Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.  It is so nice to get together with family and realize all of the things we have to be thankful for in this crazy life.  The funny thing is that the things we are most thankful for are the things we take for granted the most.  At least it is that way in my case.  I don't know where I would be without my family and those I love.  I am so thankful for them.  I am also thankful to be alive and healthy and to know the truths of the Gospel.  I have truly been blessed. 

We started off our Thanksgiving traditions this year by helping my mom make pies:

Emily loved helping Grandma.  Even though my mom pretty much had everything made by the time we got there to help, she still saved one or two pies to roll out while we were there so Emily and Colby could help.  They were good little chefs. 

My family had Thanksgiving at my parents house.  Terral was the only one not there because she was up north at her in-laws for Thanksgiving this year.  We all had a good time eating and eating and then eating some more before it was time for pie, pie and more pie.  We were all stuffed.  Afterward, the kids went outside to run off their food and energy while the adults cleaned up, took naps and just chatted.  Then the grandkids convinced my dad to set up the volleyball net and they all played a big game of Volleyball.  Well they had a good time but the boys claimed the girls cheated and the girls claimed the boys were poor sports.  It was so funny to hear then talk about it. 

At 7 pm it was time to hit the stores for Black Friday.  I made Russell go with me this year because we were getting a big present and there was no way I was fighting for it in my current condition.  Russell was amazed at how many people were at the store and the lines and fights and everything that Black Friday entails.  Russell ended up being like second in line for the big present so he got his ticket and then came to help me with the rest.  We finally made it out of Wal-Mart alive and Russell went to pick up the kids and go home while I continued shopping with my sisters until I finally gt home at 5 the next morning.  It was a long night!  We weren't involved in any fights but Jess did see one guy get trampled at the movie section in Wal-Mart.  She said that when they said go everyone pushed in so hard that the whole display case collapsed and the older guy was caught up in it and trampled.  Poor old guy.  Our other funny thing we saw was someone was sleeping outside the door to JCPenney at 4 am and JCPenney didn't even have a sale our even look like it was opening for a few hours.  We said we hope that person got what they wanted for a good price because we would never sleep out. 

That next day (Friday), we just chilled at home for a while and then went over to Russell's parents for another Thanksgiving feast.  Emily had been over helping Grandma Farnsworth get ready for the dinner by help make the place mats and place settings.  They made way cute little turkeys out of apples and gumdrops and Emily even assigned the seats placing herself right next to Aunt Traci and totally away from Russell and me.  We thought that was pretty funny but unfortunately for Emily we still made her eat her dinner!

After our second Thanksgiving dinner, we headed to the Temple to see the Christmas lighting.  We got the times mixed up though and got there about a half hour late so the program was over and we stepped onto the temple grounds just as the lights were turning on.  So I guess you could say that was perfect timing!  We walked around the temple grounds admiring all of the beautiful lights and even took a few pictures. 

 

Emily and Colby loved seeing the lights and especially love seeing the baby Jesus and listening to the Nativity story.  It was a very fun night and a good weekend.  Now it officially time to get ready for Christmas.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Random Fun

I haven't posted anything for a while so I thought I would write a little bit about what is going on.  We haven't been doing much; just the same old stuff so I haven't had any reason to post. Anyway, one fun thing we have done lately is watch Tyrel wrestle!  He is a pretty good little wrestler and it is so funny to watch these little 4-5 year old wrestling matches.  Some kids get really into it and wrestle and other kids just lay down and let the other kid pin them and then they will get up with the biggest smile on their face like they are the best wrestlers ever.  It is so funny.  Here are a couple pictures of Tyrel wrestling in his final match:

As you can see he wrestled that kid to the ground!  He has a blast and I think Klint has even more fun watching and coaching from the sidelines.  Lacie said he couldn't go to the matches any more because he yelled and cheered too loud and the people were plugging their ears.  We all laughed at that.  Tyrel did a great job and came home with first place medals pretty much every match.  One time he got second place and he was pretty disappointed.  What a funny kid.  It has been really nice to have the Hughes family back in St. George.  Emily and Colby love playing with Tyrel and Jack and the girls.  Colby loves Jack and talks about him all the time.  Jack on the other hand isn't really sure about Colby because sometimes Colby plays with his toys and Jack is very protective!  Also playing with the boys has been good for Colby because he now thinks everything is a gun and will shoot you with it and he also plays a lot more with is cars and other boy things. 

Speaking of Colby, he is a little fart!  His personality is growing so much these days that I love listening to him and watching him play.  The other day he told me all about his Nursery class using one or two word sentences and I could pretty much understand exactly what he was talking about.  He is talking so much better and clearer these days and is not as shy as he used to be.  He does everything Emily does and tries to say everything she says.  Sometime I wonder if that is a good thing.  He also likes to get into everything especially after I have told him not to.  Look how big he is getting!!

