished in 46 mins, that's just over 9 min miles for 5 miles straight. Yeah me!

Thanksgiving Day

What a wonderful Thanksgiving we had this year. We have some great friends from college, Utah State University, who recently moved to Fort Worth and came down to join us for Thanksgiving. Rachel and Mike it was so awesome to have you guys here. So nice to be able to spend more than a picnic's time with you. You're kids are the cutest and have the funniest little personalities.

So for starters we headed to the park. It has been so beautiful here lately that we had to take advantage. I don't think they make teeter totters like they used too, these are much more durable.

Next up was the coolest monkey bars I've ever seen. We all had to have a go and I think Aspen and Rachel's little Zander were the only ones who made it across. Though Jared did put in his best effort.

Look What Phoenix Learned

We had some friends over to play and they brought their bikes along to enjoy the nice 80 degree weather we've been having. Our friend Molly, had a little 12 inch tires bike that she let Phoenix have a go on. Within minutes he was up and riding and requesting I take the traing wheels off of his bike.
So here they are, empty and alone in the garage.

And here's the brave little bike rider. Since this day, Weds the 24th, he's been out every moment he can spare, riding his bike round and round our circle. We went out on Sunday on a family bike ride. He made it over 2 miles with out resting, smiling the entire time. Way to go Phoenix!!

Go Harry Potter!

More BIG Texas

We find things every morning on our walks, baby turtles, acorns, rocks, sticks and the latest and greatest LEAVES. The biggest ones I've seen in a long time.

New Favorite Cereal

I always wished my Mom would buy these Cereals when I was a kid. I never understood why she wouldn't let us have them. But now that I'm a mom and I realize what fluff these are, and with marshmallows on top of that, I understand.

But they are pretty good. ;)

Sugar Land Science Museum

London had to go to a Science Museum to pass off something for Webelos. So we jumped over for a quick visit.

Come to find out every 2nd Saturday they have a bunch of hands on stuff. This time it was all about Texas Pioneers. We got to build Log Cabins, weave Place Mats, Quilt, and even learn some about Genealogy. Though we didn't really learn much. :) Most of their paperwork had websites and addresses dedicated to our Church. The man just smiled when we told him we were LDS. He said he'd actually been to the Church Family History Library in Salt Lake City. :)This shot's for Aunt Marlene. The Quartz comes from right by her house in Hot Springs, Arkansas. I'd like to go to that mine next time we go for a visit. (hint, hint) Last time Aunt Marlene was visiting and we saw these we both decided they look like Giant footprints (though backwards). I still think they're pretty.

Primary Practice Activity

Our Primary Program was Sunday the 14th. It went amazing, the kids were just awesome. And I was so involved in getting them to sing that I completely forgot the rest of the Ward was even watching. I couldn't stop smiling at them all. And we got plenty of compliments about how loud they all sang and how their annunciation was just perfect. :) :) :)

London got to play the opening song. He played while all the kids found their seats then accompanied the soloists and the whole Primary. One of the younger boys was so impressed by London's playing that his mom now tells him, "If you want to be as good as London, you have to practice." And the Elders Quorum keeps asking when London turns 12 so they can quit singing accapella.

Needless to say the prior Saturday practice wasn't all about singing and reverence. We had pizza with our teachers and friends.

Ran around a bit.

More pizza, which 10 year old boys sure can eat a lot of.

And a little game of Bingo.

Phoenix did NOT want to play Bingo. He always gets a bit beastly in the later afternoons on Saturdays. Just tired out from the week I think.