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Friday, January 30, 2009

Look what the boys did while we were away

They've been wanting to go snowboarding ever since Talon got one for Christmas. Garry decided that would be a fun thing for them to do while we were in Boise.Tanner borrowed Talon's snowboard because he had to work. Taz borrowed Tiffany's boots and rented his gear. Garry just took pictures. (As he says, "Old bones break and don't heal so well!")
They stayed on the bunny slope all day and never ventured farther, but they say they're ready to next time they go. Taz said it was really expensive because the cheeseburgers were $7.00 each!! (Not the fact that he had to buy a new coat, and rent the gear, and pay for the tickets...)
Fun for them!













Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Some other fun things we did in Boise







Cynjyn and Kres loved playing at Brian's house. His sister Alisa, had a collection of Polly Pockets that was fun for them.








Kres found a Hannah Montana wig and went around saying "rock on"!





Cynjyn and Ella confiscated the balloon bouquets and sat up in the tree outside mom and dad's condo for about an hour.





Cynjyn made a congratulations sign for Brian and Krissy.It snowed while we were there almost everyday. It didn't stick until Sunday though.It snowed Saturday night. After church Sunday, Cynj and Kres went outside at Brian's house and made a snowman.



Just beginning...








Kres kept coming in and asking Alisa for decorations for the snowman. He came in the first time and said, "We need a nose." So Alisa got him a nose (carrot). He came in a few minutes later and said "we need another nose." Alisa asked him what happened to the first one and he said: "I ate it!" Luckily, Alisa was very accomadating and furnished them with everything they needed for the snowman.



Monday, January 26, 2009

I'm back...

...did you miss me?? Where have I been, you say?? Well, let me explain... My baby sister Krissy is engaged. She is getting married March 20th. She DID NOT want a bridal shower. She has been on her own for several years, has her own house and felt like she didn't need much shower wise. Plus, she HATES to be the center of attention. Well, my other sister Ky and I wanted to give her a shower, but very lowkey one. It would be more of a sisters weekend with a shower thrown in. We decided to have it in Boise, where she will be living. We decided to just invite her sisters and sisters in law and mostly have it to meet Brian's family. My sister and I hadn't really met them yet. She didn't want her out of town relatives to have to risk traveling in bad weather, so we kept it really low-key. Cynjyn and I flew in Thursday afternoon and we had the shower on Saturday. It only lasted about an hour and a half, but it was a fun filled weekend. The above picture is Krissy the bride to be under our single wall decoration.
We got three balloon bouquets, one for outside to show the way and two for indoors. Krissy's colors for her wedding are black, white, and red, so we were able to find a lot of cute color themed decorations this time of year because Valentine stuff was in all the stores.

Here are me, Krissy, Ky and my mom! Ky did a great job sending out invites and having a vision even though she is 7 months pregnant and HATES being pregnant.


This is the table. We just had desserts, with cheesecake being the main dessert. Krissy has always dreamed of serving cheesecake at her wedding because she loves it so. Well, Brian hates cheesecake, so they decided to go for wedding cake. So we indulged Krissy with cheesecake for the shower. We got red velvet cake too because it matched. We had a white cake in the back already cut and some cream puffs, nuts and hugs and kisses.



I thought the table turned out really cute.





We had requested "entertainment" of "food storage" gifts because she doesn't need the typical house hold items. So, here she is with her stash.




This is Krissy with her wedding party. Kylee is Brian's niece and she is going to be a "flower girl" at the reception (they're getting married in the Boise temple), then there's Krissy, Cynjyn and Ella (her nieces) are the bridesmaids. Ella is holding Brian's other niece Ella, she is not in the bridal party, but Ella wouldn't give her up.






Here I am with my sister in laws. I hardly ever take a picture with just them, so I thought this was a good opportunity. They both came a long way too to support Krissy and it was nice seeing them. Jodi, Darla and me.