Colby is also into doing tricks.  Notice he is standing on his Clifford dog instead of sitting.  He will do this and then yell to me "Hey! Look! Tricky!"  He does a lot of thing that he thinks is "Tricky!"  We have started a little bit of potty training with him.  He seems to do pretty well with poop but we haven't been real strict on pee yet.  We really need to start cracking down though soon if we want him to be potty trained by the time the new baby comes.  That is the goal so we need to get on it. 

Emily is doing well too.  She loves to color pictures and is getting very good at staying in the lines.  When she really puts her mind to it she has colored some really good pictures.  She loves coloring with markers and does a much better job with them than crayons.  She loves going to pre-school with her friends on Fridays and is learning to write her letters, count, and even read a few sight words.  Emily loves her Sunbeam teacher, Sister Gough, and gives her a hug every time she sees her.  She is disappointed that Sister Gough will not be her Primary teacher next year and can't understand why Sister Gough can't move up to the other class too.  Huh I guess I have the say on what class Sister Gough teaches so maybe she can move up!! (But we will most likely keep Sis Gough with the Sunbeams.)

Russell is doing good too.  He went on his first house fire the other day with the Fire Department and he said it was so exciting!  I think his ultimate goal would be to get hired full time with the Fire Department and just fight fires.  That is a high risk job but after meeting many of the guys on the Fire Department and especially the captains and chiefs, I feel a little better about it.  These guys are really great and it is amazing the brotherhood that is in the department.  All of the guys do what they can to help and teach these new rookies the ropes and I know they will have each others backs in case of an emergency. 

I am doing well too, just hanging in there and trying to deal with pregnancy, and primary, and everything else.  Our Nursery leader had a baby and then moved so we were without a Nursery teacher.  I have been in the Nursery for the past two months and I have come to realize that calling would be the best calling in the church!  All you have to do is go to Nursery, play Play-Doh, sing songs, play toys, and have a snack!  Oh and prepare a little lesson on how we should smile instead of frown!  Then you go home and you don't have to worry about ANYTHING!!  And to top it off, all of the kids love you!  Perfect calling.  Which is why I cannot understand why that calling is the hardest calling to fill in the Primary.  I have been in and out of the Bishops office many many times since I got put in as Primary President trying to find another Nursery Leader and it has been so hard.  Finally though we got two couples to accept and another one is in the works.  Unfortunately, these couples will only be in the ward for a short time so I am still in the same boat of finding a replacement when that does happen.  So that is my life it seems finding replacements for every calling.  I wonder if I can call myself to Nursery and then release myself from the presidency?  Doubt it!  Anyway I went back into Primary last week because it was my turn for Sharing Time and it felt like I hadn't been there forever!  To add to the stress, a mom called me and said her kids had lice and before they knew it, they were at church.  Well, they have kids in Nursery, Junior and Senior Primary so the whole Primary was exposed (if that is the right word).  So we had to call all of the parents and tell them the situation.  Yeah we were on the phone pretty much all day.  I don't really know anything about lice so I was scrubbing mine, Emily and Colby's heads for a week before I was pretty confident that we were okay.  But My counselor said really the only way to spread lice is to share a hat, or comb or something like that with a person that has it.  Any way my head is itching right now so I will stop talking about it.  And in more drama news, we are currently at odds with a parent because they want to move their kid up to Sunbeams next year when really she is not old enough.  Enough said about that because I can already feel my blood pressure going up because I get so upset about the situation.  In good news though, we had three kids get baptized this month!  I love going to baptisms.  Before each baptism, I talk to the baptism candidates about baptism and explain the covenants and more.  While I was talking to these kids, I could see the light in their eyes and they were all so excited to be baptized and could hardly wait for the day to come.  They all knew all of the answers to the baptism questions I asked and I could tell they were ready.  I do love these kids and love being in Primary so I guess I will keep plugging along doing my best.

