NINE

Here are some pictures from Noah's birthday. Time goes by too fast, I can't believe that he is already nine. For FHE last night, we celebrated Noah and watched our home movie from his birth. The kids loved it. It was fun to see him as a little baby and to remember what it was like to be a mom for the first time.

Normally we open presents first thing in the morning. Not anymore, since Matt leaves for work at 5:30. It gave Zack and I plenty of time to decorate. He picked the balloons and wrote Noah's name on the sign.

I am sort of crepe paper challenged. I can never get it to twist right. It can't be that hard, but I guess my talents are elsewhere. At least Zack doesn't have my deficiency. He took charge of the "ribbon" and made our house very festive for Noah.

I think I kid ought to be surprised by his gifts. Noah disagrees. He tries to get his brothers to tell him and snoops around. Ben spilled the beans on one gift and so I told him he wasn't going to get it. I faked him out and wrapped it with a bunch of left over Halloween candy (yum!). Another present I wrapped inside a box for a game he already has two of.
Inside was a replacement DS for the one he lost. (Which means that it is time for the black DS to reappear since we gave in and bought another. )
Noah doesn't like cake so we went for birthday cookies. This is the picture I got after I told him to relax his face.

The Gun Show

Ben has been doing one or two push ups every so often and it has really paid off. Check out these muscles. An interesting thing is that these aren't actually his muscles they are Noah's old ones.
Yesterday I found Zack in his room singing and drawing. This magna doodle masterpiece was inspired by the song Bohemian Rhapsody. The tall person is the mom and the little boy is beside her. The little boy didn't mean to make his mom cry and when he says if I am not back again this time tomorrow it means he died. Carry on, carry on.. nothing really matters.

Oh, Glorious Warm!!

I don't know if I have mentioned it before, but we've had a lot of snow and cold weather. It was high time to get away so we busted out of the snow and went south to St. George for the long weekend. It was perfect! David & Emily's family spent the day with us on Saturday. We took the kids swimming (no, it wasn't warm enough to swim outside) saw a movie and just had a great time together. Haeli & Madison were in St. George for a soccer tournament. We hooked up with Haeli on Sunday and went out to Snow Canyon for a picnic & hike. We also got some quality Wii play in.

This is Zack with the picnic centerpiece.


Papa playing Frisbee with Zack. Anyone surprised that Papa found the Frisbee?Zack (the hiker) and Matt on the trail to Johnson's Arch.
Poor Noah, he inherited a fear of heights from both Matt & me. Add that with the worry gene he also got from me and you have one paranoid kid. He was making sure that we kept Zack away from the edge and was on the watch for any giant boulders that might fall.

Originally, Noah was not going to participate in the foolishness of pretending to push this rock down. No, that would be a little too risky. I think once he realized that they were no match for this giant rock he decided to play along. Way to be brave.

Another shot from along the way. I love how blue the sky looks against the red rocks.
I showed Zack how his shoes made a print in the sand. Speaking of paranoid, Zack had to stop every few steps and put a design over his footprint so that people couldn't follow us. What is wrong with my kids?

And here it is: Johnson's Arch. This was a fun little hike especially because it isn't open year round. Every time I told Zack it was an arch he would say "or a castle." When we were walking back he was wondering what we would see if we went further into the canyon. He thinks there is diamonds, jewels and those pointy things for boys heads. I love that he thinks it is a possibility, and that he had no desire to find out for sure.
Haeli had a new friend for the walk back.
On Monday Matt, Mike & the kids played at the sand dunes, caught a little of Haeli's soccer game & shopped at the dollar store while Di & I hit the outlets. This is Ben working on a Pokemon stadium.
I think this hole was already there. Thank you anonymous hole digger.


We had a pre-birthday celebration for Noah before we left. He picked Wingers and was rewarded with an asphalt pie. Check out Dianne's plate. I've never seen anyone eat so much food: a cheeseburger, chicken fingers, fries & a 7 layer wrap. She must have been hungry. Now look at Mike's plate. Ok, the truth is, somehow Di's plate ended up as the catch all. She only at 1/2 a wrap. This is Noah pretending he is happy to get a shirt for a present.
This is Noah with his real gift and real happiness. Ben was even happier.

We were sad to go. When we left St. George the temperature was 62 degrees. We pulled into Harvest Hills and 26 degrees. Ouch.

Valentine's Day

Zack has been looking forward to baking a cookie in our heart shaped pan since he discovered it in January. He wasn't disappointed, we had plenty of frosting, even pink, and lots of sugary toppings. He did several finishing touches, then Ben came along and added another inch of frosting and more candy. Noah added the last layer of junk. They were very proud of their creation. But no one wanted to eat it. I threw it away this morning. Maybe there is hope for my kids.

I didn't do a lot for Valentine's Day. The storm the night before sort of messed everything up. We did have what Zack called a "dinner party" because we had balloons and we were eating dinner. I'll take it, now I don't feel like a slacker.

Snowed In

More snow? It seems to be all I have to talk about. Yesterday's storm was pretty wild and worth mentioning considering that students spent the night stranded in several elementary schools (including ours), school buses with students ended up stuck in snow drifts for hours & all roads leading to Saratoga Springs were closed. Yes, it was a doozie.