After the shower, my mom took us to Mexican dinner. Jodi and my brother Rob went to a movie, but we took their son Trey with us. So here's the line-up, starting with the baby and going clockwise: Kresimir (Ky's son), Cynjyn, Ella and her mom Darla, Krissy and her fiance Brian, Trey, me, my mom, Clay (Ky's husband) and Ky. I'll post some more non shower pictures later. Cynjyn and I flew back to Vegas Sunday afternoon. We had a great time and wished it could last longer and that we lived closer!!



Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Martin Luther King Day

Over a year ago, my uncle gave us his dining room table chairs. Ours were old and rackety and had given up the ghost, so one summer in Oregon, we brought these chairs back. We love them because they are sturdy, but didn't love the stains and mustard yellow color. Finally, yesterday, we decided to recover them. Taz was at Shae's all day, Cynjyn went to Red Rock with the Hopkins, Tanner had Hunter over, Talon was out and about with Tiffany, so Garry and I went to the fabric store. Before
During

After




Love them and I even had enough material left over to make a matching table runner. By the by, the material only cost $20.00!! Love those MLK sales:)

Monday, January 19, 2009

A Day in my Life

My funny friend Carol blogged a day in her life with pictures. I commented that my life would be too boring, but I guess it makes a good blog post so here is a day in my life last Thursday, January15th, 2009: Here I am having just got up and dressed. Always in my walking clothes!
One of the smartest things I did for my own sanity this past September when school started, was to make a rule that the kids had to make their own lunches for the day. I was sooooo sick of making three lunches everday! So here are Taz and Cynjyn making their lunch for the day.

I briefly went upstairs to get the dirty clothes to do some laundry and found Cynjyn and Taz's room looking like this. I chose to ignore it and tell them they had to clean their room after school!


I went to wake up Tanner for school. It is mid-term week and he has two finals today. He usually gets himself up at 6:30 and I take him to school by 7:00 and then I go on my walk. But today, he didn't have his early bird class and I didn't have preschool, so I was going on my walk later and thought Tanner slept through his alarm. I got up there and found him like this. He had thrown up 4 times: 2:00am, 5:00 am, 6:30 am and 7:00 am. So I worried about him all day missing his mid-terms! (He was better Friday and made them up and all is well now)




As I came downstairs I noticed the family picture wall looking like this and immediatly went to ask Taz why he obliterated Tanner's pictures with NERF darts?? He said he was mad at Tanner because last night he wouldn't let him play with his IPHONE!!




Since the lunch basket was still on the counter, I took the chance to refill it with some recent lunch purchases. (This is the lunch basket that they are not allowed to snack out of, it is only for lunches. The kids have to have a sandwich or yogurt, fruit and then they can pick a "goodie" out of the lunch basket!)





I took the two healthy kids to school and said good-bye to Taz...







Good-bye to Cynjyn...







Then came home and went on my walk!









I spent the morning doing some laundry, painting my nails and putting some nail art stickers on them that I "borrowed" from Cynjyn (she got some for Christmas).







I had bought a few days before some ground beef that was on sale at Smith's, so I boiled that up and bagged it in one pound bags and stuck it in the freezer for future quick dinners.























I went to lunch bunch and even had my camera in my purse and forgot to take pictures. Lunch Bunch is a mid-week enrichment activity where once a month, our group meets at various restaurants around town for lunch and conversation. I love this mid-week activity and always go. We had a small group today: Janice Reese, Debra Degraw, Laverne Reid, Lea Berenyi and me, but it was at Claim Jumper and we had fun conversation! Then I took Taz to his orthodontist appointment, Cynjyn stayed here with Talon and Tanner. Garry took a group of youth to the local homeless shelter to feed the homeless (this is a service project our ward does twice a year). By now, I am completly forgetting to take pictures (sorry Carol), everyone fended for themselves for dinner since Talon and Tanner were sick, Garry was gone and Taz, Cynj and I weren't very hungry. So there you have it, you can wake up now that you've fallen asleep from my boring routine day!! Hope you had a nice nap:)










Closing a Chapter in Life

Last Saturday was our very last pinewood derby. Taz will turn 11 in August and will move into boy scouts. His car is #64, the gold one. These are the cars from the boys in our ward. We will never have to do another pinewood derby car!!Taz ended up taking third among our ward and so we had to return to the church that evening because he qualified for the stake run-off. He didn't place in the top 5 in that, but a boy from our ward took 1st place in the whole stake!! These are the cub scouts in our ward!





