Thanksgiving Weekend Fun

 

 

Every year I say, "lets just go buy a fake tree." That way we don't have to drive up the mountain, get stuck, hassle with other drivers on the one way roads, walk around the mountain trying to find the perfect tree that has been growing beautifully for 35 years (no kidding) just to cut down and put in our house for a month then throw out!! But then mid November rolls around and all I can remember is the fun of it all, I long for the fresh cut tree smell and the chill of the mountain air. Then we get up there and I say, "why didn't we just go get a fake tree." :)

 

No, it is a fun tradition. Although I do feel bad cutting down a tree that has been growing for longer than I have been alive!

So here's our Christmas tree!

 

 

 

This one was a bugger.  It had a little bit of a crooked trunk so it tipped over TWICE. (eiyiyi!)

 

After our fun day on the mountain we made our way to the Rupert Square to enjoy some hot chocolate and cinnamon rolls and to watch Santa Clause turn on the lights and then watch the fireworks. This just might be the favorite Thanksgiving weekend tradition!! I love it, some years it is freezing cold but this year the temperatures were pretty mild!

 

Here's the kids watching the fireworks:

 

My mom is amazing! She made and put together gingerbread houses for the kids to decorate.  They had so much fun. 

Look at that mess, she's is so brave!

 

 

Here's our little gingerbread village!

 

We saw this idea in the Better Homes and Gardens magazine, so the big girls got to make a snow globe city! Cute!

 

Thanksgiving 2013

 We had a wonderful Thanksgiving Day with the Mickelsen family!!  Lots of good food and fun playing with cousins!

After dinner per tradition, the guys go out and shoot clay pigeons. Get out the ear plugs!

It was a beautiful day...LOOK at that sky!! Hudson just hung out on the 4-wheeler watching the action.

 

 

 Here's Nate throwing a clay pigeon for Braiden.  He hit some! I was impressed! I wouldn't be able to hit a stationary target, and a moving one, not in a long shot! (OOooohahaha! :D)

Here is my brother and my nephew. (father and son)   Last time we measured I was only taller than Ethan by about an inch, I'm sure he's passed me up by now! Freaky!!

 

I love this picture of my dad, my nephew and my brother. (father, son, father, son) I wonder who got the target??

 

While the guys are out shooting the girls stay in an do paper crafts...my fav!

 



July

 

I love our little town, we party for a week over the Fourth.  Here we are at the Christmas lighting breakfast.  (a fundraiser for the Christmas lights.) It is a fun tradition and the food is so yummy! We ran into the Wayments there.

Later that night is the fireworks show so it is a early morning and a late night on that day.

 

There are food booths all around the square and that is the best part!! The Mexican food is a must, the scones are a must, the kettle corn is a must and you have to have a hamburger at least once.  So you have to go daily because no one can eat all that food in one sitting. ;) Every night they have entertainment and it is fun just to go sit  and listen.  Nate is involved with the Kiwanis and they have a food booth so if we want to see him over the fourth we have to go to the square. :) darn.


Here is the parade crew:

  

Braiden and Brody were in the parade this year on the Rupert Sharks float.  They got to take squirt guns and spray all the parade viewers with water, they thought that was great!

 

After the parade we went and played on the river at Paul and Karla's for the rest of the day.  Heaven.

Ezra surfing with Joslyn

July 5-6 was a massive Catmull family reunion. Catmulls came from far and wide. 

Busy busy.

Easter and then some

 

It is tradition, every year on the Saturday before Easter we go up to Albion to the Easter Egg Hunt.  We love it because it is pretty low key, not a ton of other people and they stuff their eggs with good stuff, like Snickers, Twix, and Milky Way candy bars oh... and MONEY!! Each of my kids got between $1.50 and $2.00!! Hence the grocery bag, we're not fooling around with tiny Eater baskets here. ;)

 

The kids are divided up  into age groups 0-2, 3-4, 5-6, 7-8, 9-11, The only age group that parents can help is 0-2, so Joslyn had to do it on her own this year...WAAAA! Oh, and wait one minute where's the 12 yr olds? That means that this is Braiden's last year to hunt (legally) WAAAAAAA! I think he can do it one more year...if he wants to. I have one too old for the Easter Egg Hunt...man I am getting old!

 

Here we are checking out our loot, when the lady announced that the only bunny that was found was the 0-2 age group, so Hudson ran back out there to his section and guess what?!?! He found the bunny!!!

 

Here he is picking out his basket!!

 

 

The winners!

 

After all that excitement we went to Grandma's house to color Easter eggs:

 

 

And play with the stuff from Hudson's prize basket. It was such a fun day and the weather was so so so nice! We all ended up with rosy cheeks by the end of the day.

Easter Sunday after church we went to my mom's for dinner, Here's the kids in their Sunday best:

 Ready for the egg hunt:

Scott LOVES doing this every year!

 

Much to my dismay, this one wasn't very enthusiastic about it, guess I am going to have to add better incentives to the eggs, because "as long as you live under my roof you WILL hunt for Easter eggs..." (just kidding) When I was growing up we would hide and re-hide and re-hide those eggs, good times.

What a Cutie!!! She is showing off her Princess gardening tools and gloves!

Hudson has been begging for Nate to take off his training wheels and now....HE CAN RIDE!!!!
It only took him about 10 minutes figure it out!! WOW!! He has been riding that little balance bike for two years so he really had the hang of it he just had to learn how to pedal and balance! His brothers were both in 1st grade before they rode a two-wheeler and Hudson is only in preschool, I am impressed!!

