All Kinds of Together

Today we had our annual extended family Christmas party at my parents' house in freakin Eagle Mountain. None of us were excited about the prospect of getting up early on a Saturday to get everyone ready and drive out there by 9:45, especially because we knew we'd be taking family pictures after the party and needed to have everyone presentable.


The party ended up being enjoyable and the picture taking was fine. Every year we set up my tripod and use the self-timer to get a family shot for parents' Christmas card. It's no small feat to get a usable photo of 18 people using a self-timer and only taking about 5 shots (the men folk and kids aren't very patient). I love to snap photos when everyone is primping and fidgeting, it always makes for a funny picture to me.


It was snowing lightly when we started taking the pictures so this one has a snowflake right in front of my dad's face, but other than that I think this is the best shot.


We always take a picture of my parents with all the grand kids, and I do believe this is one of the best ones we've ever gotten.


We also had to coordinate the kids' attire for "the jammie pants" photo. My mom always makes matching jammie pants for all the kids, yet somehow getting everyone to remember to bring them, wear a matching shirt, change out of their regular clothes and then pose for a picture is quite the ordeal, but we managed to get this shot.


After we'd taken a bunch of pictures someone started singing "Jingle Bells" and suddenly all the kids burst into song. It was a rather adorable, impromptu moment.

Then they just got crazy.

Poor Landon ended up not feeling well around the end of our gathering and spent the rest of the day under a blanket on the couch and then went to bed at 8:00.


Whitney played in the snow by herself for over an hour and built a little snowman decked out in true Whitney style with a lei, leaves for hair, rocks for a face and a helmet.

**What did you do today?
Do you use your self-timer very often?
Does taking pictures of kids raise your blood pressure?**

Comment Window Tidbit: I'm happy to report that the weather has warmed up substantially and we're currently at 37 degrees. The ice in our bathroom windows has melted.

Busted Campout, plus Winners

I'm late in posting about this, but we had our 2nd annual Family Backyard Campout on September 18-19th.


The kids and I started the campout the way we start every visit to Freakin Eagle Mountain...in traffic! Granted, it was Friday evening rush hour but still, it took 17 minutes to go 1 mile due to construction and volume of cars. Serenity now!


As we sat in traffic we saw the wind get stronger and the sky get darker so we feared our campout was doomed. We pulled up at the house just in time to see the dismantling of the tents (we'd missed the set up because we were stuck in traffic, darn).


I thought the colors of the sky and the surrounding plants were rather beautiful and took a bunch of photos.

These clouds looked surreal and huge to me.

{Photo by Amy}

We moved all the gear into the porch and ended up eating dinner and chatting all evening out there. We love the screened in porch so much, it's really a more accurate indication of the way our family likes to spend time "outside".

{Photo by Amy}

The wind died down and it didn't end up raining, so we could have slept outside after all. Randy and Jared made a fire in the fire pit so the kids still got to make s'mores and hang out.

{Photo by Amy}

It's a good thing Amy went outside and took pictures by the fire because I was so comfy chatting on the porch I didn't take any photos the rest of the night!

{Photo by Robyn}

The girls set up their sleeping bags in one of the empty guest rooms (formerly Robyn and Jared's room), while Lori and Amy set up their sleeping bags in the other empty guest room (Adam was at home sick that night).

{Photo by Amy}

{Photo by Robyn}

Landon and Austin were the smart ones and claimed the couches in the downstairs family room, and Robyn and Jared claimed the den. My parents got their own cozy bed of course!

{Photo by Amy}

Ashley had fallen asleep on Robyn's lap while we were chatting on the porch and was able to make the transition to sleeping bag and giggly-girl filled room without waking up.

Randy and I got the raw end of the deal and ended up on our air mattresses (by the way Michelle I borrowed yours) in the exercise room. It was nice to have ceiling fans going, but as my air mattress lost air again (I have no idea why and really must find the source) I ended up on the very hard floor. It was a long, uncomfortable night for me and a rough one for Randy even though his mattress stayed inflated.


