Future Blog Makeover

So I get to go home on Wednesday. After I have hugged my family set up the two remaining Christmas trees, grown two love handles (one for fudge the other for caramel) I am going to give my blog a real makeover. My own personal header and everything. I am so excited. My mom is really good at it and can teach me to use her program. I admit that it is rather pathetic that my mother has to teach me a computer skill when computers are so post to be my generation. On the bright side having my mom teach me things makes me feel like a kid again.
Lucky Amber gets home on Tuesday. I am so jealous. That is ok though because then I don't have to compete for arrival competition. Hopefully I will have lots of pictures to show you soon of all the fun projects we are planing on doing. Of course there will be lots of pictures of my family. All 13 of us.

Pictures

Did you think I forgot to take pictures of people while out in the snow? Nope. Here they are.

This is Serena

She is new to the high school scene and is handling it great. I am very impressed with her self confidence. She doesn't seem to care what others think. If she likes it she likes it, even if some people would see them as childish or immature. Not that they are but that high school nerves would seem to make them though. Not Serena though. Her out going, fun loving, general happy personality and dedication to her goals conquerors all.

This is Jeremy.

No he is not part Chinese. He just has the eye squinting smile like some of us in my family. Jeramey loves to help in the kitchen when it comes to cooking and, like most boys, just wants to have fun. He also seems to want to be older then he is sometimes. I have tried to explain to him that being a kid is fun and he should enjoy not having the responsibility of various things. It didn't work. Oh well.

Here is Autum.

While in many ways she is a girlie girl she has the energy to keep up with her two brothers that are close in age. She also loves one on one attention, the cat and fisher price dolls. Apart from that she has a set of lungs made for singing. At the ward party Santa came. Darcy, the lady who cut my hair, told her to go tell Santa what she wants. Autum said she didn't know what she wanted. I think in many ways Autum has the ability to be content with what she has as long as there are people to be around and interact with.

The youngest is Wes.

Don't let his size fool you. He is small but is more then capable of holding his own in a squabble.

He also has a tender heart and can be quite the gentleman. Lately he has taken to pushing my chair in for me. He will sometimes even hop up out of his chair so he can. Wes is very creative in a silly way. Sometimes he will tell joking stories about why such and such happened to so and so or they could do this next time that happens. Another thing I find so cute is that he wants nothing more then to be like Jake and Ross. I think that says many good things about the kind of big brothers they are. One of the ways Wes is trying to accomplish this is by eating allot. He is succeeding very well.

Then there are Garn and Aj. Sorry, I didn't get a picture of them. They are wonderful though. They both give excellent advice that is based on spiritual understanding and their life experiences. They have taught me so much and I am very grateful for it.

A Walk in the Snow

Today I was woken up to someone telling me it had snowed. A minuets later someone came and told me breakfast was ready. I must admit that if you have to wake up that those are some great things to wake up to. A special treat to breakfast was hot chocolate. Thank you snow for giving me an excuse. The snow also canceled church. I guess people are a little scared of snow here or maybe it is way worse in other places. Oh well. To substitutes church we watched music and the spoken word along with other programs from the BYU channel via the Internet. The music was especially wonderful because it is Christmas music. I love Christmas music. After lunch we went on a walk. Here are some pictures for you.

A little lesson from a little branch. This branch is very thin yet supports allot of snow. I think people are like this. We are very little, yet we can support allot of things.

It's a Wonderful Life

For years I would never watch It's a wonderful life because all I could remember about it from my childhood was the sad part from when he jumps off the bridge and then no one knows who he is to when he gets back to the bridge. I don't think I ever really got to see the end where things go back to being happy. So today, after Uncle Garn reassured me that it was not sad, I watched it. Very very good movie. I did ALMOST cry though. I wold also like to add that James Stewart is a great person from what I can tell. Someone went to do a Biography of him and they couldn't find any scandal that he had been involved in. That is awesome, especially when you work in Hollywood.

Ward Christmas Party

This morning was the ward Christmas party. Part of the activity involved making gingerbread houses. Here is mine and Autum's. Do you like our deck?

Here is Wes's. He is very proud of his garage.Jeramey had a house but he had a tornado come through and destroy it. It was actually rather nice. Not your normal gingerbread house though. He had done something different with the roof.

Christmas Card Garland

Aj was telling me how she will sometimes hang the Christmas cards she gets. She already had some red yarn so I decided to dress it up a little. This is what I came up with. It only cost about $5. Don't you just love the dollar store. Now all I have to do is hang up the cards on the red string.

It doesn't show up on the picture very well but there is glitter glue on the pine cones.

Christmas Garland

Happy Holidays

Lately some of the blogs I follow have been very into garlands. I was going to add pine cones and might later, but I am so post to help decorate the other thing in the house too.

Christmas Cake

My final in LCOP was a potluck. In order to pass we had tor bring something so I brought a cake. Due to the season I decorated it with some holly. Sadly the frosting turned out pink. Apparently the kind of die in my kit dose not make red. Oh well, now I know. On the plus side I can make neon pink which is funner anyways.