Friday, January 16, 2009

Pay it forward


Read closely...this is how it works...
{The Rules}
--Be one of the first THREE bloggers to leave a comment on this post, which then entitles you to a handmade item from me.
--Winners must post this challenge on your blog, meaning that you will Pay It Forward, creating a handmade gift for the first THREE bloggers who leave a comment on YOUR post about this giveaway!
--The gift that you send to your Three Friends can be from any price range and you have 365 days to make/ship your item. This means you should be willing to maintain your blog at least until you receive your gift and have shipped your gifts. And, remember: It’s the Spirit and the Thought That Count!
--When you receive your gift, please feel free to blog about it, sharing appropriate Linky Love!
If you are not one of the Top Three Commenters on this post, you can still play along. Please take the button and post it on your blog; start your own Pay It Forward chain, and encourage your blogging friends to do the same!
SO, REMEMBER... it is good... :) Pass it forward.

Friday, January 9, 2009

First savings of the new year.

Coupons were pretty scarce and deals weren't very good during the holidays. I was pretty discouraged with my couponing. But January's 1st Sunday paper came through big time. This week Albertsons had great deals. The above purchase came to $28.85. It would have been $66.78 without coupons. So to break it down, I got 32 items and that breaks down to $.90 per item. This gave me three $5.00 off coupons on my next visit, so I went and loaded this load in my car and went right back in to get the below items.

With the above, I purchased 13 items and it came to $9.40 (it should have been $43.77 w/o coupons and sales). That comes out to $.72 per item. This gave me three more $5.00 off coupons on my next visit, so I went and loaded this in my car and went right back in to get the following:

This total came to $9.72 (would have been $52.27 w/o coupons and sales). It was 13 items and that breaks down to: $.74 an item. This purchase gave me three more $5.00 off coupons on my next visit, but I had bought enough and was running low on good coupons, so I stopped there! Now I'm back in the mood for my Sunday paper and couponing!!

The final project

Tanner finished his project that we started on NYEve for geography. It was a shield representing his ancestry and current life. He put a dragon on because that is a symbol of China which is where his Grandfather on Garry's side is from. He put Big Ben on to represent his ancestors on my side. The bull represents his great grandfather and grandfather as cow farmers. The math symbols represent intelligence, and people who are good at math and teachers on both sides of his family. The music notes and volleyball represent his interests now in life. He had to put a "motto" on the shield, so he chose "Do it the Goon way!" which is something we always say to our kids. Which means do it creatively and with your best effort, don't take the easy way out!! We thought it turned out really good and he took it in a day early and his teacher showed it to the class as an example of an excellent shield. (She also had an example of a bad shield). The class had to "present" their shield in front of the class and explain it. Tanner said about 4 kids went then someone asked the teacher if Tanner could go and Tanner declined, so the class started chanting: "Tanner, Tanner!" So he finally relented and presented his shield!


Monday, January 5, 2009

BUMMER







I am so bummed right now. Last year, I found out about a website called Blurb.com. They let you load your blog onto their book creater and you can turn your blog into a book. I did this for 2007 and I loved it. A recorded completed memory of they year and our families adventures. So this year, I loaded the newest version of blurb onto my computer and tried to download my blog and found out that they no longer support blogger! Arg!!! Does anyone know a program that lets you load your blog and print it out?? Let me know please!