In the morning Lori and I were in charge of breakfast and made bacon, fruit and "The Guidry Special" (English muffins dipped in pancake batter and fried then dipped in powdered sugar--it's like dessert). Afterward the kids went back downstairs to play and the rest of us sat around talking for hours (except my dad who did yard work and Jared who was working elsewhere).

Edited to add: "The Guidry Special" was named after the family of Adam's best friend from first grade when we lived in Missouri. His last name was Guidry and his mom taught my mom how to make it.

Overall it was a successful camp-in, even though we basically sacrificed a good night's sleep and were tired all day Saturday.

**Have you ever had a camp-in?
Do you ever sleep well when you camp?
Can cousin fun ever be overestimated?
Do you like to just sit and talk with family?**

Congratulations to these good mail winners--please email me with your mailing info at stuart_jill@hotmail.com

20--Jodi
17--2 Green Eyed Girls
11--Alisa
14--Gail
35--Anita K.

Comment Window Tidbit: The leaves on our trees are changing color, apparently Fall is really here!

E-I-E-I-O

My parents invited us over for Sunday dinner yesterday so we made our way out to Freakin Eagle Mountain, which even without traffic felt like a long drive. I realized I hadn't been out there since Father's Day in June, that's crazy!


This is what we saw as soon as we got out of the car. It was funny to us because 1. now that Robyn and Jared have moved out my dad has reclaimed the 3rd garage space for his beloved tractor and 2. the cat looked like he could not be more content.


The next funny thing was this note written by my dad which was hung so high up on the door that any smaller person (i.e., my mom) wouldn't have even noticed it. It says "P.U. Manure" which is funny for the P.U. itself, but really means pick up manure. Parental quirks can be enjoyable.


As soon as we entered the house we saw my mom carrying a plate of peanut butter and cheese crackers for Andrew. This is one of his diet staples (he's incredibly picky, we don't really know how he survives).


Whitney brought her creepy white tiger (those eyes, seriously!) since she would be staying the night.


The porch table was all set for dinner, we love eating out there!


This new post-it note of my mom's just cracked me up. They recently got rid of their normal
phone service for a new, cheaper plan (they just use their cell phones) but need to have a house phone for when babysitters are there. Doesn't it feel like we're going backwards on phone call pricing sometimes?

Freshly baked rolls are always a happy sight to see!

After a long, relaxing dinner and conversation time we went outside to see my mom and the kids feed the chickens (what the?) and hunt for eggs. It's so crazy that my parents now have 6 chickens!


They let them roam the yard, but that means the chickens hide their eggs from them. Landon and Whitney helped with the search, but they still only found 1 egg!

No one who has ever known my dad would have imagined he would have 2 goats, 6 chickens and 2 cats! Granted, he's not hanging out, petting any of them, but still.

One of the cats was rubbing all over me while I stood on the deck taking pictures. I love the feel of a cat's tongue licking my feet, who knew?


I was quite taken with these flowers growing on the deck (I don't know what they're called) and had a little photo shoot with them.


I love taking picture of flowers from down low, it's such a cool perspective to me.

We didn't leave until after it was dark outside (which was surprising to me because I didn't think we'd stay so late) and when I backed out of the driveway I went the opposite direction of home. I just wanted to drive around the neighborhood a bit and pass by Amie's house just because. As we drove by Amie's we saw them sitting in lawn chairs in the driveway, so of course we had to back-up and go visit. Landon was thrilled to have some time to play with James, and they immediately took off as if they'd had an agenda all along. Amie stood at my car window talking to Randy and I and ended up causing me to laugh so hard I peed! If you're ever around her, ask her to tell you the story of Jessica's blind cat.

**Do you like the feel of a cat's tongue?
Are you ever taken with the flowers?
Have you ever hunted for real eggs?
Do your parents have quirks?
Do you think the tiger's eyes are creepy?**

Comment Window Tidbit: I have been out of cotton balls for almost 2 weeks! I use them every day to remove mascara from under my eyes, so this has been a pain. How hard is it to go buy cotton balls?? Apparently too hard. I even went to Target the other day with those in mind, but still managed to forget them!

Up at 6:00 on a Saturday?!

