Free Christmas cards...yeah, that's a good deal =)

So Shutterfly is doing 50 free Christmas cards for all you fellow bloggers out there! Here's the link:

http://blog.shutterfly.com/5358/holiday2010-blog-submission-form/

I'm excited! I love to add our family Christmas card on to our neighbor gifts, but it's too expensive (we always start small with our neighbor gifts, then end up giving a little something to everyone in a three mile radius. OK, exaggeration, this isn't Richfield--three miles would mean about twenty families there!, but still, we give a lot out)

Here's some of my favorites from the site, but they have lots, lots to choose from:

http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/christmas-photo-cards

They of course, also have all the other fun things that you could possible stick a picture to: puzzles, stickers, t-shirts, mugs, some really cute Christmas ornaments, etc.

They even do calendars: http://www.shutterfly.com/calendars/wall-calendars Make one up for your family chock full of fun memeries. Yes, Mothers cry when they get these.

So go sign up, it's a quick form you fill out, then wait a couple days to get their e-mail with all the details. Then spend more time filling out the rest of your Christmas shopping list!

Wanting to get ready for the Speedy Spaniard?

Since our Bishop challenged us to strengthen on bodies and our spirits, and to be fit enough to run in the Speedy Spaniard this next summer, I've been trying to put together a group to exercise in the church in the mornings after kids are gone to school. Of course this does not include only those in our ward, but whoever wants to come, LDS or not, in our ward or stake or not, I don't even care if your kids go to SFH or Maple Mountain or wherever =). My sis in law does it, and it's perfect in the winter when being outside isn't an option, it's big enough you can have several (lots? hopefully?) women come together, small kids will be in a safe place where we can keep an eye on them while they play with other kids, and nobody has to make sure their basement is free from toys, laundry, etc. every day! I know the best chance I have of sticking to an exercise routine is if someone else is expecting me to be there. Sooo, after running the idea through the channels, we are down to just letting the Bishop know about how many ladies are planning on coming, when we will be there (I'm thinking Mon, Wed, and Fri?) and finding someone with a key to come. I also posted a shortened inquiry of this on FB, but for those who are not on it, and for those who don't read my blog, let's spread the word around and try to answer these questions by Sunday so we can get final clearance and start on Monday!


Other things to bring up:
--A lot of us will be bringing small kids (including me), and that's good, but we need to keep them in the gym with us.
--I don't think I need to bring this up, considering the wonderful ladies in our area, but we do need to be very careful about the videos we use and the clothing we wear. Legwarmers have been approved ;)

So let's send the word around, and then get back to me, convince someone with a key to come, and we'll be ready to go!

I love...#3

It's 7:15 on Monday and the rest of the fam is cleaning up after dinner and I just remembered to to do my I love...Monday blog! How did I remember? I was looking for a video on the humanitarian efforts (Brother Barber showed it during the YM/YW combined sunday meeting, very good)to show for family home evening, when I saw this:

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?locale=0&vgnextoid=bd163ca6e9aa3210VgnVCM1000003a94610aRCRD&channelId=bd163ca6e9aa3210VgnVCM1000003a94610aRCRD&sourceId=070d6ce71083c210VgnVCM100000176f620a____


I love...this video and so many of the rest on the Morman messages website.

And guess what my lesson on Sunday was about: yup, gratitude and appreciation (Have I learned my lesson yet?).

What do you all love today? Well, go tell Someone thanks for it!

I also love...Farris! And Logan. By that I mean Logan, UT. It was our 10th wedding at the beginning of November, and we decided to take a quick weekend trip back to Logan, where we met, married and had Felicity. We were able to do a session in the Logan temple, visited where he proposed, drove around in the canyon and even took my nephew, the current Aggie, out to lunch. I loved seeing the campus again, so many good memories! And of course, being on campus again means:
I love...Aggie Ice Cream. yum, yum, yum.

Caleb's Thanksgiving menu

Caleb had to write a Thanksgiving menu for his class, here it is, including spelling and capitalization:

mats ptatos and gravey.
Turkey.
ckorn and cod. [corn on the cob, hee-hee, he calls it corn and cob]
Ice creme.
Pezzu.

