more stuff

Someone told me today at the gym she hates Christmas. Not the real meaning of it, but the commercialism. I don't love that part of it, but that is what makes this Christmas so great for me. We are not really involved in that part of it. I don't love the traffic that it brings about, either. It has helped business at the restaurant a little, though so that's good. I love Christmas music, and can't seem to get enough of it. My favorites are Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Carpenters (that's a given), and Jim Brickman. I crank it at work when I'm alone. Sad to turn it off when I open the store. Day 2: This week I am running 4 minutes at a time. I surprisingly found I can do it. I am finding that I really love running and the high that goes with it. Really looking forward to being able to run 30 minutes without stopping. So, Tasha, are you in? Anyone else? I think I need to find one in Utah that's sooner than the Zeitgeist here. Chad is also helping me with the weight workout. I quit doing that for a long time. I'm not sore from the running yesterday, just the weights. I am enjoying these 2 weeks of more time at the gym, and an hour later. I wish it could be like this always. Dang early morning seminary. :)

random thoughts

I have decided that I want to run a half marathon. If I blog about my training and progress, maybe I will be more accountable? So, tomorrow I start. Sounds familiar. Don't know when or where yet, just that it will be 2010 sometime. So, there it is, out there now. I am trying to convince Chad to join me. I don't think he's as excited about it as I am. I'm sure he will be. We are really enjoying the Christmas season this year. It has been a very tough year for us, especially the last month, but we have seen such miracles, small and big happen that it leaves us no doubt that the Lord is aware of us. So, strangely, I am so grateful for our trials we are having so I can feel the peace and love that we can only feel from God. My kids are so excited to be out of school. I'm not so sure. I love them being home, but it has been EXTREMELY loud since Fri night. I keep thinking there are earthquakes...no, just a bunch of boys. Maybe it's good I work for a couple hours each day, give us all a little break. Merry/Peaceful Christmas Everyone!

I'm back, for today anyway

This is the place making arrowhead necklaces in a hogan. Ry now wants and expects a pony.

This is the Place Burnett cabin. MMM cap'n crunch. (we were supposed to find 10 things that were not supposed to be there.)

Hogle (Hobo) Zoo Trolley ride.

Church history museum she's so sweet.....and Jacob???/

Thanksgiving point Chuck-A-Rama

We wore 'em all out! YEAH That's his knee he's sleeping on. Comfy? Yes, I was there, too.

We had a fun weekend, so I thought I'd tell anyone that checks this about it. We left Thursday night and stayed at Nicki's. We got there pretty late so we just went to bed. When we woke up we headed to This is the Place monument park. This was the favorite part of our trip. If you haven't been, it's well worth your time and money. It was fun to take a step back in time. We found that we could send Jacob and Reid out to be apprentices and they would feed them, but they wouldn't take Tanner and Blake. Apparently after they are 14 they are too mouthy and eat too much. We rode on trains, Rylee rode a horse, and we saw a cabin of one of Chad's ancestors. Apparently they liked Cap'n Crunch in the 1800's. After that we ran across the street to the "Hobo Zoo" (Rylee's words-so it stuck). We didn't stay there long, maybe an hour, we've been there many times and just went for Rylee mostly. Oh, and so Jacob could see the Peccary's (a creepy piggy looking thing.) We rode the trolley down to the Planetarium and got tickets for the I-max Bugs show. Then rode the trolley back to the Lion House for dinner. That was pretty good, but boy do they give a lot of meat. There was a lot of wasted meat from my family. After that we rode the trolley back to the planetarium and watched a 3-D bug movie. Kinda creepy, kinda cool. Jacob was pretty upset when the preying mantis ate the butterfly. Sorry if that ruined the movie for anyone. :) Then we hopped the trolley back and went to the Church History Museum. Rylee found the kids room and could have stayed there for a long time, but we were tired and wanted to go. It was neat to go there, though. We seem to go there a lot, it is always the same, but we love it. Then we headed to Spanish Fork to stay with DeeAnna. We slept in Sat. then went to Thanksgiving Point. They have a little childrens garden that the younger kids played at. There was a Noah's Ark and a maze. Mostly for little kids. We went to Chuck-A-rama for lunch. A highlight of the day for the boys. A little sad, because the boys can't have soda or junk food so they bypassed the dessert and soda. I was proud. Our last stop was the Aquarium. It was OK. not the highlight, but ok. The kids got to pet a manta ray, they said it felt weird. We wore everyone out......

FYI If any of you want to explore SLC we found this great deal online. for $20 each we did all this stuff. There was lots more to choose from but that is what we picked from our list. Great weekend! Thanks Nicki, DeeAnna and Melissa for everything! And just maybe I'll blog sooner than later?

Copy

I read Chad's e-mail to his sister and thought it was lots of good info, so I copied it for you..... We are surviving. It was hard for the kids to adjust to getting up for school again. We had some tired kids. But we are back into the swing of things. We had the pinewood derby on Thursday night. Reid got second place overall, he was really excited. Mom , Dad, and Melissa came. Tanner had winter ball last night. There were 5 couples in his group. They did all kinds of activities during the day. They ended it by coming to our house to watch a movie and have ice cream pie. They watched Kung Fu Panda. They only spent about 30 minutes at the dance. But it was too loud, so they went over to the Stake dance. He said he had a good time. He spoke in sacrament meeting today. By the time he took his date home it was 1:00. Then he worked on his talk until 2:00 (even though his Dad told him to work on it Saturday morning). So he went to bed at 2:00 and woke up at 5:00 to do his paper route. We thought he was going to fall asleep on the stand today. It was an adjustment today to go from 3:00 to 8:00 church today. We still made it there by 7:40. Jacob started basketball this week. He has 5 of his friends on the team, so he is really excited. Usually in soccer he ends up on another team than his friends. The other night was my turn to pick up him and 3 of his friends after practice. I went to pick them up and they were not there. His coach said another dad had picked them up. So I called Tarilynn and told her that someone else had picked them up, I was kind of mad. Then I went to lock up the store. Tarilynn called me about a ½ hour later and said Jacob was not home yet. While she was talking to me Jacob called her on another phone and said they were at the school and needed picked up. They had gone to another side of the school and had gotten locked out. They had been outside for over 30 minutes. Finally they had gotten in the building and found someone with a phone. I felt bad that I had left them.

Tired!

So, it's after 11:00. I'm tired. BUT, I can't go to sleep yet because there are 10 teenagers in my basement watching a movie. I guess that means I'm chaperoning. I paid all the bills, I guess this is the next on my list. It's Winter Ball tonight for Tanner. I'm sure he's having a great time. I can't ask yet. He claims he got pictures so I can't wait to post them. Blake went to work at the restaurant tonight with Chad. We put the restaurant on Craig's List a couple weeks ago, and are going to list it with a realtor on Monday. We'll see what happens there. Jacob wanted to stay up really bad to torment Tanner and his friends, but we wouldn't let him. Reid thought it would be fun too. Jacob and Reid spent hours cleaning their room today, THEY FOUND CARPET! Shocking! The boys have all been saving their money for months and saved enough for a Wii. We got one last week and the younger ones have been spending all their free time on it. I was able to beat Blake in Boxing, but then he beat me. Jacob has been bugging me all day to play him, so I did, and he knocked me out in about a minute. Sad, really. Rylee really likes it too. We start our 8:00 am church tomorrow. What a switch....we went from 3pm to 8 am. Yuck...I think I will like it better, though. Well, I don't know what to say but, good night.