Merry Merry Christmas

I dunno—I might have more to blog than can ever be blogged…

Tempting to just punt

Maybe I’ll compromise and just do pictures but…then we’d miss things like Tanner’s Christmas Eve prayer “Dear Heavenly Father, I know Christmas is really about Jesus but please bless that Santa will come anyway.” 

😂

So here we go:

—feels like Forever ago but…let’s see what the pictures hold. 

Saturday these guys got Grandmas 4 wheeler fixed up. Tanner has wanted one for a long time (honestly as soon as I came around on the motorcycles I’d way rather them have two wheels under them than 4 but whatever) I think we’re taking it home with us! (At first I was totally against it. The kids love riding it at the sewer ponds and I didn’t want to “steal” it from Grandma but Isaac thought it was fine and that our kids were really they only ones that would care anyway… and he thought they might have more fun with it at home…anyway…so I mean nothings for sure until it happens but that’s the plan. (I should RUN but it also seems like a pretty slick little way to get over to the cemetery too👍🏻) 

Tag when it wasn’t your turn and we had the side by side out there too—it’s always fun.

Simon says 

A fun gift pass around that’s Aunt Lauren tradition. 

Delicious Christmas Eve dinner 

And then it was Christmas! 

I got the boys to do their song for Grandma

Now at least I have a video 👍🏻

https://youtu.be/Mp70bnAPf_o

Santa did find us! Tanner-can this count as documentation of an answered prayer? 😉

I can’t believe I don’t have a picture of Colt with his stuffed monkeys draped all over him or his clarinet. But I think he had a fun Christmas too. I’ll have to do a make up round on those pics 😬

Adjusted Christmas plans -a little crazy as I threw it all together but—totally worth it 👇🏻 (And I just happen to love those Rizzy ties too ❤️❤️❤️) 

We had so much fun-it was so good to see Grandma-have her get to meet Addi. Good times. Good memories. Maybe it was growing up on Chapel St but I just love the walking to church tradition! 

Her ward had a fantastic meeting too! As a kid I didn’t love Sunday Christmas but now I totally do!! 

I have a few other pics from Sunday-like Sister chow’n down on a meat stick she swiped from Sadie or Seth showing off his Rubble crocs Santa hooked him up with but—use your imagination cuz the pics didn’t turn out that great. 

Monday Shawn’s family took Grandma north and we headed south. 

I text my mom when we were on the road (no trailer but all the ski stuff—loaded to the hilt—said we were coming) and she text back 

“Dad just wrecked his truck taking a load of cows off, he said he’s ok, I’ll keep ya posted I’m heading out to utah hill and I have a tow truck coming”

😳😳😳

Crud!

He really was ok-just a little bruised from his off road adventure and dang hungry/thirsty since it turned into an all day ordeal. But yikes-pretty scary!! We are so thankful he wasn’t hurt!! I guess he just looked down to check some brake thing??? Like if he’s adjusted it the way he meant to or not and…it just happened fast. 

Thankfully he’d already dropped his load of cows or it would’ve rolled for sure! 

The eye witnesses say the pics don’t do it justice—I thought it still looked plenty bad. 

Anyway we all made it safely to my folks house by Monday evening. 

Thank Heaven!

And the Christmas fun continued! 

At this point I’m just throwing pictures on here. But we’re staying busy and having fun. 

We don’t have a picture that adequately shows how jealous Patch it’s of Addi—it’s hilarious! 

We went on a muddy little hike to the cave…but I’m pretty sure the old Farris wheel and teacups were a bigger hit. 

Thursday we went Skiing. It was packed! So much waiting! People everywhere 😩😩😩

Cannon probably complained the most but ended up loving it. Colt did great and liked it—no pics of them. Not worth leaving our table once we finally got one. Tanner hated it—thank goodness I took pocket chess! His actually did like that—the pic must have been right after I asked him if he liked skiing. Yikes! Sethy however—LOVED IT. 


I’m positive I said never again after the last time—now I’m thinking. Never again during “peak” season. 

🤷‍♀️

Uncle Harv and Aunt Kay stopped by! 

Then more feed yard fun and a bowling trip. 






