Christmas coming, but until then...

HAPPY NEW YEAR!
A stinking cute picture to start off 2010.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the New Year. I love making new goals and starting fresh and resolving to have a fantastic year. I always feel hopeful and excited for things to come!!

And dangit, 2010 shall be amazing. I will make it so.

I will do a Christmas break post soon. No time, no time, never enough time. Until then...!

Gingerbread Houses

We had a great time making our little graham cracker gingerbread houses. Two nights in a row (after making the houses), Abram got into trouble for who-knows-what and was told he couldn't have dessert. Well, both nights we found him with little sneaky fingers - eating as many candies off the houses before he got caught :) He certainly DID end up with dessert, and a few angry siblings. But I am pretty sure he thought it was worth it!


Caleb who thinks he is too awesome for pictures.


Isabelle


Jonah, who took the longest and decorated his with great care


Elijah


Abram


Cute Clara

Dance!

We spent the entire month of October gearing up for some major dance events. First, we had "Art with Heart", a benefit concert for Shriner's Hospital that Dance Impressions does every year. It is an amazing show for a great cause.
Just a few days after that, there was a big competition and convention classes at the Salt Palace. Isabelle's team rocked it and won first place in every category. Their "Bugle Boy" dance really stole the show.


The winning team!! Way to go!!


Belle's other dance, which also won first in everything, "Big and Bad". This is a larger group dance.


Clara spent the day at the Salt Palace with us, which was fun. She was a delight and made everyone smile :)


She takes her sister down!


Clara absolutely loved the costumes and would go up and "feel" all of the girls skirts :)

I had to throw this picture in. Most of Belle's team went to "Thriller" this year together and really enjoyed the show. However, the girls were geniunely freaked out by these "zombies". A few of them (Isabelle included) were actually trembling by the time we got to our seats. It was really funny! And see that boy in her class, well, he screams like a girl :)

Silver Lakes

In early October, we went up to Brighton to do some hiking at the Silver Lakes Trail with our great friends, the William's! I was kind of expecting lovely fall leaves, but to my surprise we were greeted with snow. It was SO GORGEOUS. Several times I stopped just to take a deep breath because it smelled just like Christmas. I would really like to try the hike in the summer because we never made it to the lakes, which I hear are beautiful.

All the kids were great troopers, but on the way down, Eli had a FIT. He was freezing and wanted to be held and just could not be pleased. So we had the pleasure of listening to him cry the entire hour back down the mountain.

Also, at the trailhead, the path follows a very small lake. It is a wooden path, surrounded by swampland. Well, my poor Jonah tripped over himself and fell right smack into the mossy, muddy water. See the picture at the bottom :) Even his UNDERWEAR were full of mud. I'm sure it made for a comfortable ride home!

All in all, a great time. I LOVE being outdoors!!


All of the kiddos

Chris, Britt, Kristi, Jason

Clara, Chris, Brittany, Abram

Clara

Clara

Caleb and Zak

Abram and Hailey

Isabelle and Whitney

Poor soaked Jonah (hehehe)

Isabelle

Beautiful Isabelle...
For dance we have to do a photo shoot with Hazen Photography. They do hair and makeup (yes, makeup, even for the tiny girls) and make you look like a supermodel. It's fun for one day. However, these pictures are stinking EXPENSIVE! So, with great sadness, I only bought the team photo this year and just came home and took my own pictures. Not professional, but still beautiful!

Halloween!!! As always, Chris took the kiddos out to fill their buckets. And fill them they did! Half way through, though, Jonah came home because he had a plan: I could pass out candy while he played spooky music on the piano. That is my Jonah, no question! Caleb went with his friend, Eric and hit up most of the Bountiful mountainside. It was a great evening that ended with a Hallween show on TV and a fairly decent bedtime even!


Caleb had to have the dumbest costume out there, but he picked it. And wore it without embarrasment, so you can't really feel bad for him. Sure, he would have picked something else, but I refuse to buy costumes anymore, so Caleb had to resort to being clever.


A close-up of that big, cute bow on his head :)


Since we have no shortage of old dance costumes, Belle decided to be a doll. So cute!


Belle


This is like the fifth year in a row that this costume has been worn. Surely it should be retired, right? In fact, it is the second year in a row that JONAH has worn it. Next year we will encourage him to take Caleb's lead and use his imagination a bit. Although, maybe in a more masculine way than Caleb did.


Eli and Abram


Clara really was darling and happy, but for some reason she was very upset during pictures. I think maybe she had just woken up.

So sad to say goodbye to October!

Piano recital

I managed to get ONE photo of our 1950's-themed piano recital. What?? You can't tell my boys are straight from the 1950's? Hey, they've got collars on their shirts...what are you talking about?! Well, at least we found something sort-of fitting for that flashy female of mine.



It was a "duets" recital, which certainly added to the excitement.
Isabelle and Jonah were a pair and did wonderfully. Hooray for them.

Poor Caleb, on the other hand, got paired up with a kid that I'm pretty sure has never practiced piano a day in his life. I think it would be fair to call their performance a bit of a train wreck. Caleb knew his part perfectly, but you would never have known it because he had to wait and try to keep time with his partner. The teacher came up to me afterwards and apologized profusely and assured me that next year she would give him a fabulous partner. Really, it was fine since Caleb has such a laid back personality and found the whole situation a little funny.