Well in baby news, I am continually getting bigger.  I haven't taken any belly pictures with this one which is kind of too bad but maybe soon.  Everyone keeps telling me I am small but I feel really big.  The doctor says I am measuring right on and everything sounds good.  One hiccup though was my glucose test that checks for Gestational Diabetes.  I had that test done at my last appointment and it tested high.  Normal range is 90 to 128 and mine came in at 157 so they were worried that I might have gestational diabetes.  Dr. Astle didn't seem too worried because I am measuring right on and nothing else seemed out of the ordinary but he wanted to do further testing just in case so he ordered a 3 hour Glucose test.  Can I tell you that test sucked!  I went to the lab at 8 in the morning and couldn't leave until noon!  First you have to be fasting which for any one that has been pregnant you know that makes you sick.  Then they draw your blood once to test it at it's original level.  Mine came back as like 72 and if it was lower than 70 they would have contacted my doctor.  Off to a great start right!  Then you drink the nasty sugar water that tastes like a flat Sprite.  This causes your blood sugar to skyrocket so you get nauseated (at least I did).  And they tell you if you feel like you are going to pass out tell us immediately and don't throw up or the test is ruined and we have to start over another day.  So I am sitting there trying not to puke and trying not to pass out for three hours all the while unable to eat anything.  So every hour for the next three hours they draw your blood again for testing.  My poor arms looked like I was a heroine addict.  Finally I was able to go home and get some actual food to eat.  Russell made me lay down while he made me some lunch because he said I looked very pale and bad.  After lunch I slept for a few hours and finally felt better.  I don't know how the results of the tests turned out but I haven't gotten a call from the doctor yet so I am thinking that is a good sign.  Other than that this pregnancy has been pretty good and it has gone by so fast!  We only have about 9 weeks left!  And we still have not decided on a name yet.  We are throwing around Logan, Ben, Tyson, and some others but who knows yet we are open for suggestions.

Anyway that's what we have been up to lately.  The holidays are coming up very soon so this is kind of the calm before the storm I guess because we will be getting busier.

Happy "Tangled" Halloween

Happy Halloween everyone!!!  We had a really fun and eventful Halloween this year.  This year for Halloween, we were characters from the movie "Tangled," Emily's favorite movie:

Emily was Rapunzel, of course.  Russell was one of the Pug Thug Ruffians, Colby was the brave Flynn Rider, and I was the evil Mother Gothel.  I made each of our costumes this year and I think they turned out really good.  Russell made his awesome viking hat using the antlers from the deer he shot last year.  It was fun to dress up with the kids.

Here are some more cute pictures of my little Rapunzel and Flynn Rider.  Aren't they the cutest kids you have ever seen? 

On October 26, we had a little Halloween party for preschool and all of the kids dressed up in their costumes.

Noble was a Paleontologist, Emily and Colby were Rapunzel and Flynn Rider, Faye was the Blue Fairy, and Eva and Junior were pirates.  Colby is not really in preschool yet but I couldn't leave him out so he dressed up too.  During school they learned about pumpkins and even got to pick a pumpkin out of the Olsen's pumpkin patch.  I am so mad at myself though.  I set the pumpkins Emily and Colby picked on the hood of the truck while I was putting them in the car then, because of my pregnant lady brain, I forgot all about the pumpkins and drove off.  When I got home, I realized I forgot about the pumpkins and they were now gone.  I hurried and got back in the truck and drove very slowly back to the Olsen's house trying to find our pumpkins.  I was only able to find Colby's little pumpkin and it was pretty scuffed up.  We never did find Emily's pumpkin and she was so sad.  I was sad too and so mad that I forgot the pumpkins and they fell off the truck.  I wish my brain was not so forgetful when I am pregnant.  Luckily Emily was okay with sharing the big pumpkin we bought at the store instead of having the little pumpkin she picked.  I am such a bad mom.

Anyway back to Halloween...  Every year during the Halloween week, we have Halloween themed food.  This is what we had this year:

 We had Mummy Dogs, Ham and Cheese Spiders, Octopus and Seaweed, and Mummy Pizzas.  I love how they Spiders turned out.  They look so real and they were good too!  The kids loved eating these foods mostly because they love hot dogs and pizza!  We also had out traditional Dinner in a Pumpkin, Pumpkin-Ginger Waffles, and Pumpkin Pie French Toast.  All very good.

We also had fun carving our pumpkin:

 Isn't our pumpkin spooky?  For a few days before we carved the pumpkin, Emily kept reminding us that we needed to make a pumpkin with triangle eyes, triangle nose and a spooky mouth with teeth.  I think she designed it very well.  Colby was old enough this year to enjoy the carving process without screaming.  He liked setting on the counter and watching Dad but was a little hesitant to stick his hand in the pumpkin and feel the guts but he finally did.

As the Primary President, I was in charge of the ward Trunk-or-Treat this year.  We had dinner, a costume contest, and of course Trunk-or-Treating.  It wasn't really that hard to plan because my presidency helped a lot.  My Secretary just sent around a sign up sheet for people to bring soups and I just reserved the pavilion near our church and coordinated everything.  For dinner we had soup and bread bowls.  I was a little worried that we wouldn't have enough soup but the ladies in our ward totally came through and we had more than enough and a good variety too.  I ordered the bread bowls a few weeks earlier and the bakery said they would have them ready.  When I called them the morning of the Trunk-or-Treat to see when I could pick them up, the lady told me that they didn't have my bowls because my dad had called and cancelled my whole order.  I was completely in shock and said "No he didn't!"  The lady was like"Yes he did I talked to him myself and cancelled it!"  Again I said, "No my dad doesn't even know I made this order so he didn't cancel it and neither did I."  Then the lady realized she had made a huge mistake and told me she would have my 225 bread bowls done by the time they closed at noon.  I had a dream the night before that this would happened which is why I called first thing in the morning.  I was so mad and couldn't believe they didn't check for the name on the order before they cancelled it.  Anyway the bread bowls did get done and the lady even gave us some doughnuts and didn't charge us sales tax on our order because of the mistake she had made.  Come to find out, the order that cancelled was actually for Friday not even the same day as mine.  Oh well we got our Bowls and we saved about $20.