Busy busy busy

Fun fun Fun!!! 

Christmas in Utah!

Oh boy 

What’ve we got? 

Saturday we did “brother gifts” I love doing them early I love all the excitement—so fun. And they talked me into Saturday cuz we “might” go to Utah on Sunday-ok fine, whatever. Isaac was gone so my aim was to make life as easy on myself as possible. They had so much fun though! And after that we did crafts Mrs Hardee gave us. They had a blast (and I must really love cleaning up messes-what was I thinking?—what happened to easy on myself?) 

Speaking of Isaac being gone-he went to Oklahoma to get the semi with a drop axel that he bought-because apparently the Golden Goose isn’t tough enough to pull the lowboy loaded with the excavator-I don’t know-ask Seth he knows 50 times more about things than I do! Anyway Oklahoma-he left at 6:30 and didn’t get back until 2:30 the next morning (Heaven bless Bro Baker for going with him!) that after 8 or 9 hours to Illinois somewhere Thursday  to get the light towers he’d bought and Wednesday middle of nowhere Missouri 5 or so hours to get the thumb he’d bought. 

Sooooo he’s totally sick of driving-sure let’s jump in the car and head to Utah. Then we got him Monday for 17 more 🤯🤯🤯

But we’re not there yet-I’m ahead of myself. 

Sat we finished up Y basketball 

Sunday pics 😍



Sunday pics are fun-the battle on the bench not so much. Seth threw himself backwards and cut his head and gave himself a shiner from the bench in front of us. 

Just another day around here. Yikes! 

Isaac hates traveling on Sunday *that’s a lie! He hates traveling with us on Sunday if it’s just him for his business stuff he has no problem with it. It’s just not enjoyable with us…I’ll give you 2 guesses how I feel about this…

Oh you only needed one-hmm

Anyway I know he doesn’t want to travel on Sunday So I’m not even packed up. But the boys wanted to get headed to Utah. So we tried. Oh so much to do. Pack up-load up-the missionaries came over-the house a total weekend bomb. It gets to be 5:00 and dark I’m thinking this is crazy we’re wasting good darkness hours to be driving in-he says if we’re not gone by 9:00 we’re not going-but at 9:45 we all load up. He sits down in the drivers seat and says “I better check that trailer tire” oh cuz we’re pulling the trailer it has the dog carrier and skies loaded on it. So we sit in the car and Addi is screaming her guts out. Great start right? Finally at 10:00 he gets back in and off we go. We don’t even make it mile before Addi projectile vomits everyone. So we head back for clean clothes (only I’d packed everything) but I got her tubbied off and Isaac realized how late we were going to get to Huntington and we vetoed it. We’d just leave Monday. The boys were crushed but it really was the best choice. 

So we left Monday after lunch. Only we couldn’t find Belle anywhere so we left her-

Dog carrier back off. 

And it’s dang Cold in KV this week so even I am worried about the dang dog-cuz I don’t want to deal with heartbroken boys if anything were to happen. But Isaac called a neighbor to check on her and…hopefully everything is fine🤞🏻🤞🏻 
And Ug- remember all that traveling? Monday we’re  traveling with the grinch. Have mercy. When we had two kids and we’d make that drive we’d find a play place for dinner and again the next morning for breakfast-let them get some energy out. Now 5 kids, its just suck it up-push through 😩 throw a pizza at them for dinner-and worry about breakfast when we get to Grandmas. So miserable. Poor kids. They fight over tablets turn them off. No more! It was not a very fun ride. 

But we made it

That’s the most important part! 

And the good times are rolling 

Like Addi got to meet Grandma in real life! 

Cousin time!!!

They painted rocks…

And played downstairs with Aliyah’s toys



Gingerbread houses! 

Sadie has some pretty fun toys too! And this girl just all the sudden started sitting up on here own. Cute. But pulling up on to things Ahhhh not yet!!  (Cann put her up to the walker toy—she obviously liked it) 

Don’t blink! 

They grow so fast! 

I guess that’s why I blog. 

