It's Christmas already??

Oh boy, I really need a boost of Christmas Spirit. I used to really love Christmas, but it seems like every year I dread it more and more. What's wrong with me? My kids are the one of the only parts that makes it all worth it. We put up our tree the other day and it was so fun to watch Abby. She still doesn't get what is going on, but she LOVES the Christmas tree and all our decorations. As soon as she wakes up in the morning the first thing she wants to do is see the tree. Then she spends about 30 minutes rearranging ornaments on the lower branches. So cute! Abby and I went to the Festival of Trees a couple of days ago to watch my sister Amy sing. At first Abby loved all of the hundreds of "Christmas stars" as she calls them. But it got boring rather quickly for her (and I have to admit, for me too). So we ditched the festival and went out to lunch with "Amy Aunt" and cousins. That was the best part! Watching Amy's group perform was awesome too, though. They did a fabulous job and I really miss singing with them. But there is a time and season to all things, right? Someday I will be in another choir!

If I get a dose of Christmas spirit soon, I can tell you where it's going to come from! Every year my family does a Christmas project in place of exchanging gifts. We have done many wonderful things over the years including humanitarian kits, emergency kits, sub for santa and food bank donations. This year we decided to make quilts to donate and also purchase items on the wish list for the Christmas Box House. For those who don't know, the CBH is an organization ran by Salt Lake County that shelters children who are removed from their homes because of abuse, neglect or abandonment before they are placed in foster homes. Instead of having to spend several nights in less comfortable circumstances, they have immediate access to a full staff of trained individuals who can offer comfort and someone to talk to about this very difficult time in their lives. Some of these kids come to the house with absolutely nothing....sometimes not even shoes! So the CBH has a huge "wish list" of items that they need to help the kids just have the basic necessities of life, plus have things to do and learn while they are staying there. I am excited about doing this! I love this part of Christmas and I am so grateful for the lessons that my kids learn about gratitude, humility and charity from doing these special projects. Most of all I am grateful for my amazing family who are so inspiring and such a good example of unconditional love!

If anyone wants to learn more about the Christmas Box House and what they can do to help, here is their website: www.thechristmasboxhouse.org

So cool!

Nate came home from school yesterday with some great news! His photo of Abby won a trophy in the Reflections contest and his entry moves on to the next round. I am especially excited about this because Nate's self confidence could always use a good boost. It's hard to be the 2nd oldest I think. He is forever living in Alex's shadow, but I really try to make sure he knows how unique and amazing he is. I am so happy for Nate's accomplishment!! He is such an awesome kid!

Nate the photographer

This year at school, Nate's teacher required them to do a Reflections entry. He has really been into photography for a few years now, so he decided to give it a try. He took this picture all by himself! Well, ok, I was helping Abby smile, but that's it! I thought he did a great job. The theme was:

Beauty Is...

Isn't that sweet? :)

More camping adventures!

Camping is a lot of work. As I am spending the countless hours preparing for this annual tradition or as I listen to Shawn get frustrated at the kids (and sometimes me) as we are loading up our van and tent trailer to full capacity, I wonder: why do we do this to ourselves? Shouldn't we just go get a hotel somewhere and order room service? Why do we think this is fun? I ask these questions again as I am shivering in my sleeping bag, scratching my numerous mosquito bites or as I am holding my breath by the hole in the ground that is cleverly disguising itself as a bathroom. But year after year, we do it all over again. Here's why:

Abby LOVES camping! She loves the bugs, she loves the freedom of running around outside all day long, but she especially loves the dirt judging by the huge amount that she collected on her person throughout the trip.

The kids LOVE playing games! Here they are playing a new one, "Munchkin Booty". I think it was almost as entertaining to watch them play it.

Nate and Grant LOVE fire! Here they are hanging out by the fire, putting their fire sticks in it and scaring me just a little.

I LOVE seeing my husband happy! Being with his family in the beautiful mountains makes him happy.

We took Kaiser with us this trip and he LOVES squirrels! The squirrels, however, do not love him.

Kade and Seth LOVE going to the river. They throw rocks, they play with fish. Good times.

I LOVE seeing my kids get along and have fun together!

I LOVE this little girl! (p.s. I stole a few of these pictures from Briana. This is one of them. Soooo cute.)

Abby LOVES the river too! She cried every time we left.

I LOVE watching these crazy, talented, creative and awesome kids perform their annual skits and songs that they work together to make up for us. I don't think they realize just how amazing and unique they are.

