Grandpa Crandall

Last week my Grandpa Crandall passed away. An event like that always brings memories and emotions to the surface. At the viewing and the funeral I had the chance to visit with family and cousins I grew up with and reminisce about being little. Like many of my cousins, one of my favorite memories of Grandpa is riding on the back of his motorcycle to the mine to find Fool's Gold. And riding horses. And watching Grandpa change the water. And the witch house at Keetley and the squeaky bed in the kitchen there. And the big rock in their front yard at home. And for some reason, my sister and I both talked about the smell of Grandma's pantry-so good:) Remembering Grandpa of course brought up memories of Grandma and talk about my dad, both of whom we all miss and I'm sure Grandpa was overjoyed to see, among so many others. I'm always telling my kids how blessed we are to be an Eternal Family. Times like this truly bring that blessing into perspective. To be together forever! Yay. I am so thankful for the sure knowledge of the gospel. And for my heritage. We love you and will miss you Grandpa.

Yo Ho Ho and a Bottle of...

On Sunday afternoon, I took out a bottle of sparkling cider that we forgot to open on New Years Eve. Now, being the super-crazy partiers that we are, the boys instantly recognized the bottle. Hayes: Hey, what's that? Is that a PIRATE drink? Dax! Mom has a PIRATE DRINK!!! Dax came running and was extremely worried when he saw the bottle. Dax: Mom, pirates drink wino. Why do you have wino? I calmly explained that it was just apple juice in a fancy bottle and it was ok for us to drink it. Dax: Oh, Ok. Well wait just a minute. He disapeared and returned wearing his Disneyland pirate hat. Dax: (very seriously) I thought if I was going to drink a pirate drink, I better wear my pirate hat. Well duh! Why didn't I think of that?! And not to be outdone, Asher had to have a hat to drink his as well, so he got the magician hat. Why not? Magicians can be winos too, i guess:)

Christmas 2008

The boys left Santa some green dinousar cookies and 9 carrots for the 9 reindeer. This year Dax wanted to be extra nice and leave Santa a note with the treats-I mean, it was Christmas Eve, after all, and going the extra mile couldn't hurt, right? He composed it entirely himself-which I'm sure that you figured out when you read "we lick you". We did not actually lick Santa, but we do LIKE him:)

Must Be Santa

Haysie's kindergarten had a little Christmas program. He was so excited for us to all come to his schoool and watch him. And he did such a good job! Doesn't this kind of thing always make you smile? I think I'll be a little sad when the boys are too big for construction paper Santa hats and class programs. Although, sometimes that day seems a very, very, very long time away:)

Nine Years!

Happy Anniversary, Honey. I love you forever.

A Little Backwards, Just Like Me

Ok Julie, I stole this picture from your blog, so thank you. No, this picture is not from Halloween, as the Clone Trooper costume may suggest, it is from Thanksgiving. As I was adding the post about cutting our Christmas tree, I realized that I had skipped right over Thanksgiving. Skipping over Thanksgiving and going straight to Christmas is something I don't approve of in general. Don't you hate it when stores start the Christmas season before we've even thought about Thanksgiving? So this is a lame attempt to make up for breaking my own rule.

We had Thanksgiving with Tyler's family on Friday. For the actual day of Thanksgiving, we met Angie and Colby for DINNER OUT. You wouldn't think DINNER OUT on Thanksgiving would be THAT big of a deal. Colby said he drove eight hours just thinking about some good Chinese, so the hunt was on. Let me just say that there are very few places open on Thanksgiving, and this includes Chinese buffets. So we decided to hit good old Chuck-A-Rama for our Thanksgiving dinner. (Plus, LeeAnn gave us coupons ) To our great surprise, Chuck-A-Rama is apparently an extremely popular spot for Thanksgiving. What???? When we arrived, the LINE TO EAT THANKSGIVING DINNER AT CHUCK-A-RAMA WAS OUT THE DOOR AND INTO THE PARKING LOT. Seriously. I repeat: What???? So we went to the Village Inn next door, where there was no line at all and had French Toast. The kids were thrilled.

The next day we celebrated with the rest of the family at Norm and LeeAnn's church, where we had a delicious, normal Thanksgiving dinner with no French Toast. The kids all put the stage to good use and preformed a talent show. What a blessed mother I am to have such talented kids. Hayes did some sort of very serious dance while Ren provided a beat box (is that right?) and Dax dressed up in his Clone Trooper costume and shot a nerf gun at Tyler. I mean the talent was astounding. Then Dax surprised us and sang a version of the Star wars march song in the microphone which can only be appreciated if actually seen and heard. I think I laughed until I cried.

We had such a great time, it makes me realize the thing for which I am the most thankful: My Family. How great it is to have people to love and who love you.

Oh Christmas Tree

Jaci, Callan, Camille, Broc, Emily, Addie, Dax, Grandpa Wiley, Hayes and Austin (Grandma Jo and the twins are sitting in the truck)

The Saturday after Thanksgiving Camille invited us on their annual trip to Fish Lake to cut Christmas trees. What this picture does not show is the hurricane-force wind whipping around, thus the many, many, many layers. The wind made it pretty dang cold, but it did not keep us from our goal. We came home with some beautiful trees and had a lot of fun in the process. And some extra credit goes to Callan, who because Tyler had to work, took really good care of me and the boys. I'm sure the back seat of his pretty truck has never seen so many goobery crumbs, not to mention a very nice jacket we managed to soak in chocolate milk. He, Broc and Austin did all the hard work while I, Camille, Jaci, and the kids mostly did a lot of pointing at possible perfect trees. So thanks for letting us tag along guys, we love you all and we love our tree:)