Wednesday we went for a hike 

Grandma and I probably should’ve swapped pictures before I blogged. Whoops-oh well. 
Thursday we went to Aliyah’s kindergarten music program. And that afternoon over to see the Nielson’s. They are glad to be home-but have a special place in their hearts for Missouri. We love them and they gave us the sweetest Adam-ondi-Ahman books. And we’re not going to go caroling this year but for a pack of bubble gum I got the boys to sing their Christmas song for Wayne and Teresa-it was awesome! 
As we’re leaving they were saying how great the kids were I was like “oh they’re fighting by right now I guarantee it” I got to where they were-loaded up in the van 7 seconds ahead of me-yup-fighting! Why!??!!!!

Oh well. And least the kept it to the car—doesn’t feel like much of a victory though. 

So that was yesterday then last night we hit the wave pool. (I know grandma has good pics-I don’t) 

And today! 

We went to the temple!!! 

Grandma tended but we decided we better take the Addster with us. She’s a trooper! The Provo City Center temple is beautiful! We listened to the byu speech “we need an endowment” and read a really good president Nelson talk on the way up. 

The temple is my favorite place to feel close to Riz. Sometimes more than others -and if I’m honest not a ton today- but still it’s as close as I can get to him here on earth. Merry Christmas little man. We love you and because of Jesus Christ I will hold you again someday! 
After the temple we had a delicious cafe rio lunch date and then hit Walmart for some last minute stuff for Christmas on the road. 😳 we’ll see. 

And then back-where Grandma Lauren and Shawn had dinner ready. What? They are spoiling us!!!!

Oh and I had to take this pic. Pretty sure he is the only person on the planet who would A: drag those work bibs across the country and B: throw them on quick over his suit cuz he wanted to run out to the shop quick and check on his battery. 🤣🤣🤣

Only Isaac. But I love him! Even if I threw him under the bus for being grouchy on the drive across. 

Sorry Honeybear. 

And nobody reading this is dumb enough to think he’s the only grouch—I’m probably pretty lucky he’s not the blog author 😉

That might not be all-but it’s all for now! 

Fridays always sneak up on me. But hey how bout I start with this-remember last week I said I loved Tanner’s teacher. This week he took t-shirts for his class -we’ve done it several times with different kids and classes right? Well this time I was cleaning out Tanners back pack and I got a Thank You note from EVERY single kid. Impressive right? Even Tanner wrote one and addressed it Mrs Ison 😆🤣 but they were all different and so cute, Tan and I had a great time reading them. I sent the shirts to school thinking they would put them under tree—he’d told me “mom, we have a tree in our class now” and I said “oh sweet, should we send some packages to go under it?” And he liked that idea. But I guess he just took them and passed them out. (I was happy to have them out of my bedroom)  I said “did you let Mrs. Totta help you decide who to give the smaller ones to?” He just looked at me like I was stupid and said “no”

Ok. Whatever-it was fun, they loved them, good enough. 

Ok so that’s the shirt story let’s go back to last Saturday-

Tanner had basketball and it was awesome, the other team didn’t have enough players so we gave them two of our players and it was actually a good game!! Both teams had six and it was a much much much better matchup to not have us have every good player and Tanner got to play a ton more than usual too because they only had one sub on each side —it was fantastic. He’s still so indecisive with the ball but he played hard and did a lot of good things! 

After basketball we headed to the church to meet brother Jones there to practice our song for Sunday. The boys did a musical number in sacrament and it was awesome-seriously my favorite thing!! I wish so bad that I had a recording of it —they did so good. The deal was if they would sing in church then they got to go shopping with me for something for a brother -and we got treats- and do “brothers presents” as they call them. So the song kind of took up the weekend and then the kid dates kind of took up the week. 👍🏻

Sunday we also had dinner at the VFW because Cannon’s teacher talked him into entering his essay into the patriots pen contest. He was bummed he didn’t win because it was cash prizes, I was like hey you had to do it anyway for school-thanks for getting us all lunch 😉

He was livid we stayed in church close -major fit changed realized the other 6 of us really weren’t going to change, changed back- but it was really the only way we’d consent to go on Sunday. Were we overdressed? Yes. But we just kept saying we’d just come from church and we felt good about it. 