But most of all, I LOVE my whole family and my family LOVES to camp. So every year I will plan, prepare, shiver, scratch, cook, clean and do anything I need to so my kids can have these awesome memories together!

The Great Outdoors

After weeks of preparing we finally got to go on our yearly Crockett family camping extravaganza! We headed up to the Tetons this year to Green River Lakes campground. The scenery was SO beautiful, this picture does not even do it justice. We had a good time, even though the bugs were insanely bad and camping is always a little bit hard with a toddler.

(in case you were wondering why Seth looks strange, it's because his aunt Erin painted his face with the face paints. He was going for a skeleton look. lol!)

Abby just loves to wander and I was pretty worried the whole time that we would lose her in the woods somewhere. But we tied a bell to her shoe so we could hear her wherever she went. It also had the added bonus of scaring away bears. :)

Shawn got to take some fly fishing lessons from the master, my Dad, and even had a couple of bites. But no fish were actually caught, much to my disappointment since I love fresh cooked trout in the mountains. ***sigh*** Oh well, maybe in a few weeks since we have another trip planned with the Shipleys.

Here's some more pictures of the beautiful scenery:

There is something about the mountains that just takes my breath away! I think it feels like a little piece of heaven (except I'm hoping that in heaven, there aren't any angry bears or pesky mosquitoes.)

Peek-a-boo!

Oh, Abby just cracks me up sometimes! Here she is playing a fun game with herself. She hides under the blanket, then walks around until she falls over or runs into me, then laughs hysterically. She is such a little nut!

The reason why she is not looking at me in these pictures is because she is too busy checking herself out in the full length mirrors that are her closet doors. She loves to watch herself and I frequently find her talking or singing to herself in the mirror. Should I be worried about that? :)

She definitely earns her nickname of "Princess Abby".

Late night jabbering

It's close to midnight and I really should be sleeping! But I can't sleep because I am a worrier. I worry about lots of things that I have no control over. Most of the time I can deal with it, but sometimes it interferes. So here I sit. I won't bore you with all the details of my worries, so instead I will talk about my weekend.

We went on a fabulous fun-filled trip to St. George with our friends this weekend! It seriously was the best time I have had in a while. I feel so blessed to have such great friends that are in my life. We saw a play, lounged at the pool, swam, shopped, ate great food, played cards, watched t.v., joked around and talked, talked, talked about nothing and everything. It seems like just a few years ago that we all met, were newlyweds with babies on the way and our whole lives ahead of us. Now fourteen years later we are raising teenagers, have thirteen kids between us all and can see middle age in the not too distant future. Where does the time go? The older I get the faster it seems to slip away. But with friends like these I think I can take whatever comes my way. Thanks guys for being so awesome and for making life fun!!

Insanity!!

That's my life in a nutshell.

Not only does that word describe the current state of my calendar, it could also be used to describe various other aspects my life. Like my house, my kids, my husband, my brain. I just need to ramble here for a bit and get it all out of my system....

First off, June is the busiest time of the whole year for us. Every year I expect that, but I am never quite prepared for how hard it slams me up against the wall. Seriously. It started off with a huge joint birthday party for me, my mommy, my sweet granny, my youngest boy and in memory of my deeply missed brother. It was a great way to start the month, except Abby took a hard fall on the floor and put her two front teeth through her lip. Bummer.

The next day was spent trying to juggle babysitters while Shawn and I worked as ushers at the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house. This was a fun assignment, but a little difficult to schedule with work and everything else. It's a beautiful temple and I am excited to be in that district. Shawn is signed up to work four more times, but that was the only time I will get to be there in that capacity.

Thursday came and since we had been eating cold cereal for dinner the past three nights I decided I better take a trip to Costco. I pushed my huge cart all around the store for an hour, so proud that I was getting something accomplished when......blahhhhh.....Abby throws up all over the floor, the cart, the diaper bag and oh ya...me. So much for grocery shopping. I grab Abby, hightail it out of the store sans groceries (telling one of the employees on my way out that there was a major cleanup on aisle 7) and spend the rest of the day cleaning up after her at home. Oh well, I guess we can have cereal one more night, right?

The next day was my birthday which I spent taking my parents to the airport for their 8 day Alaskan cruise, teaching piano lessons and working at the pharmacy. My sweet hubby and kids came to visit me though and brought me a piece of my birthday cake that they had made for me. Awwwww.

