BB

Sometimes all you need is a big box.

And Aiden looks like he got punched in the face, but he had something going on with his eyes that night. Don't worry, he was fully recovered by the next day.

Goal Update

Just wanted to give a little update on one of my New Year Goals. I have done pretty good with exercising more. Last week I did all my scheduled training runs, which I haven't done since August. And I started doing some Firm exercise dvds at home. The kids love to build up their muscles with me.

And last night I fit a run in after the kids went to bed. Luckily I had planned it with Brooke or I would of skipped the run and hopped into bed myself. As you can tell we had a hard time getting a picture with both our heads in it.
Gotta keep this up. I just got my legs for Wasatch Back and, if you can believe it, they are harder than my SoCal legs. I need to become a running machine so I don't die.

Night Sledding

We hit the road/sidewalk sledding during last night's snow storm. The kids and adults had a great time flying down our street. We have been waiting for a storm big enough to make it down our street and we finally got it.

and the kids couldn't get enough of it.


And neither could we.

And it was snowing so much it started sticking on Andrew's head.

I think it was a perfect family night.

Extended Weekend

We just came off a great weekend. Trent had been planning this St. George trip for a while and I jumped on board last minute. I got work covered, kids covered, a lesson covered, and a talk covered. Can I just say Trent and I have an amazing family who is always so willing to help? Without them we wouldn't have been able to have a nice relaxing weekend away.

Anyways, our trip started Thursday afternoon as soon as we dropped the girls off at Emily's. Even driving to St. George is a vacation when you don't have kids yelling and fighting in the back. ;)

The first morning Trent and I ran together...well Trent left me in the dust on way home, but he stuck with me for the first 2 miles.

Afterwards we enjoyed our drinks of choice in the hot tub.

Jake and Candice joined us that night. We had some delicious food at Don Pedros, had another dip in the hot tub, and went to sleep to get ready for the morning. You see everyone came to town to run a race on Saturday. Jake and Trent ran the Half and Candice did the 5K. Unfortunately I couldn't participate because registration was closed by the time I knew I was coming along. I did get my own run done in the morning before I headed over to the finish line. I tried to hurry, but I missed Candice finish, but I am sure she looked strong and rocked the race. ;)

Next came Trent. He did well and came in 10th.

And then Jake. Love this pic of him in the air. And this was even taken with my phone. Can you believe it?


And one group shot. It was a little cold.

That was all the photos from our weekend. I really need to do better, but when you don't do anything but hang out, what is there to take pictures of?

All in all it was a fantastic weekend. We got lots of sleep, did lots of nothing, ate a lot of good food, and got to hang out with two of favorite people.

And like I said before it wouldn't have been possible without our families. Emily, Grandma Teri, Grandma Holly, Brooke, Kimmy, Cameron, Jill, and even our neighbor babysat for us. It takes a lot of people to cover The Hoard and everyone was so willing to help out.

And here is a peek at what happened while we were away.

The girls got to be girls and play with make up.

And these were the ones responsible for the fun.

And I just had to add another cute one of my girls.

And the whole beautiful group.

For most the weekend the kids were at Jill and Cameron's. The kids love both these two and were so excited for their own weekend away.

They colored a lot. Andrew even came home with a sketch pad and new pencil and got pointers from the artist himself, Cameron.

The kids found a new game of checkers, which Aiden now wants at our house.

They watched some movies.

And even got Happy Meals from McDonalds. They were definitely spoiled.

I think the kids had just as much fun as we did. It is probably just as good for them to have a break from us, as it is for us to have a break from them...;)

Thanks again to all those that helped! It made for a great break for Trent and I!

Birthday Bowling

We finally had the boys birthday party last night. They have been anxiously waiting. We like to spread things out from Christmas. It is just too much to have another party the day after Christmas. December birthdays are no fun.

We had the family up for a pizza dinner, followed by presents.

And oreo ice cream cake.

And finally, the grand finale.

Bowling.

12 kids, 12 adults, 1 picture taker, 1 baby, 2 little non-bowlers, and 2 late comers made for a hectic night at the bowling alley. We had all the kids on 2 lanes with bumpers. And the adults on another 2 lanes. I think some of the adults wished they had bumpers as well...I won't name names, but Emily was the winner with a score of 40 something...;)

The kids

The Adults

The final score. Andrew won on the "big" kid lane. And Morgan won on the "little" kid lane. I didn't get a pic of the adult's score. But I think Trent and Cameron tied with 150.

Thanks every one for making the journey and celebrating with us. We had a great, crazy night!

Happy Birthday Celebration Aiden and Andrew!

A & A

We celebrated Aiden and Andrew's birthday at school yesterday. They were so excited and had been waiting for a couple weeks for this. And since this post is about them I had to include a picture and brief explanation about it.