Books: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly  If you know me I am ALWAYS reading a book I love reading, unfortunately there hasn't been too much good lately I've been striking out major! I read The Garden Plot By: Kristen McKendry, the story itself wasn't all that bad it was just the author that annoyed the crap out of me, I am so naughty, anyway she quoted a hymn every other page. UGH! If I want to read the hymns I will get out the hymn book, sorry!
Then bad got worse, I will just tell you that I am not a book quitter, I hardly ever quit reading a book especially one that I just paid $9.99 for in the Kindle Store. :/ grrr! Beautiful Ruins By: Jess Walter, it was the Costco book pick and I had read another good review on it so I decided to try it out, well the "s" word turned into the "f" word and it was a little filthy. If that wasn't enough it was SO random, I can handle a book that jumps from one time and place to another time and place but in between those times and places were these random chapters that left you wondering what it had to do with anything. So I quit about 1/4 of the way through :/   Take it from me, save your money, and time.  skip this one!!


I have been elbow deep in spring cleaning, here's part of the list:

 

I am just taking it day by day, if I don't have a ton of time that day I choose a smaller job if I have a lot of time I try to tackle the bigger jobs. I will just say, I hate cleaning blinds, it is by far my most dreaded household chore.  It is when blind cleaning time comes that I think of hiring a cleaning lady. :)

Bathroom light fixtures are today's job :) Nate is plugging away at his list too, look:

 

 

 

 

SO LONG 90% dead pine trees...

 

 

Hello 100% alive trees! SO much better!

 

We also have plans to build a garden shed for the mowers and all the lawn tools etc. I am so excited!!!

 

Sorry that was a LONG post! Thanks for sticking with me!

Will You Be My Valentine?

Here's my little Valentine, well one of them any way.

 

We had a fun Valentine's week, I got the kids little mailboxes and put little surprises in them all week long.  I think I had just as much fun leaving them as they did finding them each day!

The 5th grade classes had a Valentine box contest, Here's Braiden's box...

 

We got on pinterest to look for ideas and this is what he chose.  He had to make the box himself "with very little help from a parent." Which was hard for me! We had a great time working on this together, (you know, me gathering the proper supplies and talking him through it. ;) ) It turned out great!

 

The kids got Peter Pan for Valentine's Day they have loved it! Hudson especially, he begged me to get the costume box down because there is a Peter Pan costume in it.  Well, he has been wearing the Peter Pan hat everywhere we go now.  It's great to be 5!

Brody is SO funny, he is my "What If..." boy Oh the things he comes up with! Sometimes the entire dinner conversation consists of What ifs, and when he gets rolling it gets everyone else involved too, even me..."what if we all ate our dinner?" (yeah I'm a grouch like that.) Here's an example, I think from watching a little too much Peter Pan. Brody- "Mom what if we could fly to Disneyland?" or another popular one is "what if our house was made of__________________?" (insert any number of foods here)  (fruit loops was a recent one) You name it, he has what if'd it, money falling from the sky...yup! Food falling from the sky...yup. A Disneyland ride in our backyard...yup. He has an imagination, I'll give him that!

This is Joslyn on Sunday...(you might wonder why all the pics I take of her are in the piano room...Well whenever I say, "let's go take your picture" that's where she goes. And it has the best light. Anyway I spent more time on her hair than I did on mine, she was sooo good about it too!

Pretty Baby, she is still my baby, I think I'll call her that forever!

Speaking of Sunday...I watched the season finale of Downton Abbey Sunday night...all I can say is OH Season 3 you make my heart ache!!! Too bad it's over, it went sooo fast! Now we have to wait another 10.5 months for season 4 to start.  Never seen Downton Abbey? Well you have plenty of time to get caught up!! (I have seasons 1 & 2 on DVD if you need to borrow)  I think I'm going to watch season one of Call the Midwife (I've heard it's great!)before season 2 starts at the end of March, that should tide me over for awhile!

The boys have been playing basketball for the last month and a half, they love it and I really enjoy watching their games and Nate is wondering what the heck he got himself into coaching both of their teams!!! There is only a week left though, I never take pictures because the lighting in that gym is horrible!! But they are having fun, and when that is over we will get a little break until baseball starts!

I had a brief lapse in judgement when I sent in my registration for the Sawtooth Relay again...eyeyiyi! Natalie is on our team this year, we are so excited that she agreed to do the race with us!! Let's pray for better weather this year!!!

The Fourth

I absolutely love the Rupert Foruth of July festivities, they start on June 30 (our Anniversary) with a breakfast in the morning and fireworks that evening. Then you can usually find us at the square every night before the fourth enjoying all of the food booths and entertainment.  It is a busy busy week for us because Nate is involved in the Kiwanis club and is usually helping with their food booth in one way or another.

Here we are at the parade:

Two cuties eating snacks.

Brody, Joslyn, Hudson and Jake watching the parade.

Braiden was on the Pioneer Equipment float:

"Hi!"

Nate's brother Cob pulling a handcart for the Rupert West Stake. Kiley and Hailey dressed up as little pioneer children.

After the parade we went to my mom and dad's for a picnic.  I saw this cute jello on Our Best Bites and decided to try it out.  It turned out so cute and patriotic, a tad time consuming but cute still the same.

After mom and dad's Nate's aunt Louanne had a picnic at her house.  They planned all these fun carnival games and crafts for the kids.  They had a blast!

Ashley and Joslyn went from innocently playing with the ducks.

To getting all in, fully clothed, up to their necks.

Diving out.  Silly girls!

Grandpa Kurt doing the Mento's & Diet Coke fountain.

Cute little hula girl!

After that we ran home changed clothes and were off once again to watch fireworks! What a fun, fun day & week!