Gingerbread men--enough said

West Jordan Elementary school choir

 They did the play "Principal Scrooge".  Our cute Principal played the part very well even though he is a happy rarely angry person.

 Our Ashley has been very shy.  She is trying hard to overcome this on her own.  She tried out for a group part for the first time.  She got the one she wanted and did an excellent job.

 Our wonderful third grade teachers played a really cute part in the show.  I love great teachers!!!!

I have no pictures of this but Allison spent the month doing "gigs" with the WJHS choir.  They were so great and fun and she had a blast spending most of the nights singing.  When the gigs were over they would go out caroling to raise money for the school's charity--The Shriners.

Christmas Eve

 First we made yummy sugar cookies for Santa

 We also ate a few.

 We went to Aunt Shelly and Uncle Mikes house for Christmas eve dinner and festivities.  Then we came home to do our Christmas Eve traditions: The Christmas story, Christmas Jammies and presents from kids to kids. Jarin got a reptar to go along with his Reptar jammies.

 This year Jason gave to Ashley, Ashley gave to Jason, Jarin gave  to Allison and Allison gave to Jarin.  When they give their present they say something nice about the person they bought for.  This year the compliments were more meaningful then in the past.  They finally went beyond "you are nice"!!!

After all the presents we settle down to watch a movie.  This year it was Santa Clause.

Christmas Day

 I told the kids they could wake us up at 6:59. Jason and Ashley were up at 6:40.  They were happy to waite for the "big" kids to wake up.

 Here they are in the traditional waiting at the top of the stairs . We had to stagger because the "little" kids are getting big enough that they hide the "big" kids.

 Jason and Ashley got I pod touches from Santa.  They were pretty excited.

Maggie played and played in the wrapping and with her christmas toys and then she fell asleep half standing up.

Happy sweet 16 Allison

 Here is Allison's sweet 16 birthday present.  A brand new baby kitty all for her very own. Its all she asked for and she has not stopped smiling since we took her to pet-smart and let her pick it out from a litter of seven very sweet kittens.  It was a hard choice but this kitty won Allison's heart.  Now she just needs to give it a name.  Ashley can't wait until she is 16!!

Allison is a sweet, happy ,fun loving teenager.  She loves to sing, dance and laugh.  She loves animals and her family.  We love you Allison--Happy Birthday.

Thanksgiving 2012

James had to work from 9-5 on Thanksgiving so it seemed we had a lot of time to do all the baking and get the turkey in so we could eat by 6:00.  Jarin and Allison baked pies on Wednesday, Karen baked a few on Thursday.  Jarin wanted to stuff the turkey like grandma Townsend used to do so we did that and had the turkey in with plenty of time to get done.  James came home at 5: 30 and said there was no way the turkey was even close to being done.  To make a very long and funny story not so long and funny(we all promised to remember the fun and not the arguements and orneryness) we finally sat down to eat Thanksgiving dinner at 8:00 p.m.  Good thing we were not planning to do the early pre-black Friday sales.

Here are a few things we did as we waited to eat our yummy dinner.  Which it was very yummy by the way and the turkey was the best turkey we have had for a very long time.

Allison and Ashley did a minnie round of 3rd grade arm wrestling.

A little bit of Ashley

Ashley was a hippie girl for halloween. She is the only one who really dressed up.  It was kind of a quiet, mellow halloween.  Its weird when your kids start to grow up.

Ashley turned 10 on Wednesday November 14th.  She is such a sweet girl and so fun to have around the house.

 

She wanted a slushy magic for her birthday so she can make her own slushies and milkshakes.  Jarin brought her home some BYU creamery cookies and cream milk so she could make a milkshake.  It was yummy and fun.

The girls and I have been watching "Cupcake Wars" on TLC. Ashley wanted to go to a cupcake place by dance that won "Cupcake Wars". She got a snickerdoodle cupcake and a vanilla one.

This is the Vanilla one. She thought it was beautiful.  The cupcakes were very yummy.

Carve-a-Rama at the Chuck-a-Rama

James decided to do a ppumpkin carving party at his work for all the employees and their families.  So we went too.  It was nice making a mess and not having to clean up

 I guess the end products are first in this blog.  Ashley's pumpkin is sticking out its tongue.

 Jason enjoyed the eating a little too much.

 James made homemade root beer.

 Jarin had to consult Allison on how best to carve his pumpkin

Jason had about 20 donuts.  Everyone brought a treat.  James took our chocolate fountain and had fun things to dip in it.  Our favorite was the bite sized scones.  YUM