Christmas Movie

Every year at Christmas, and sometimes when its not, my family watches Miracle on 34th street. Lucky for me my family here has the movie too. I am watching it as I type.

Another movie my family likes to watch at Christmas is Christmas in Connecticut. What holiday movies dose your family love?

Pepernuts

A Christmas tradition from my Mom's family is the making of pepernuts. We made them a few days ago. Sometimes it is a long process but when you have 3 other pairs of hands to help out it it makes things go fast. We had all the cutting done in about an hour.

Cut,

Place,

Cook,

Eat.

St. Nicoals Day

This morning my Uncle Garn woke me up saying that the kids wanted to wake up now and see what St. Nicolas left. Huh?.......Oh yah, we left our shoes out last night so he could fill them with candy and presents. For those of you who don't know St. Nicolas day is a German tradition like our Christmas, just on a smaller size. Because Garn and Aj lived in Germany they celebrate it too.

Thank you St. Nickolas.

Here are some pictures.

Waiting for everyone to get up is Autum and Wes.

Here are my shoes, and they've never looked better.

Hidden behind all my candy was this book.

St. Nicolas must have been inspired because when I opened it the first few instructions were things I need to remember. One thing I really like about this book is that below the instructions is a scripture to go with it. I love having the scriptures right there to back guidance and instruction up. I think Santa would be well liked by any young adult or teenager for leaving this in there Stocking. I know St. Nicolas is.

Thanksgiving Activies

My Thanksgiving Started off fixing the pumpkin pie mistake I had made the day before. Thankfully, after a call to my Grandpa N, I was able to fix it. I was told by many a person that it tasted great. That made my day.

After that we went on over to the zoo. They were having free admission for everyone in thanks for the tax money that is going to be given them by popular vote. It was nice of them to say thanks.

In case you didn't know, elephants are my favorite non-Australian land animal.

They also have a little museum in the zoo dedicated to elephants. It was full of statues am a baby elephant bike. The bike is much bigger then it looks

This is Wes. He stopped to smile or me.
I just love these turtles
This hippo turned around just so I could take it's picture. Apart from that the view was non to pretty.After that we went home and prepared the last touches for dinner. Then some friends came over. It was cool because we had ran into all of the people that were coming to our house at the zoo.

Thanksgiving

Every Thanksgiving my family watches A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. I got to watch it last night. It made me happy.

Traditions are wonderfull things and I am thankful for them. Here are some other things I ama thenkful for

Amigos: They make me feel special.

Books: They allow me to have adventures without risking anything.

Cooks: They make some of my favorite things.

Dogs: They chase cats and can tell when you are having a hard day.

Education: It empowers your mind.

Family: Sorry there are to many reasons to list.

Games: They keep me entertained.

Heavenly Father: He loves me and let his son die so I could live with him again.

Instruments: When played well together creates music that arouses the soul.

Jesus Christ: He died for me and in doing so gave me so much.

Kids: Their innocence and simple happiness brings joy and life to everything.

Laughter: It chases tears away.

Money: It allows me to do the things I need/want.

Notes: A simple thing that can make a persons day.

Opinions: People have such interesting ideas sometimes.
Prophets: They tell me what I need to hear.

Quotes: They make you think, laugh and/or smile.

Religion: People who actively practice a religion are know to be happier and have more hope.

Scrapbooking: It allows my creativity to flow.

Telephones: They let me call home.

Utah: It is where the saints found refuge and I always feel extra good there.

Voting: It lets me voice my opinion even when it is not popular

Work: When accomplished it makes a person feel good about themselves

X I'm substituting it with the letter H: Holy Ghost: It is the comforter and tells me things I need to know

You: I'm sure you've done something nice for someone which makes me happy.
Zoos: I have lots of fun memories at them.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Classes

Well, I finely registered for my classes. It took me a while to figure it all out but I was finely was able to make a schedule that allows me time to work. With this I am finely getting to learn something that I have wanted to FOREVER!!!!!!!

I get to take swing dancing lessons.


Yea!!!!! I am trying to get a guy friend to take the class too so I know there will be a male there that is taller then me. Hopefully it will work out.

Brown Sugar

Somethings are handed down from generation to generation. One of those things is eating plain brown sugar. This quirk I inherited from my mother who inherited it from her mother who it seems to have inherited it from hers.
When Grandma was a girl her mom would use it as a reward. This makes me think that Great Grandma must have liked it or else she wouldn't have used it as a reward.
I love that I do things that my mother, grandmother and great grandmother have done. Even though it might seem strange to some people (Becca, Serena and Jake) I still like it.

Fall Cake

I decorated a cake today and I even took pictures for you.

Isn't i so seasonal. I had wanted the darker orang to turn out more red but lost patients when I was mixing my colors.

If I was a real cook I would have had carrot cake on the inside. Will just pretend. Then the cake will be perfect. :->