Friday, November 26, 2021

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was spent in St. George this year with the Morwood family. We always enjoy seeing family in St. George. The warm weather is nice too. 
Charlotte loved helping Grandma make pies this year. She rolled out the dough and made a delicious apple pie! 

On Sunday before Thanksgiving, we had a big family dinner with everyone. We haven't done this in a really long time so it was good to see everyone together. We found out that we were in charge of the family Christmas party this year a few days ago so we used this family get together to have the Christmas party too. Even though it was before Thanksgiving, it was still fun. 

For the party we had a Candy Sled Derby! It was epic.  Everyone made candy sleds out of candy bars and candy canes and whatever else they wanted and then we raced them down a wooden track.


Everyone got involved and really into the race by cheering each other on. This made it really fun. It was really interesting to see the creativity come out and see how everyone designed their sleds.  In the end, Braden, Roy, and Emily were our top three winners. I think everyone had a good time. The best part was watching Josh help Rider make her/his sled. Josh really got into it and you could see his mechanic brain really kick in.  All Rider cared for was that she have rainbow candy canes on the bottom. This party was a hit and so easy to plan.

Also during the week, I met up with my friend, Trista, and went on a fun hike to Scout Cave.  Our first stop along the way was this cool little arch called Turtle Rock.

We hiked about 3.5 miles in until we got to the Scout Cave. This was a pretty cool little cave overlooking Snow Canyon. We had a great time just chatting and catching up as we walked. It was so good for me to get out and hang out with a friend. We hiked about 7 mile that day and saw some amazing scenery. The crazy thing is, I have lived in St. George my whole life and never been to this area at all. We definitely need to get out and explore more often!

Thanksgiving at my parents' house was pretty quiet this year. It was just us and the Bassett's. On Tuesday my dad and mom started feeling a little sick like they were getting a cold. With people coming over for Thanksgiving, they decided to get tested for COVID-19. Unfortunately my dad tested positive. We had been around him all week so we were pretty sure we were exposed as well. Terral's family have all been vaccinated so they were fine with coming over.  My dad felt really bad and wanted to just stay in his room but we told him we were already exposed and vaccinated so he might as well come out and be with us. He did and we had a good Thanksgiving. Luckily he had been vaccinated so his symptoms were very mild and more like a cold for him.

We headed home on Friday.

On Dec 1, Colby participated in the school spelling bee.
He was one of the two winners out of his class so he got to be in the big school wide bee. He studied so hard for the spelling bee, memorizing a lot of strange, hard words.  Then on the day of the spelling bee, he was so nervous. Unfortunately he was the second person to get out because the word he was supposed to spell was "mink" and he spelled "meek." He was so sad and mad at himself but I told him he should be proud for winning his class bee and working so hard for the school one. I asked him if he learned anything new from working toward this goal and he said yes so I said then it hasn't been for nothing.   

I felt really bad for him but everyone in his class and his friends were really supportive. Come to find out, the district spelling bee was cancelled so it's not all a loss. 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Tuesday, November 9, 2021

7 months

Look at this cute little 7 month old baby girl. Brooklyn is growing up so fast and starting to get her own personality. She loves all of her brothers and sisters so much but she loves her mom even more than anyone in the family. 

All the kids love hanging out with her and being good older siblings. It was a good season for taking pictures with the leaves on the ground. Brooklyn and Colby loved playing in the piles of leaves. 

She has an amazing smile that is very contagious.  We can't help but be happy around this little one. 

While we were outside taking pictures, Brooklyn's friend, Harvey, came over to be in the pictures too:

Okay they might not know they are friends yet, but they will soon.

Brooklyn liked playing in the leaves.  She even tried to eat one but it was really poky in her mouth.  She didn't think that was very nice.

Speaking of eating, Brooklyn loves food now!
Last month she was gagging at everything but now she is eating everything!  She loves vanilla wafers and graham crackers.  She thinks real food is pretty great.  In fact, I think she likes real food better than bottles now.  She gets really excited when I put her in the high chair.

Happy 7 months old Baby Boo!!  We sure love you!

Wednesday, November 3, 2021

Family Pictures 2021

 It has been a few years since we had real family pictures taken. I think the last time was in 2018. So it was time to get new ones especially now with Brooklyn. 

I didn't know who to get to do our pictures because the lady that did them before just had a new baby and was not doing any sessions at this time. She had given me a few names but I wasn't really sold on any of them.  Then while Russell was coaching flag football, one of the parents took a bunch of pictures of the last game and sent them to everyone. These football pictures were amazing so I told Russell to ask her if she did family sessions. She said yes and we were sold. We scheduled a time with her and I think the pictures turned out amazingly.




We took the pictures at the American West Heritage Center. I love this location because it is very scenic and there are a lot of different places to take pictures.  Crystal was great at engaging the kids and getting them to smile.


She sent us around 200 pictures and it was so hard to choose which ones were our favorites. So there are a lot of pictures in this post.






I really liked all of these of the kids together. It makes it look like they like each other! 

These pictures of Russell and me were cute. She did have us do some fancy poses together by the ended up looking like wedding or engagement photos so I didn't really like them. 









The ones if Charlotte make me laugh because they totally show her sassy personality. 
I really love how all of them turned out. I am glad we found Crystal Ruby Photography. I love this family of mine!