Annnd we all had to fabreeze our close before we went down to the community Christmas concert at our church that night (which was wayyy to stink’n long 😩😩😩) but the primary kids sang. And actually Cannon’s English teacher was at the VFW and the concert. We were following her 😊

But it was a long day-oh and I taught RS-my new calling-which I thought I would love but it’s trickier than I thought. I’ve subbed lots of times but when you’re the sub it like -eh, not really my job they’re just happy they found someone to say yes, it’ll be fine. When it’s my real calling I feel a lot more pressure— it’s quite a task trying to reach people at all different levels of preparation and trying to get participation too. Yikes-hopefully I’ll get better and a letter at it. 

Monday we did Cannon’s kid date after basketball and Tuesday we did Colton and Tanner. There was definitely some miscommunication there,  Isaac met us at the church but then he thought he had to stay there with all the kids until I cane back and to get  Tanner -but I thought they’d just play for a few minutes then go home. 2 hours later -we hadn’t hurried, it was (rare) one on one time and I was loving it. Isaac wasn’t mad AT ME but he WASN’T happy with the situation or just the breakdown in communication or whatever! And he tries to act like he’s not mad and everything’s fine but he’s terrible at… disaster! Disaster is probably the best word. but we survived it and I had so much fun with the kids individually that I didn’t really even care about the disaster so… oh well! and Wednesday morning Seth and I went. 

We did have some sickness this week, Seth missed school Monday, Cannon stayed home Wednesday. 

Wednesday night we got word that Grandma Ison is escorting a missionary home and we be there for Christmas!! That changed our plans but we’re excited!

 The brothers brought me this little Christmas present. You know it’s cute when Isaac reaches reaches for his phone to take a pic.

 Not a ton of pictures but…Utahs coming there will be an overload! 

Oh wait I forgot-one more quick story. When Isaac and the kids were at the church they set up the little hoop. Well  they left it up and Wednesday we swung by quick after school so I could work with Tan a little bit. We were working on 3 spot and I was rebounding Tanner shot and that dang thing fell down. It hit me-but thankfully not bad-I have a bruise on my shoulder but that’s really it. 1/2 inch different and it probably dropped me. Anyway Thursday we took the Tilton kids over to play one man dodgeball —oh wait I gotta interrupt this story to tell a different one. When we were driving home from that I was telling them that Isaac’s been the bishop for almost 5 years and that’s how long the calling usually is so we don’t know when he’ll be released but when he is then we probably won’t have church keys anymore. And Noah said “Can’t he just sign up for another 5 years?!” Ha! No!! — okay back to the other story so Thursday we’re there playing in the gym and a guy comes in, looks at the hoop and then takes a picture so I ask him “hey are we getting a new one of those?” And he says “oh no-I’m just the safety inspector” 😳😳🤣

I mean it’s the Lords house. 

He knows everything that goes on there-and everywhere. But I’m just glad it wasnt the day before and I was standing under a precarious modified hoop we’d rigged up that came crashing down. Yikes! 

Sooooo not blogging hardly at all last week-just throwing some pictures on there…that was pretty easy. 

And we loved that Utah game! 

Maybe I’m complicating this little family journal…hmmm

This week was busy! 

Cannon had basketball Tanner had basketball then Cannon had more basketball and Isaac had projects. (Mostly with the Golden Goose—in fact he got done and toyed with the idea of running to KC “quick” to get the belly-dump I agreed 1/2 way planning on another rescue mission but the guy never got back to him so he never went) 

I love Tanners teacher! I feel like she teaches the kids so much more than handwriting and reading -although she does that really well too- but the other day I picked him up and as we walked to the car he was so excited to tell me he’s writing a note for Colt. I know it’s the sweetest thing because the other day I got this:

I didn’t get any pics of basketball worth posting-that’s fine at some point they all start looking the same anyway 😂 oh but Tan told me he’s been playing soccer at recess with some friend named Bobby. Im glad I just hope he actually plays. This basketball situation isn’t that great for him and football was the same—I’m glad he’s moved on to something else if he actually gets to play! (Besides I’m not saying I love watching soccer but I can come around on it and do think soccer players make the best defenders so-play soccer man!) 

