Ketchup

Caleb loves, loves, LOVES ketchup he'll eat just about anything dipped in it. Eric also shares Caleb's love for ketchup but was totally grossed out the other morning when I finally caved (thinking he would hate it)and gave Caleb ketchup to dip his syrup covered waffles in.

This is by far the grossest thing he has asked to dip in ketchup!

100th Day of School

I have been stressing over Ethan's 100th day of school project. All I could think about was it's due on the 1st and as some of you know I am filling in at my old job for the next two weeks, I have to meet with a sister in my ward on Tuesday night, a presidency meeting Wednesday night means I have to do this project on Thursday night! How in the world am I going to be able to help Ethan locate the 100 items, display them and find a snack representing the number 1 or 0 by Friday morning????? So I decided this project had to get done right away so most of the day Saturday we spent locating our items, gluing and shopping for the snack. It was so much fun.

I can't believe that I was stressed at all!

GO BIG BLUE!

Imagine the excitement in our house last night when the Giants won in overtime against the Packers! It was a nail bitter two missed field goal attempts by the Giants, a called back touch down, and a fumble and they still managed to pull it off.

The GIANTS and the Patriots are going to Super Bowl XXLI.

It should be an interesting Super Bowl in this house someone is going to be disappointed!

I wonder what Tiki Barber is thinking now?

Family Rivalry

Eric has been a huge NY Giants fan forever, his dad and brother only watched football when Eric was playing so he had no one to share his love for the game and the giants. Eric even tried to get Julie to watch the Giants with him but she was waaayyy too girly for that. He has always talked about having a son to watch and root for the Giants with, well Ethan has decided that he loves the Patriots not the Giants he'll actually root for the opposing team when the Giants play. Eric has now given up on his first born son and moved on to Caleb, poor Caleb has no idea that he is now a Giants fan like it or not!

Time Out

Caleb was playing with his rescue heroes, he made one hit him in the face told it "time out minutes" and proceed to the time out corner and put that naughty rescue hero in time out.

Yes, he's been spending a lot of time there himself lately.

It's a Mountain Lion

We think it's a mountain lion you tell me?

Creatures of The Night

For Christmas Eric got a head lamp to help light the way when he puts wood in the furnace. Since he started to use it he has seen glowing eyes staring at him as he loads the furnace, at first we thought maybe a deer or a coyote. Upon investigating the animal tracks around the house we think it maybe something else, bear or maybe a large cat. We did see two bears on separate occasions on our property one was eating our bird seed the other our garbage. When we first moved into our house I saw a mountain lion cross the street onto our property.

What do you think????

Too Early

6:00am is way too early for these boys to be awake!!!!

Every night in addition to the three binkis Caleb has to have his two puppies and Nini-Bear

Carrots and Ketchup

At dinner tonight we gave Ethan the only vegetable that he'll eat without gagging, baby carrots and ranch dressing. Of course Caleb had to have carrots too, but due to his food allergies he can not have the ranch dressing so we just gave him the carrots. You could see the wheels turning in his mind as he picked up his carrot and then looked at the ketchup on his plate intended for the chicken nuggets. He proceeded to gobble up his carrots dipped in ketchup. Yuck!

Winter Wonderland

O.K., I've shown the view from my window but it was a little different today.

Hurray for the fixed snow blower!

Where in the World is Sarah???????

I am soooo excited for my younger sister Sarah. Two days ago she boarded an airplane for the first time so she could study abroad in Thailand for three months. She is not going to be able to call home often so they have arranged for us all to get email updates this is the first one.


Dear Friends and Family:

One Asian blessing states, "May you live in UNINTERESTING TIMES." Well yesterday's travel was very interesting. Our JFK group left 2 hours late and missed their connection in Taipei by 30 minutes. The LAX group tried to stall the flight to CNX without avail and so our group split in Taipei.
The LAX group arrived in Chiang Mai on time but without 20 pieces of luggage. The JFK group arrived 6 hours later, mostly without luggage having to make an unscheduled stop at Bangkok airport.

After dinner (about 7:00 PM Chiang Mai time), 6 of the men and I returned to the airport to collect almost all of our luggage and the students went to bed at 10:30 PM. I think we are only missing two pieces of luggage and the airlines are looking for those pieces.

As you can see, I am up early (4 AM) thinking about the day's activities and wondering when the 2 pieces of luggage will arrive. In the mean time the airlines have given some permission to shop and retain receipts.

All of this is to say that things are interesting here!! The students have a great attitude and seem to be enjoying themselves even though tired. In two days our internal clocks will be reset.

Today we will meet the Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and the Vice-President for International Affairs at Chiang Mai University. I will give my orientation lecture and our 10 CMU student "buddies" will take the
SST students shopping. We are all ready to get things started and have
the "trip of a lifetime." Tomorrow we ride elephants and take a "jungle cruise" down a rainforest river on a bamboo raft. The students will never forget the fun of this adventure.

I hope it doesn't get too much more interesting in the next few days. Our love to all of you who are staying home. May you live in uninteresting times.


Director, Spring Semester in Thailand


I am so excited for her, she has always amazed me and I am truly grateful that she is my sister. Love You Sarah!

I am now a morning person!!!!!

Not being a morning person my husband had to learn early in our marriage not to wake me up! He said I would actually growl at him if he made any noise in the room while he was getting ready for work. Well, I don't know about the growling but I did get very annoyed. That has all changed! I have been getting a wake up call from a friend who gets up at 5:10am that has motivated me to get out of bed at 5:00 so I can answer the phone before it wakes the boys. I work out and still have time to read my scriptures. I have been using a great study guide that has kept me moving and on track. I just want to thank the two people who have helped me make two of my new year possibilities happen. I now am taking the time to nourish my body and mind Thank you, Thank you, THANK YOU!

Daddy's ski mask

Caleb found daddy's ski mask the other day and had to try it on all by himself. "No I do"

Ooops!

Once there was a snowman

Snowman, snowman once there was a snowman tall, tall, tall

in the sun he melted, melted, melted

in the sun he melted small, small, small Ethan was so sad to see his snowman had melted away

The Artibani 500

I thought this was cute the first 1,000 times.

Not so much anymore!

When Friends Travel

Tonight Ethan was sitting at the table and said "mom I miss my friends the Marbles." He was so excited when I told him that they were coming home tonight.

I LOVE RED

I LOVE RED!!!!

"Eric"

Caleb has decided that he will no longer call Eric Daddy.

Caleb: "Eric"
Eric: "no Daddy"
Caleb: "NO ERIC"

Oh well!

Snow much fun & A Cup

Today Eric took Ethan outside to make a snowman. They came in and had a cup of hot chocolate.

When I was younger we (my brother, sisters and neighbor cousins) would go out to ice skate and play in the snow all day, only to come in when we absolutely had to. You know when your little legs can't drag the sled up the hill anymore, your mittens are so wet that your hands are warmer out of them than in, you can't skate on the blades of your skates any more just the sides, you've been hit one too many times with a snowball. When we would come in my mom would make us hot chocolate not the stuff in the package but the real deal. I would always get to drink mine out of my own special cup that is now Ethan's. I hope it makes him feel as warm inside as it did me.