Past Happenings

We decided to make sugar cookies the other day and give some to those who have helped us with some things lately. It was lots of fun, and lots of work. Obviously the girls were having fun. Also, if you notice in the pic, Jayda got a new haircut, as did I....Happy Christmas!

5 is Great! Christmas Edition

My friend Amanda tagged me to do this, it was orginally 8...which is my lucky number, but I changed it to 5...since that is how many children I will have sooner than later...:) And less people to tag at the end. :)Enjoy!

Favorite Christmas Movies
The Polar Express
The Santa Clause (& the two after)
Miracle on 34th Street
Charlie Brown Christmas
National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation



5 Things that happened yesterday
I woke up at 5am (4am our time)
I flew home from Missouri
I went grocery shopping at Costco and Walmart
I actually made dinner after all that.
I went to bed at 9pm dead tired!

5 Things to look forward to
Christmas all month long
Our Cluff Christmas Party Weekend
Finding out what we are having in January
The PG Rec Center Baskeball Season
Snow

5 Things on my wish list
To finish all the projects around the house we've started
To start and finish other projects I want to do
To plant my apple tree that has been outside for 2 weeks :)
For my family to come visit me
For my house to stay clean

5 Things I love about winter/ Christmas
Hot Chocolate/Sugar Cookies/Mint M&Ms (we'll bulk the food items)
My Chrismtas Tree
Christmas Music
Snow
Watching Christmas Movies

5 People to Tag
Melissa, Loreen, Sabrina (maybe you will update yours), My sister (update again), Maile.

Our Thanksgiving Week!

Tuesday, we arrived in St. Louis at around 3pm. There were 22 of us arrived at the same time...so picture two 15 passenger vans pulling up in the bus pick up lane at the airport, wait for it.....with a big trailer attached to carry our luggage. (Corie got a pic, check her blog for an update). We went to Tyler and Floris' house to hang out and eat dinner. Wednesday, we went to the store, got ready for Thanksgiving, Floris cooked a million pies...we played games and just hung out. 10 more people came in that day. On Thursday, we set up a million tables in their oh so spacious and gorgeous living room to eat dinner. We had such a delicious dinner....it was great. So great we had leftovers until Monday. Yikes. :) Tyler also had a friend from the ward come over and bring a bar-b-qued ground hog? Nasty! Several people tasted/ chewed it...uh not me. Gross. On Friday, we planned to see some sights. We went to the St. Louis zoo, which was super fun for the kids. The zoo is very good and the animals were acutally there. (most of the time). After we left the zoo, we went to eat lunch at my favorite place in St. Louis, "The Saint Louis Bread Company." (If you remember, Nelson and I lived there for 8 months when we were first married.) So we had a delicious lunch, then headed to the arch. We were going to ride in it, but the line was way too long and we didn't have time. We had to be at my niece (Sadie's) baptism by 5pm, so we had to leave. As we start to head back to the vans, we heard Casey (the oldest, and maybe not the wisest!) had locked his keys in one van, wait for it.....with it running. Ha! So in the time we could have stood in line and rode the arch, we sat on the steps and froze. :) It was still fun. Oh and 3 more people came in on Friday. We went to Sadie's baptism, which was really fun, then we played more games and at more food. Our latest game...Hearts. Lots of fun! So we went to bed late, got up early on Saturday to drive to Navoo and go to the temple and see sights. We had a temple appointment for 11am...so we left at 6:30 am (mind you that is 5:30 am here). We drove the 3 hour drive to Navoo, left all the kids (24) with Tyler and Floris, so we could go through the temple. We enjoyed it so much, the Navoo temple is beautiful. Tyler and Floris were brave and took the kids for a horse carriage ride with our Uncle Jack (he and his wife Laura) are on a mission there. We came out of the temple to find Tyler and Floris unscathed and in one piece, at least physically..maybe not mentally..:) then we went to Carthage, ate lunch and took a tour of the Carthage Jail where Joseph and Hyrum Smith were killed. It was a very solemn and sad place. We continued on and when back to look at Navoo, and looked at Historic Navoo with the Mansion House, other houses of the Pioneers and Joseph Smith, as well as His gravesite, along with his brother, wife, and parents. We visited Jack and Laura for a second, then headed back to St. Louis. It was a fun, long, spiritual, and exciting day. :) We got up early Sunday to go to church at 9am. After church we ate, visited and played more games. We played the big circle signing game (with lots of people). If you haven't played, it is super fun with a large group! Sunday, 5 people went back home...it was sad. Our weekend was coming to an end. Monday, Ben and Pam left to Texas (their new home), and Casey and Barb left too. The rest of us were staying until Tuesday, so Monday we went to the St. Louis Science Museum which was fun for the kids, then we hung out. We left David (15) and the most responsible person I have ever met...with all the kids and the adults went to...where else...The Saint Louis Bread Company for dinner. (Like Kneaders, but a tidge better maybe..)Our night ended with the usual, trip to walmart and a game of oh...not hearts this time...Scum. it was so fun. We left at 5:30 am today to come home. We had such a fun weekend. It was a great Thanksgiving. Thanks Tyler and Floris! It is one we will never forget.