And maybe I didn’t get basketball pics but look what I did get —these 😍

I wanted a pic of the whole crew but…cooperation is minimal and I didn’t want to be late. 

I didn’t know it then but I guess a the guy in our ward who sat right in front of us actually went to that pac 12 championship game…but he was cheering for USC…

I’m pretty sure we had more fun than him-especially if he was there. 

The missionaries came over and we watched the Christmas devotional.

And we have been having some pretty intense family games of sardines lately. I’ll tell ya what—we play in the dark…and there are booby traps all over especially upstairs. But the kids love it and I hope I’m getting making memory points! I like looking for places to hide when I’m looking for them the only trouble is I find their size of places-I’m much too chubby these days and plus I usually have the Addster with me. Sometimes she’s quiet and content to be in my arms -sometimes not and she gives us away. 

Monday was too long ago to remember but the pics say we were just goofing off

Tuesday was the ward Christmas dinner. I signed up for Christmas Jello and Brownies—but I bring a pretty big crew so I figured I better take rolls too (Rhodes rolls-my kids like them better anyway) but Isaac had me cook turkey, make gravy, ok we used cans and added the turkey drippings but still, and make mashed potatoes. “Oh you don’t have to do any of my stuff” he said. Yeah right. Only to call and say “you’ll be home so you can put that turkey in right?” All is fine (fine as in I’m swinging from the chandelier…oh wait the farmhouse doesn’t have chandeliers!) but it all works out. The thing about Isaac is he’d do anything for anyone…and he thinks other people are like that too😂 I’m trying. Sort of. Sometimes. No it is a great quality hopefully he’s bringing me up and not I’m dragging him down 🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻

But so much for I don’t have to cook that night right? 

But the dinner was nice-fun-well attended-

Probably the best part for me was after I got to chat with Baydon and Brittany. I think it was good for all of us. We’ve needed that-I just didn’t quite know when or where or how so that it happened very “organically” I can’t believe I just used that word for an adjective 🤣🤮 but whatever it just happened and naturally and it was good and I love them both and look up to them for the strength and faith and testimonies of Jesus Christ. They are awesome! Then I got home and got more crushing news that another sweet friend lost a baby (they were the Hiltons neighbors when they were here) Ug! Sometimes life is just too hard! I don’t Facebook but I was grateful another friend let me know and I was able to reach out but so dang hard-and right at the holidays too—so dang hard! Heaven must just need an army right now too. Someday we’ll understand everything, I have faith in and hope for that brighter and brighter perfect day! 

Addi is teething and up a lot in the night  (way more than when she was a newborn) but I don’t mind-I’m just holding that little girl tight and so happy she is here!!! (She has this little twinkle in her eye like she knows more than me and always has—I’m good with it, in fact I like it.) 

Let’s see that gets us to Wednesday oh I think Tuesday might have also been the day I found out my Aunt was in the Hospital ICU too. I’m telling ya-no shortage of reasons to be praying!!  But Wednesday was the temple and priesthood preview for Cannon! Crazy right?! But I’m excited for him and the primary leaders did a great job (and so did Isaac on his part) it was neat!

By yesterday we were just so excited to have nothing after school we kindof did nothing! And more of the same today! We’ll except the boys and Isaac played around with some artificial intelligence thing-where they had it write an essay and stuff. They were pretty enthralled…I would have preferred help around the house or something…but they didn’t ask me. 

Until next week! 

We’re staying up too late watching the Utes play in the pac 12 championship. 

🤞🏻

So here’s some pics 

https://youtu.be/6ince_hwrvY





I think they sum up the week pretty good! 

This isn’t 3 trees it’s really just one that flashes and and changes but it’s over at Rizzy’s cemetery-Caleb has lights on a little wreath too. It’s pretty sweet. 

The hand is healing up. 



And I love this reach for he lights stage 😊

This poor girl though-she’s had the roughest day. I’ve changed a hundred diapers and her little bum is red as can be. Poor thing-hoping this short lived. 🙏🏻

You know it’s a good game if this is all I write 😂