December 2016 (Excluding Christmas Weekend)

Oh December, how I wish you went more slowly.  I love the Christmas Season.  I love it so much that I am adopting my Mom's idea of celebrating until January 6th - Three King's Day.  Today is January 6th and I finally took down the Christmas decorations while listening to my favorite Christmas music and eating Rosca de Reyes that my Mom brought to us.  It's hard  for me to say goodbye to Christmas, and as I was lamenting this to the boys today Brian said, "Well anyway, you should keep Christmas in your heart all year Mom."  He's so right.  So here I am tucking Christmas away in my heart and hoping to keep it there all year while I relive the beautiful Christmas memories as I post them on the blog.

December started beautifully with the Church's Light the World initiative.

I took the daily service ideas to help us become more like Christ and put them in our advent calendar muffin tin for the whole month along with a little treat.  Each morning we opened the day, and decided how we were going to serve and be like Christ for that day.  Some of the more memorable activities were gathering toys for a family in need, picking out food at the store to donate, writing letters to family members far away, and committing to do kneeling morning prayers each morning in December.  I loved it!  It helped us focus on others and on becoming more like Christ through the whole month.

We went up one Saturday to the ranch for the annual Samiclaus party.  

Each grandchild did some musical performance for Samiclaus.

Back at home we kept the animals happy and healthy.

The boys continued their morning Lego routine.  The first thing they do after waking up is start creating things while I get ready.

They drew pictures to send to Mark's 104-year-old grandmother in Taiwan.

We got lucky and happened to be at Home Depot on the day Santa was there with workshop Christmas things for the boys to build.

I supervised the boys construction project while Mark got more items for our basement construction project.

Mark worked hard continuing on with the basement remodel.  He broke out some of the fireplace to make room for a bedroom wall.

He filled in the conversation pit.

Flooring will go directly over the wood and no one will know it was there besides it maybe will sound a little different when walked on.

Both boys won at school for their reflections music compositions.  Brian wrote a piano piece and Timmy wrote one for the cello.  The theme this year was "What's Your Story?"

This year Brian also won at Cottonwood Council level.  They feel even now because last year Timmy won at council and this year Brian did.

Here are the reflections songs the boys composed.

For the first time in over ten years I was able to get tickets to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas concert.  We took Mark's parents and it was amazing!  I enjoyed every second!

The guest artist was Rollando Villazon.  He was awesome!

Speaking of Christmas music, we fully felt the Christmas season music insanity at our house this year.  I became the cello pack horse and we played at what felt like a million different places.  It was a little crazy, but so fun at the same time.  One of my favorite things in the world is to make Christmas music!

The boys played in the annual Cheney Cello Christmas Concert.  It is so fun for them to learn lots and lots of Christmas songs and then to play with 80+ other cellists.

Here's a few clips of the boy's cello concert and school sing a long.


I played the cello and sang at the stake sing-in and on Christmas Sunday at church.  I sang for a special musical number in church earlier in December and the boys sang with the primary on Christmas Sunday.  We hauled the cellos to my parents house to play with my family and we took them to Grandma Joyce's house to play for her.  One of the musical highlights was playing the dinner music for our ward party.  I wish I had a picture of her, but my mom came all the way down several times to practice with us and then played the piano for us at the party.  It was so fun to play with Brian and Timmy and my mom!  The old people in our ward especially loved it and the boys got thank you cards and even money for their playing that night.

Brian and Timmy were cute enough that night that the 2nd Counselor in the Bishopric let them wear his nice cowboy hat a awhile after their cello playing was over.

The primary sang a few songs too.

At home we were getting super duper excited for Christmas!  Brian and Timmy bought and wrapped presents to give to each other and they were very excited about it!

We had a bit of sickness as well.  Timmy never got over a cold he had from November and needed several rounds of antibiotic to finally get rid of that bad sinus infection.  One doctor's visit we had to wait over an hour to see the doctor.  Luckily we have technology to help us pass the time.

Here's some Chinese school work from Brian.

Brian completed a big report about the Cherokee Indians at school.

The kids were happy to get some Christmas pajamas from Nai Nai and Ye Ye!  The excitement for Christmas to arrive was palpable.

Our visit to Grandma Joyce was lovely as always.  We love her so much!

Christmas arrived with lots and lots of snow!  I'll post Christmas weekend happenings in another post.  After Christmas we really really enjoyed a break from work and school and we loved all the snow to play in!

The Monday after Christmas we had some friends over for sledding in our backyard park and hot chocolate.  It was a beautiful, cold and fun time!

That night we got a babysitter and Mark and I went to a movie together!  We went with Luke and Sunny on their last night here.  We saw Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.  It was so good!

The next morning we went back over the Nai Nai and Ye Ye's house to catch Luke and Sunny for a game of Majong before they had to head back to California.  Oh we will miss them until next time they come into town.  Mark is lucky to see them again in California in January.

Since there is too much snow to ride the Christmas razor scooter outside, the boys use them in the house!

Christmas break was full of snuggling in the new BYU soft blankets while reading or watching movies.

And putting together Christmas Lego sets.

We went for a swim at my parent's condo pool and stopped at Arctic Circle on the way home.  Timmy absolutely loves the cherry dipped cones there and he doesn't care at all that it gets all over his face.

We went to the library and got loads and loads or new books to read.  We got so many books that my library bag broke and I need to find some other way to carry all those books.

Mark did so much work on the basement.

The boys found some games to play.

And we did more sledding at the park.