Edited to add: I removed the slideshow because hearing the music every time I clicked on to my blog was driving me crazy!!! (Monday 6/9/08)

We did our first ever 3 Generation Family 5k this morning in the rain out in freakin Eagle Mountain. I also created my first ever slide show with music, though somehow have "demo template" on it #*?@!. Oh well, I'm not doing it over again. Enjoy!

**The pictures are in case the video doesn't load and for future blog publishing.

Before the race. What in the world? There were like 50 people, what's up with that?

My dad and Olivia, cute.

We got passed by almost the whole family.

Video of Jared, Landon and Austin passing us.

Tess and Adam at the finish.

Whitney had a hard time with this "race" but loved finishing.

Our family shot (courtesy of Kelly) in our matching t-shirts.

Victory!

Classic note from my mom.

Wording by me!

Bacon!

Randy and I were so tired from getting up early and doing our power walk that we crashed when we got home at 1:00. I slept until 4:30!! Good grief. This day feels like several days in one, and the wacky weather is definitely contributing to that feeling.

**Have you ever done a 5k?
Do you love bacon?
What do you think of our t-shirts?
(Randy designed them.)**

Agitated?

I generally don't think of myself as someone who gets very stressed out, yet I often find myself feeling agitated and then have to review the possible causes so I can talk myself into a calmer state of mind. Sometimes this doesn't work. At those time I feel like my subconscious is nagging at me to get moving on things so as to save me from future discomfort, either way I'm not keen on it.

So last night I was feeling agitated about the big Etsy order I had to finish and mail today, the calls I needed to make for primary, leading our ward book discussion of The Screwtape Letters Tuesday night, this Sunday's Sharing Time and the blog party. Even though none of these things is hugely overwhelming by itself their collective weight is taking its toll.

{The scene while taking Whitney to school.}

This morning my alarm went off at 6:30, so I stumbled out of bed in a sleepy stupor to turn it off (it's on the book shelf away from my snoozing fingers) got dressed for the gym, talked to Landon for a minute (he gets up so early!) and then decided to go back to bed! That's a new low for me, I have never actually gotten dressed for the gym and then decided to go back to bed before. I was so weary, but I've been doing so well the past few weeks that I just went after dropping Whitney off at school (Landon rode with a friend). I prefer to get it done earlier, but at least I did it right?


I was focused my efforts today and managed to do 3 loads of laundry in-between cutting out, packaging and mailing my big Etsy order. I also listened to all 3 hours of the audio version of The Screwtape Letters while doing this so that refresher helped calm my mind a bit about that. I also made my 10 primary calls today and have heard back from all but 1 person (woohoo). I hate asking anyone to do one more thing so I just dreaded calling them, but everyone was really nice.


The kids and I headed out to freakin Eagle Mountain after our trip to the post office right at 5:30 tonight and got caught in both snow and rush hour...lucky us. What should have been a 25 minute drive ended up being a 50 minute drive instead. I actually didn't get grumpy about it (though I wanted to) because I was so happy about finishing the other things I needed to do today.


The weather calmed down just before pulling into my parents' neighborhood. The clouds were so low and looked so cool against the mountain that I had to take a picture (Amanda H. I always think of you when I pass this place). Our purpose for heading out there was to pick up the mountain man hat my mom made for Landon's school play. I hadn't planned on staying very long, but we ended up being there for over 2 hours. The kids were thrilled to be able to play so long with Austin and Olivia.


I got this very nice card from Jen V. today. She took advantage of the free card promotion going on with the John Adams miniseries and sent it to me (so nice). I had posted about this promotion and then forgot to do it myself. It was a really nice note, thanks Jen!

So after such a busy day I'm feeling better and less-agitated than I was when this day started. I need to prep for tomorrow night's book discussion and I need to work on Sharing Time, but that's still 6 days away so I'm okay (I just don't want to leave it until the last minute like I often do). As for the blog party, I'm hoping to book the location tomorrow and then send the Evite because real invitations aren't going to happen at this point. Serenity Now!

**Snow in April, what's up with that?
Do you get officially stressed or just agitated?
Would leading a book discussion stress you out?
Did you send one of the John Adams' cards?**