Update...

There hasn't been too many things to write about lately, our lives have been pretty uneventful....the most exciting past times have been the big screen or the tube...
We went and saw Twilight on Saturday, and I loved it. I expected to be disappointed, and in a few minor ways, I was, but overall, I actually really liked it. I wouldn't mind seeing it again, and I will definitely buy it. Last night, we watched the season "peek"/ movie of "24." It has been off for so long with the writers strike, they were smart to suck us all back in...and now we have to wait until January for the actual season to start. Good thing we have PrisonBreak to keep us going for now. (That and The Biggest Loser).

Tomorrow we are heading to Missouri for Turkey Day. We leave for a week to visit Tyler and his family. A bunch of the Cluffs are going, it will so a bunch of fun and chaos.

Hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving.

Christmas at our house!

This year I was so anxious to put up our Christmas tree and decorations, I am not sure why, but nevertheless. Although I still have pumpkins on my porch that need to be hauled away....Christmas is everywhere else. :) In Jayda's Kindergarten class, they have an elephant mascot named "Eddy." The kids get picked to take him home, and Jayda got to bring him home on the day we set up our tree. Lucky for her! Eddy has a journal, so the kids write in it what they did with Eddy and draw pictures. So there you have it. All of us, plus Eddy had a great time putting up our tree! :) Woohoo! Bring on the Holidays!

There's only one!

Maybe next time!!!! :)

Oh Blessed Snow!

I have to say, although it gets tiring by the end of winter, I do love the snow! Today we woke up to white everywhere! It has been snowing all day, so we went out and played and built a snowman. Then we came in, listened to Christmas music and had hot chocolate. It has been a fun day!

Happy Halloween!!!!

What a fun filled day Halloween is! It started with us going to Jayda's school to watch the costume parade. It was fun to see all the kids and their different costumes and how creative they were. Jayda looked cute as a pirate of course! After the parade, I went to her class to help with their Halloween party. I dressed up like a Halloween Fairy....at least that is what I called it. The kids thought I looked like a bat...okay, that works too!
After her party, we all went home and got ready in our costumes for Halloween. Halle dressed up as a BYU Cheerleader, Mia was tinkerbell, and Sienna was a little Indian. Nelson and I decided to dress up as Senator McCain and Sarah Palin. (A suggestion from a friend!) It worked out rather well, except Nelson had a little too much hair on top, and without me next to him, people thought he might be Bill Clinton instead of John McCain. Haha. I guess that made me Monica? Anyhow, we had fun walking around dressed up, and the girls had fun. We went to Nick and Corie's for dinner and trick or treating in their neighborhood. We stopped at a house with a McCain/ Palin sign in their yard and thanked them for their support! :) :)It was fun! There was a house in their neighborhood that had the yummiest doughnuts in their garage, and you had to play musical chairs to get one. :) Everyone had fun. Little Sienna had a blast too. She is the perfect age and she couldn't stop laughing and giggling as she walked up to the door, took her own candy out of the bowl, and waved "bye bye" as her thankyou to the homeowner. She just laughed and smiled and was having so much fun, she couldn't stand it. :) It was so cute. We had a great Halloween. The girls are still hyped up on candy and I suppose they will be for another day or two until it is all gone! Hope everyone had a great Halloween! Don't forget to Vote on Tuesday!!!