Saturday was then our 14th wedding anniversary. I went to work in the morning, but came home ever so excited because Shawn and I were going to get to spend a whole 24 hours together without the kids! Yay! We packed our bags for our little overnighter and dropped the kiddies at Uncle Craig's. We checked into the Little America tower suite, did a little shopping, eating, and well, you know how those things go. We fell asleep around midnight after I told Shawn "I'm not feeling so well....no....really....I'm not." An hour later I was barfing my guts out (thanks Abby) and continued to do so the rest of the night. The good news is that puking at the Little America isn't so bad because their toilets are VERY clean! About 5 a.m. Shawn decided we better check out and go home. That was a good idea, but my poor little tummy didn't like the elevator ride down 15 flights. You guessed it, I puked again, but luckily my hubby was thinking ahead and had a plastic bag waiting just for me. The next day was spent nursing me back to health amid much whining and complaining (by me, not Shawn) and a four hour power outage that night due to lightning.

Yesterday I was starting to feel better, but knew I had lots to catch up on. I tried to get things done but ended up taking a two hour nap with Abby because I was just so darn exhausted. I taught piano again that afternoon and when Shawn got home I went to my parent's house to take dinner to and "granny sit" my Grandma while my parents are gone. She is such a funny lady. It's awesome to spend some one on one time with her!

Today I had an appointment for my first ever "physical". My cholesterol is insanely high and I've known for a while that I need to get it checked out. The appointment wasn't so bad except I didn't have my insurance card with me because I forgot I had to wash everything in my wallet from when Abby puked in it. So my card was in a tidy little plastic bag sitting on my counter. They were going to make me reschedule, but I begged them to please call the insurance company for the information. Anyway, it all worked out.

Tonight I am going to Grandma's again, work tomorrow, Grandma's again on Thursday and then our good friends the Hymas' will be in town! Woo hoo! Somewhere in there I need to write the talk I'm supposed to give in sacrament meeting on Sunday and figure out a way to get Alex to his week long scout camp that he's missing because they scheduled it even though the 6th graders are still in school. I can't forget that it's Seth's birthday on Saturday which I haven't planned one eensy weensy bit of it and I also need to pick up my parent's from the airport that night and find a way to attend a pool party. Maybe I can figure out all of that tomorrow morning while I'm at the dentist's office with Abby because I just looked in her mouth this morning and I think she knocked her front tooth loose when she fell on her face a week ago! Hopefully Shawn will have enough time to fix the brakes tonight on the van, since they just started making this horrid, awful, grinding noise last night. This is especially important because we are supposed to drive it down to St. George next weekend for a fabulous getaway, which I need to plan and pack for plus figure out Father's day stuff and how am I going to work at night when Shawn leaves the next day for his week long "manager's retreat" at Lake Powell? And like the gullible person that I am I agreed to be the PTA Treasurer again this year and that means that the end of our year is June 30th! Can you say "reports up the wazoo and hours and hours of reconciling"? ***sigh***

Yes, my life feels like it's too much for me to handle sometimes, but really I wouldn't trade my life for anybody else's. (well, maybe I could think of a few people) I have to remember to count my blessings every day and be ever so grateful for my amazing family, friends and neighbors. They make all of this chaos worth it!

(Uh oh...I better hurry and post this since I left my power cord to my laptop at my Grandma's last night and my battery is going to die any second now...)

:)

How artistic!

I know I'm not the best photographer and I probably own the world's crappiest digital camera, but I took this cute picture the other day of Abby and I just wanted to share the cuteness. I learned how to do this neat little trick in Photoshop (I totally LOVE that program) and I think it's adorable.

Happy Easter!

Easter is my favorite holiday. I love everything about it and it doesn't stress me out like Christmas does. Plus, it's also the only day out of the year that I can get my family to pose for a picture in their nice clothes.

Happy birthday Nate the Great!

Well, he's ten years old now and I can hardly believe it! He has grown about 3 inches in one year and is turning into a little Shawn. He is even learning to ride a unicyle and got his very own from Grandpa.

We took Nate and the cousins to Classic Skating for his party. The kids all had a great time, of course, while the adults all went home with migraines. I must be getting old because, MAN that music was loud! :)

When we got home, we had his new bike sitting in the family room downstairs. I think he was pretty surprised since we acted like he had already opened all his presents at the skating rink. Out of all my kids, Nate is the most active. He is always outside and always asks for something sporty for his birthday. He is such an important part of our family and we LOVE him!!!

Good Times Together

February has been a fun month for us so far! Lots of changes and lots of family time together. My kids are doing great in school and even though they are on two different tracks this year, things have been working out well. Nate and Seth went back to school a couple of weeks ago after having three weeks off and now Alex is home for three weeks. He has been extremely helpful by watching Abby for me while I get stuff done. Plus it's been nice to have someone to talk to during the day. I can't believe he is going to be 13 years old this year! Ahhh! I have a teenager! He is such a great kid though and so much fun to be around.