One day we finally got the time to ride TRAX downtown for our traditional see-the-lights-at-temple-square trip.

I wonder if there will be a year when these boys don't want to ride TRAX.  It always seems to be their favorite part of the night.

We stopped to see the windows at the Grand America...

As well as the ZCMI candy windows.

Of course my favorite was temple square as usual.

The next day I took the boys to stay a night at the ranch while Mark worked on the basement.   My parents had a new fun car track that the boys loved in addition to all the other fun things to do at the ranch.

We got a few runs around the field with Grandpa before the six-wheeler needed a break.  It was so fun and it brings so many memories!

I got a quick cross-country ski hike in with Alli and Dave and Bristol.

Then that evening we had our balloon New Year's Eve party even though it was a night before New Year's Eve because everyone was there on Friday.  It was very very fun!

Good food, popping balloons with lots of money in them, and playing games like Pie in the Face, make for an amazingly awesome night!

The next morning my mom made us a good breakfast and then we had to head back down from the sunny clear skies in Oakley into the smog of what looked like Mordor as we drove down the canyon.  I am grateful for the time we had up in the clear clean air!  The rest of the weekend and break was spent cleaning up, doing laundry, and getting back to practicing instruments as we geared up to start school and work again on Tuesday January 3rd.

Here's a few clips of random videos from December.

November 2016

November began with warm and beautiful weather!  The grass in the field looked a lot like the spring grass.  The ponies loved it.

Often work around here turns into fun.  I almost always enjoy working outside with the animals more than any house work that needs to be done.  On Saturdays when the family is with me it is even more enjoyable.

Our rooster got really loud and pretty mean.  So, we said goodbye to him at the beginning of November.  It was a little sad to say goodbye, but the next morning when he didn't wake me up at 5:30 a.m. I was grateful to Mark for taking care of that unpleasant part of raising chickens. The rooster tasted good for dinner that weekend too, which was another plus I guess.

The boys love when Mark lets them use his power tools, like the belt sander, to sand down their sticks and spears.

I spent countless hours in October and November writing the primary program and figuring out how to sit 70+ people up on our small chapel stand and then rearranging seating, fixing the program and finally taking a relieved breath when it was all over with.

Some of our hens are very friendly.

I am trying to take pictures of myself as my hair grows out so that I can see what length I like the best.

On beautiful days like this, I just want to sit and hang out with the ponies when I feed them. Peaceful happiness right there.

Brian got his student of the month paper and picture back.  He is a great student!

I love this journal entry from Timmy's October journal.  His spelling and pictures make me smile.

This cute pony picture was taken about one minute before Chip decided to freak out and buck like a true rodeo bronco.  I have no idea what happened.  I was leading him along with Timmy riding and he just started bucking.  In my attempt to save my child my foot ended up right under that little bucking bronco and my poor toes got pretty smashed.  They were black and blue for the rest of the month.  Timmy was fine and got back on for some good calm riding as I limped Chip around the field.

I cleaned up 10 or so wagon fulls of pine needles from our sugar pine in the front yard.  Every year I forget how many needles drop from that tree.

The weather turned in the middle of November from beautiful warm Fall weather to cold winter-like weather.  I love my fireplace heater in my office.  I use it every day.

Timmy had some funny teeth in November.  He lost three from the front top and before the last one came out it was looking pretty goofy.

I enjoyed the super moon with the ponies.

Just before snow came I got the last rose on my rose bush.

And just before the snow came, my mom brought Ahab down to stay for the winter.  He immediately took to sleeping in the barn. This was his first night here and he stayed warm and dry when the first snow arrived.

The boys were ecstatic the next morning to see snow!

I mostly enjoyed the snow from my desk while working on the primary program. This was my view that snowy day.  The ponies unearthed this vintage toy horse from the dirt in the field this summer.  I think it deserves that spot on the windowsill and it makes me smile when I have to be sitting at my desk.

Ahab seemed to adjust well to being here and doesn't mind the chickens hanging out with him all day.

Brian and Timmy had their Fall cello recital.  They were so happy Grandma came all the way to watch them.

My favorite guys.

We had some time before Thanksgiving, so we used it to put up the tree.  The boys loved decorating it!

Brian and I were going along listening to Christmas music and decorating the tree when we turned around to Timmy's giggling and saw this!  He was wearing the stockings and the tree skirt and a Santa hat.  He's such a goofball.

Thanksgiving came with a little snow.

We hosted Mark's family at our house again this year.  Timmy was super excited about making a fruit turkey.  He did the whole thing!

It was a fun center piece and a healthy treat too!

The day after Thanksgiving, Mark used his day off of work to work at home.  Our basement went from this...

to this...

to this.

After Mark ripped out all the old faux beams, the wet bar, the carpet, and ceiling, he had a few young men come help load in all into the trailer and take it to the dump.  This picture of the trailer was taken before they finished loading everything.  It was completely full when they left.

Timmy was really into the Christmas stuff.  He was happy to be an angel for a morning.

One morning I woke to Brian reading to Timmy.

I am just so grateful for their friendship.  In Brian's primary class on Sunday, he was supposed to write a thank you note to someone.  He chose to write a note to Timmy and could not wait to give it to him.

The boys got really into ping pong and love playing with Ye Ye or Daddy at Mark's parent's house.

One evening after homework and practicing was done I let the boys play in the fresh snow.  They don't care if it is dark outside, they have head lamps.

Snow and Christmas decorations was a fun way to usher in December!