I love the addition of pizza!

I love...

I love...Mondays #2! Wow, I am actually doing it two weeks in a row!

I love...Sunday afternoon naps. Hurrah for the 9:00 block (although, I don't enjoy it as much at 8:00)!
I love...the view out my kitchen window. The mountains change colors every few months, the sky behind them tells me what the weather is like, and the neighbors have a sumac tree that is brilliant right now!
I love...WinCo's bulk isle. I know, weird. But they have so much, it's amazing!
I love...Sunday calls to my family. I love catching up on family news, hometown doing's and laughing about everything with my mom.
I love...kids perspectives on fall. Joseph just looked out our window, gasped and said "Mom, our tree is getting OLD! The leaves are almost gone! Are we going to get another tree?" which brings me to my final love of today:
I love...the cycle of the seasons. Every year I watch the leaves fall and the grass and flowers dry up, get covered in snow, grow and bloom and then repeat. How peaceful and hopeful to see this every year, whether Democrats or Republicans or even Tea Partiers are in office, whether my kids are in cribs or big boy/girl beds, whether I'm closer or further away from my pre-kid weight. Thank you Heavenly Father for this beautiful world!

Ahhhh, now I'm ready to face the week!

The Primary Program

This coming Sunday is our ward's Primary Program. I love that Sunday! And this year is the first in a long time that I won't be involved, except as a parent. It will actually be the first as a parent of primary age kids where I am only involved as a parent! So my kids have been practicing their parts.

Felicity: I can follow Jesus Christ's example and pray every night.
Caleb: The Holy Ghost helps me be reverent.
and Joseph's part makes me laugh:
Joseph: Heavenly Father and Jesus love me because they are patient with people.

Hee-hee! I think our Primary President is getting cynical about the sunbeams. No, just kidding, usually the kids write their own parts. I'm not sure where this idea bubbled up in his head. Maybe he's heard me praying for patience? Our primary president is doing a great job, and I very much understand and appreciate all that her and the rest of the presidency and all the teachers do every week. And bless Sunbeam teachers all over the world. May they never run out of crayons or patience.

Halloween!

My sister Nicki came up on our Halloween-ish Day (we celebrated Halloween on the 30th so we could celebrate Sunday on Sunday ;)) to help out and to get some of the Halloween laughs, too. She brought her laptop, we plugged my camera into it, then copied the pictures into my USB drive, so now I can share some pictures from Halloween! It was a chilly, wet Halloween, with a hailstorm passing through as we ate dinner, but it was only sprinkling when we hit the Trunk or Treat and finished up by going to a few houses that we'd missed from the that. We had a delightful time, and the Mommy and Daddy tax on the candy (ahem...) was yummy.

Joseph is part of a neighborhood preschool this year, (kindergarten next year? Already?), and they had a party with all the little brothers and sisters invited. Cute kids! LittleBug would only be in this picture if he could ride on that toy at the same time. He's a tiger in this picture but decided he didn't like it, so we went with the duck costume for trick or treating.

When the pumpkins were still ripening, I scratched these letters and pictures in, and then the pumpkin scabbed them over. Easy-peasy, and so many things you could do! We had an overabundant crop, giving pumpkins to Joseph's preschool class, our neighbors, the Laurels and Mia Maids, and still having enough to line more than a dozen on our front steps! Crazy squash plants.

The whole gang, after the trick or treating and the trunk or treat. Only a little wet!

I love the cheesy grin on our duck. He loved splashing in the abundant puddles.


Our terriying Dragon makes a repeat. He loved this costume so much last year, so he decided to do it again. The legs were a little High in the Water, but it was wet, so it's all good.

Our Ferocius Dinosaur.

He's not really giving the peace sign, those are his claws. Because he's Dangerous.

I painted Felicity's face to make her more fairy-ish. I think the best part was the purple eyebrows! And I love her smile-for-the-camera smile in this picture, hee-hee.

Here's the whole costume. I decided to go with the pixie kind of tunic instead of the skirt. It was a last minute, figuring it out as I went and only using what I had on hand kind of costume, but she loved it. She really liked the leggings, our '80s girl.

Hope you all had a fabulous Halloween, too!