I was on my way home from American Fork when Matt called to inform me that the storm was hitting hard. Where I was it wasn't even snowing. Ten minutes later and this is what the driving was like. I was just ahead of a bunch of wrecks and slide offs. I hear there were many. I wonder if it was because people are awesome like me and take pictures while they drive.

When I got home the wind was blowing snow everywhere. All of our windows were completely covered with snow. This was at about 6:00.
This is our flashlight container. Plenty of flashlights. No batteries. Darn. Good thing our 72-hour kits had working flashlights. We also had a light saber at full power. Unfortunately we only had one working weapon and three potential jedis. Draw your own conclusions on how that went.


We ate cold pizza (it makes me sick to think about it) by flashlight. I taught the kids how to run a flashlight strobe light which entertained us for a little while. We read stories and Matt set up an ipod movie before the kids went to bed.
Picture using the flash....
This is a little darker than it really was, but not by much:
The power didn't go back on until about midnight. I thought I turned the boy's bedroom lights off. Turns out the switch should be up not down. Or was it down not up? At least it only woke me. The temperature inside was down to 62 degrees. Not too bad. Now I am not a scientist or anything, but I think that Matt's repeated opening of the sliding door so that he could see outside may have cooled things down more than it would have been. I was getting cold though so I am glad the power came back when it did.

My attempt to video the goings on from our living room window with a commentary from Zack. You may be able to hear the wind whistling or the banging of something loud outside. Zack is talking about how our lights were flickering. This is before the power went out for good.




Today, the kids didn't get a full snow day, but school was delayed until 11:00. The road out to Eagle Mountain was closed all night & most of the morning. It took Matt 2 hours to drive to work because the roads were such a mess. The real kicker of this storm is that they didn't warn us. Usually they talk up big storms; the meteorologists are probably upset that they missed the opportunity. I thought we were going to get a little snow. St. George is looking really good right now!

Snow Snow Snow Snow Snow!

You may recall my September lamentations about the predictions for this winter. Winter did get off to a slow start here but once it started it really hasn't stopped. We have had big snow storms nearly every weekend. Sometimes we are even lucky enough to get a big mid-week storm too.

Maybe it's because I have been mentally preparing myself, that I have lots of good books to read or that I have new boots. I don't know, but for some reason I am not that bothered by the snow. I think it helps that the many snow storms have kept things nice and white so we have yet to get to that dreaded period of dirty snow. I do hate that my kids come home from school snowy & soaking wet every day. I am not sure what it is that drives them to walk through big piles of snow but it is a force that cannot be denied. I could do without the cold, it has been freezing--like shatter your garbage can cold (it happened). This weekend is forecast to warm up into the 40s. Noah will be begging to wear shorts.

Last Monday we had a serious snow storm. It was pretty nice weather in the morning until about 12:00 when it unleashed winds and snow like I haven't seen in a long time. I've been in a few snow storms in my day and this was right up there in the crazy category. The visibility was almost nothing so it was hard to drive in. I was up at the elementary school (shocking I know) and they couldn't get the buses in to take the kids home. After about an hour, it finally settled down enough that it was safe to go. That might be as close to getting a snow day as my kids will get. Too bad they were stuck at school. Noah & Ben wish they lived in Idaho so he could miss as much school as Ashtyn has.

This picture is of the house across the street after that big storm. The wind blew snow all over on the houses which completely fascinated Matt.

Here are some pictures from Sunday morning. It snowed nearly all day long. Matt went out and shoveled the driveway and sidewalk and, to his credit, he didn't pass out from fatigue and hunger (it was fast Sunday) or use it as an excuse to eat something even though we don't get out of church until 4:00.

The day before our driveway was completely clear. Matt had his work cut out for him.

The sidewalk was also clear on Saturday. You can't even tell where it is. These pictures are from Monday once the storm was finally over. That tree is 15 feet high. Not really, but the snow is deep. Maybe someday I will take a measurement.


I blazed this path yesterday. Matt doesn't do the main sidewalk, I guess that is my job? I didn't want my kids covered in snow when they got home. Ha, guess who got the last laugh on that one?
When I was little, Dad would pile up all the snow on the West side of the yard. In a good year that pile would be huge. We could sled down it or use it for forts. This is our version of it. If we had more property and a tractor with a loader, ours would probably be as big, but winter isn't over yet.

If that basketball career doesn't work out for you...

We are right in the middle of basketball season. Noah is playing for the Fire Hawks (they choose their own name) and after a rough start we are now 1 win, 2 losses and a tie. That is official, they are keeping score this year. Not that Noah didn't keep score last year. I am not sure what has changed for the team, they seem to have the same amount of talent, but somehow they aren't putting up the big numbers like last season's average 20 point win.

Of course Noah loves it and I love hearing him re-tell his heroic basketball feats. I am inept to describe the goings on the court, I think Noah has developed a bit of the Francis flare for storytelling. Ask Nana, she heard a play by play yesterday that would make Hot-Rod proud: there was the behind the back dribble and the wild circus shot that miraculously went in. They did happen, but boy does it sound better than it looked. Maybe I'll skip the games and just wait for Noah to tell me about them. I am sure I will be more entertained.

This is one of Noah's better moves from a game two weeks ago. I curse myself for missing his shot yesterday because it did go all over the place before it actually went in the basket. I do have a bunch of bad passes on film. Let me know if you want to see them.