How I love being a mother! I can't even express how blessed I feel to share my life with these angels. Earlier this fall I had our pictures taken by my sister-in-law, Lynette Thueson. I was excited about how they turned out and I wanted to share some of my favorites. We are lucky enough to have two really talented photographers in the family. Carter's other sister Ginger Allen also does beautiful work. If you are interested, check out their photography blogs. You can find Lynette at http://sawtoothproductions.blogspot.com/ and Ginger's address is http://gaphotography.blogspot.com/ In fact, I think I'll put their links in my blog roll. Thanks so much Lynette!

First Snowball Fight of theYear!

I'm posting this for our Arizona family... I called down there yesterday just as the snow was starting to fall and all our cousins were out in the back yard eating ice cream! We came home from church today and I asked Jayden to change clothes and shovel the walk. Being that this is the first snow-fall, he was excited. In fact, all the kids piled on the snow clothes and went out to "help."
Then Carter came home from his meetings and joined them for a quick snowball fight.

Life Insurance is Current, Right?

Carter is a good sport, but he does not love putting up Christmas lights. Every year he accuses me of secretly scheming to make a claim on his life insurance policy by making him climb on the icy roof. Sorry, Honey, but you'd have to have a lot bigger policy for that to be tempting. Right now you're worth much more to us alive than dead. Besides, we like having you around, so be careful!













But I was starting to wonder about HIS motives when I discovered him taking the children out for walks on the roof! Do we have policies on the kids that I didn't know about?



Our roof drops off three stories in the back. Hey, let's walk up here kids!

Hug a Tree Day!

The Perfect Tree!!
I'll bet you never guessed we were tree-huggers! On the first Monday night in December we traditionally pick out our Christmas tree. When I was a kid in Nevada we went out and cut one every year. (And yes, Carter, there ARE pine trees in Nevada.) We couldn't imagine buying a boring tree from a tree lot. Times have changed some and I am now happy to buy our tree. My poor kids don't know what they are missing. But it still feels like a big deal and I ceremoniously make treats and hot cocoa for the occasion.



Daddy is in charge of lighting the tree. I oversee decorations. Next to Christmas morning, my favorite part of Christmas is when I carefully unwrap each ornament and hand them to the kids to put on the tree. There are so many stories and memories. I have ornaments made of shells from our time in the Caribbean and each of the kids have an ornament from their first Christmas. Then the kids go to bed and I rearrange the ornaments. hee hee.

It's a Marshmallow War in the Winter

Do you know that song "It's a marshmallow world in the winter?" Any-hoo...

For Jayden's birthday party this year Carter made a bunch of marshmallow guns with PVC pipe. The boys spent the evening playing a sticky version of capture the flag. They all had a blast. Here are the marshmallow warriors.



They all came in hungry for pizza and cake.




Happy Birthday Kiddo. I can't believe my baby is eleven years old!

Happy Thanksgiving!

We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Our family talked a lot and ate a lot, which makes it a perfect day in my book. We shared the day with Grandma and Grandpa Robinson, Great-Grandpa Mawson, Aunt Karla and Uncle Glenn, and their boys Jeremy and Brice. We hosted the affair at our house, which was a first for me. I learned a few things. For instance, next time I won't wait until Thanksgiving Day to discover that the 20 pound turkey won't fit into any pan that I own. I will also remember that it is better to trust the little pop-up meat thermometer than to take the turkey out of the oven because it looks done to me. (That will save having to secretly carve around the still-pink parts of the turkey). Ah, well. It was still a very fun day. Here are some shots of our group.


One special thing was that I got to use the beautiful dishes Grandma Mawson gave me before she passed away. There weren't enough for everyone so I had to alternate with other dishes, but the table still came out looking pretty. These are a few more pictures I liked of the guys playing some pool before dinner, the kids helping set the table, Makenna with the napkin rings she helped me make (aren't we fancy! :) and one happy pumpkin pie face.





And last, but not least, Jayden's birthday fell right on Thanksgiving Day this year. (He was actually born on Thanksgiving Day.) So he got to blow out his candles in a coconut cream pie and open some gifts after dinner. By the way, Jayden, you can thank your dad for that gift. You can be sure it wasn't my idea. He got a real cake at his birthday party later on.
Jayden, we love you!! Happy Birthday!!

No Rolling Your Eyes, Carter!

Okay, so I went to see Twilight on Saturday, and I haven't seen or talked to anyone since then, and I want to know what everyone thought.
Personally, I was a little nervous to watch it. Once you've seen a movie, those images are forever stuck and it changes the way the story looked in your head. I was afraid to hand over the reigns to a story that I really liked in my head. But anyway, I was very relieved, because I liked it. I thought it wasn't perfect, but better than I thought it might be. I wasn't sold on Robert Patterson as Edward, but by the end I was okay with him. And parts of the movie felt too rushed to me. What did you think? I guess you have to condense some things to fit it into a two hour movie. Overall, I approve, but I think I'd better see it again to be sure:)
Shout out to tell me what you thought.

A Pumpkin Poem - by Makenna

Halloween '08

What a fun Halloween!



Grandpa dressed up as a scarecrow to hand out candy. He looked great!
Our ward had a fun carnival with games and cotton candy. Thanks to our 24th ward buds for the invitation to trunk or treat.

Brennan's First Haircut (sniff, sniff)

Dad was throwing a fit about the adorable little curls around my baby's ears. I put it off as long as I could... As you can see, Brennan did not love the experience. I don't think he got a very good cut - I'm not too slick at offensive haircutting. Brennan put up some pretty good moves. But in the end, his adorable curls wound up in a plastic baggie, and my baby instantly transformed into a little boy. (sniff, sniff). It breaks my heart. No babies were injured in the filming of this.




I hope no beauticians are out there laughing at my "scissors in the mouth" technique. I know it's not professional, and it gets hair in my mouth, but it's the best I can do.

And he's all done. I really should have taken an after-shot so you could see what I mean about him looking so grown up. Maybe I'll take a picture in the morning and add it to this post as a P.S.

Mommy Preschool

I am happy to be in a preschool co-op with a bunch of fun moms. Kyler and Shaylie are both participating and having a ball. The last three weeks it was my turn to teach. It took a healthy chunk of time, but I had a good time, too. I took a few pictures of some of our activities when I remembered. Below, Brennan is waving the flag wildly during the Pledge of Allegiance.



P is for Pumpkins! We explored pumpkin innards and then cooked up the seeds.



F is for Fall and Friendship. We took a Fall walk-about collecting leaves for crafts and science stuff.

J is for Jack-O-Lantern, which came to our Halloween Party!







Ghost, Ghost, WITCH!

My favorite was reading the kids storybooks and watching their little faces so absorbed in the story. It was a good reminder how much fun it is to have little cuties at this age. I want to be better at playing with and enjoying them every day.
So, we cut and glued and colored, we sang and danced and played, we practiced writing and counting and sharing. We were busy!