At 4:30 my presidency and some of the Activity Day girls went up to the church to decorate and get ready for the party.  We just did simple decorations of table cloths, crepe paper, and centerpieces.  I made Mummy jars and my secretary decorated pumpkins and spiderwebs for center pieces.  It was nice to have a lot of help.  Russell was helping too until he got called out on a medical call right in our neighborhood.  It was actually right in our backyard.  The lady that lives next to our backyard neighbor totally tanked and was not even breathing when Russell got there.  Because he was so close, Russell was the first responder and was able to get an open airway so she could breath and then ran the call when the paramedics and fire department got there.  Even though I was mad that he left because he had all of the stuff we needed for the party in our truck, it was a good thing for that lady that he left.  Luckily he was back before the party started so we were able to get the rest of the stuff set up before the big crowd came. 

We started out with dinner and everyone loved all of the soups that were brought.  We had so many people come that the food line seemed to go on forever.  We invited everyone in our ward boundaries whether they were members or not.  We had a lot of non-members or less active families show up which was great.  It was nice to get to know them and hopefully get the less active families back to church.  My 2nd counselor, Trish Barker, said she over heard a conversation from some non-members that made her laugh.  They were talking to each other and said something like "Wow I didn't think Mormons celebrated Pagan holidays!  This is really fun and everyone is so nice and friendly and the food is so good.  They never do stuff like this in Vegas or Michigan."  Sis Barker said she should have turned around and invited them to church but she didn't.  It is funny the ideas people have about us and then when they actually come to our functions and get to know us, we are nothing like they think we are.  I am glad we made a good impression and they thought we were so friendly. 

After dinner we had a costume and trunk contest.  We had a group category and an individual category.  There were so many awesome costumes that it was really hard to choose who won the contest.  Luckily I had assigned the Bishopric to be the judges so I didn't have to pick.  We actually won third place in the group category for our "Tangled" costumes.  I made little trophies to hand out to all of the winners as well and some prizes like Fiesta Fun money, gift certificates to Arctic Circle, free car washes, glow sticks, and candy bars.  I made the trophies out of Styrofoam cups and gold spray paint.  They looked kind of funny but they worked.  The contest was fun but I don't think we will do it again next year.  By the time everyone was done eating, they were ready to go trunk-or-treating instead of waiting for the contest. 

Then I got to take a little break and take the kids around to all of the trunks while the Elders cleaned up. 

 It was fun to see all of the decorated trunks and see all of the kids dressed up.  Emily knew what to do but it was fun to see Colby as he realized that everyone was giving him candy.  He would grab a little handful especially if there were suckers and tell me to open all of the candy so he could eat it.  I kept telling him to put it in his bag but he would get so mad if I put it in there.  Finally, I opened one of his suckers and he was content to put the rest of the candy in his bag and keep walking.  Emily loved being the center of attention and getting candy too.

We had an awesome turn out and it seemed like everyone had a good time.  I didn't hear anyone complaining so it must have been okay.  It seemed like we had a lot more people come out this year than we did last year but we had a lot of bread bowls left over.  Last year they ordered 200 bread bowls and were running out so I ordered 225 but we had a lot left over.  I don't know if people just didn't take one and just used a bowl or if we didn't have as many.  It seemed like we had at least 200 people there.  We decided to give all the left over bowls to people in the ward that need then so we left that up to the bishop to decide.   The Trunk-or-Treat was fun and I am glad all that planning paid off and we had a good turn out.  One thing I do want to change next year if I can is to not have it on Halloween night.  Maybe it is just because our organization was in charge but it seemed like we didn't have enough time with our kids.  I really wanted to take them around trick-or-treating to our family and some of our friends don't live in our neighborhood but it was too late by the time we had cleaned up.  If we had it on another night, we could do the Trunk-or-Treat and still go to family and friends on Halloween.  Well we will see what we can do next year.  Some things you learn about planning ward activities is what to change, what to keep the same, and how relieved you feel when it is over!  But all in all it was a good party.

So we had fun Halloween this year and we hope you all did too!  Happy Halloween!