These two not only don't look like brothers, but there personalities are so different its amazing they came from the same womb. One such difference is seen below. Andrew always dresses "nice," he loves his button up shirts and nice pants. Aiden on the other hand only wears the "soft" pants and T-Shirts. And since we have 2 of every shirt, Andrew wears the "same" shirts every day to school. And Aiden is most likely in a Utah shirt.

Anyways, on to the school celebration. We made a poster board, brought treats, and watched the Sneetches for their half hour of school fun. The boys thought it was pretty great. And see, Aiden is in yet another U shirt and Andrew has a nice collared shirt with a sweater over it.

A few things they wanted on their posters were pictures of family, camping, St. George, and some of the stuff they liked-coloring, snow, spaghetti, bubble tape, oreos, and hershey bars. I also asked both of them what they wanted to be when they grew up. Andrew wants to be a Police Officer-I am sure to keep the town in tip top shape. And Aiden wants to be a magician-I am sure to just make things disappear.

Love my very different boys.

YW

Well everyone, I am doing good on at least one of my goals so far. I went to YW's on Sunday AND Mutual last night. In fact I was in charge of the whole activity. We had a grand time. We made Goal Jars for the new year. Crafts are always fun. And you can't beat making anything with chalkboard paint, right?

(Ours is going to be a Disneyland jar. The kids will need to save money if they want to go!)

Afterwards, there were limited leaders with cars, so we pulled a clown move and fit 8 people in my little car. It was great.

Oh and you can see one of the cute jars they made in the bottom. They all fit a ton of goals in those little jars. Should be a good year for everyone.

Its good to be back.

Fire Station

We had a field trip to the fire station today. The kids thought it was pretty cool.

I love that these 4 are all the same size, but there are 2 1/2 years between the oldest and youngest.
It was a good time.

And yes, the pictures really suck. Camera phones are crap. I need to get my travel camera fixed for sure, cause this just isn't going to work for me.

Snow, Finally

The Hoard was so excited to wake up to snow on Saturday.

They spent the day making snow men.

And a killer snow cave.

Brooke and Trent were awesome enough to help the kids.
Trent actually really got "into it." Ha, that was a total Jake joke.


Aiden and Morgan were able to squeeze in together.

And Morgan thought it was pretty dang cool.

And after the fun was over, I think Morgan was pretty exhausted.

We love snow around here.

It just needs to keep coming so we can start snowshoeing.

Broken

Well, I have been meaning to blog about our New Year, but my camera is not working. I took my little travel camera with us to St. George and during the first vacation day I dropped it. Now it will not turn on. Bummer. So, no fabulous St. George New Year post this year. However, if you look at last year's post here, it is probably fairly close to what we did this year.

Another thing that is not up to par around here are my blogging skills. I just can't seem to fit it in any more. Sad huh? It makes me sad, because I love my blog and the record of our life it keeps.

You ask why I am so busy? It's because I never stop working. Not the typical Mom work, but stuff I actually get paid for. I go hours sitting in this spot taking phone calls, charting, solving problems, and NOT sleeping. Hence the reason I have been in this outfit for for 2 1/2 days. When you never go to bed your day never ends right?

At least it is a cute outfit, one of the cardigans I found shopping in Vegas over my fabulous New Years down South that you will never see pictures of. Dang it.

Anyways, I hope things settle down around here and I can get caught up on all things in my life, cleaning, blogging, exercising, cleaning, YW's, kid stuff, and SLEEP. It is hard to do anything when you are dead tired.

And that brings me to my Goals for this year. I need to fix what is broken in my life and unfortunately there are many.

• 
  
  Get back to cleaning regularly. It is not good when you go a month between vacuuming or scrubbing toilets...


• 
  
  Exercise. I miss this, but I can't seem to get up and going when I don't make it to bed until 7 am. Any one want to swap kid watching so I can run during the day? I AM going to figure something out to fit it into my life.


• 
  
  YW's. I have been MIA for the past month. Between vacations, work, wind storms, Holidays I haven't been around much. I miss my girls and need to dive back in.


• 
  
  Budgeting. I am really going to do it this year. I don't want my constant working to go to waste. It seems that we spend whatever we make-no matter how much or little it is. I really want to decrease my spending and start saving for important things like having 5 kids in college at the same time or maybe having 5 weddings all at once. Raising The Hoard is going to get pretty expensive I'm afraid.


• 
  
  Temple attendance. I hate to admit it, but I am terrible at going to the Temple and I hope to do better this year. Even if I make it once every couple months it will be a drastic improvement. That is really sad to admit....

And that is it for now, although there are so many other areas in my life I need to improve on, I can't change everything at once or I might explode.