In other news, Shawn and I have been talking about me getting a part time job in the evenings to help pay off some debt that we have had for way too long. My friend Tricia across the street from me told me that her work was hiring so I went and applied. They offered me the job last Friday and I started on Tuesday. I work at the University Pharmacy at the OTC counter two nights a week and half day on Saturday. I really like it so far. I haven't worked outside my home for about 9 years, so it's been kind of weird to get back into the "real" world. I have to admit though, I enjoy the time away and I think it will be good for Abby to be away from me for a little bit. She is soooo clingy and such a Mama's girl. The boys have been so supportive and have even remembered to "bless Mom at her new job" when we say family prayer. I love my family!!!

So here is a few pics from what we have been up to this month. Shawn and I got to go with our friends to a Jazz game a few weeks ago. We had awesome seats!

The team warming up before the game. That's Korver doing his little jump shot.

Milsap shooting a free throw. He made it, by the way! :)

Alex was so jealous that we go to go, but was kind enough to watch his brothers and sister while we were gone. He loves basketball! He played junior jazz again this year and had a blast. His team won 7 out of 11 games, but I think he would have loved it even if they lost every one. He just can't get enough basketball. Here he is with a few of his buddies.

Playing point guard.

Here he is shooting a free throw on a technical foul. Some kid from the other team got mad at Alex because he kept stealing the ball from him, so the kid grabbed his jersey and tried to shove him. They called a technical and Alex got to shoot two. I think he made both of them, but I can't remember for sure! They won the game too. Alex thought is was so cool that he got to shoot all alone down there at the other end of the court.

Abby loves watching these games. She looks so grown up here, huh? Nate and Seth were there too, but are never sitting down long enough to take a picture of them.

Our family loves to swim!!!! Well, I actually don't love it, but I put up with it because everyone else loves it. Here's all of us hanging out in the kiddie pool.

Abby thought this was so fun. I am so glad my kids aren't afraid of the water!

Although Seth could use a good dose of fear. That kid scares me. His favorite thing is jumping into the deep end and doggie paddling back to the edge. He's not supposed to do it unless Shawn is with him, but I caught him a few times heading over to the deep end without us. I'll be putting him in swimming lessons soon, just so I don't have a heart attack every time he's near the water.


Abby and Alex


Good times!!!

I'm officially addicted

I took a class last spring about digital scrapbooking and started to play around with it a bit. But it wasn't until Shawn bought me Photoshop for Christmas that I really started to realize what you can do. I am completely hooked! What's not to love about the craft that combines two of my favorite hobbies -- computers and scrapbooks! But the best part is...there's no mess! I am lovin' it. Here's a few of my latest pages:

Just playing around

I decided to try and make a custom header for my blog in photoshop, so here is the final product. Pretty cute, huh? I am rather proud of myself. I will probably change it again tomorrow. LOL!

Wishes

Abby is finally asleep and it's Mommy time! Yay! I guess it's been a few weeks since I've put anything on here, but with the crazy holiday season I am just now winding down. I also feel like I need to put pictures on here every time I post for some reason, so that keeps me from writing anything. So here is a picture-free post from me! Anyway, life is ok here. I hate this time of year. I have serious post-holiday traumatic stress syndrome! January and February are always bleak and cold, but I know when March comes around I will start to feel like myself again. I just need to keep busy and let people into my life so I won't start feeling sorry for myself. Thanks Dad for keeping an eye on me!

Lately I have been wishing that I had more friends here in Magna. It's totally my fault that I don't. I just don't make friends easily and I have a hard time putting myself out there, ya know? But I'm trying. I just wish for the good ol' days when my best friends all lived within a mile of me and I always had someone to talk to and hang out with. I wish I could be like my sister who makes dozens of friends everywhere she goes. But wishes don't come true unless you do something about it, right? So my goal this year is to make an effort to get to know people.

My other goal is to work on my family history more. For some unknown reason, I have been crowned the family history queen in my family. I did not seek this title, but here I sit with boxes of family history stuff on my shelves that are gathering dust and I have no idea where to start. I need to do something soon though because my sweet little Grandma, the former queen, is not going to be around forever. And she happens to be the one with all the answers to the questions I am sure to ask. So maybe I should get my butt off the computer, right? Ha! The things I would get done if I didn't have a computer. Ugh...I don't even want to think about that one.