Arizona Christmas (a little bit early)

We coincided our Christmas trip to Arizona so that we could see this cute girl perform in her hip hop dance recital.  Here she is with Barclay, all made up for the occasion.

Gwen, Camryn and Manda

We made chocolate candy houses

Bren even got in on the action !

We met Mitch (not pictured) and Elle and Therese for dinner at the Texas Roadhouse.

Cam played Battleship with Gramps

We visited the Mesa Temple Grounds and walked around the beautiful light display.

We made homemade sugar cookies and frosted them.

Cam with her friend from hip hop - excited to perform

Sleepy Grandpa and Cam and dogs after a long day

Cam Claussen loved the lego sets !

Cam Schutt LOVED her books, and also the ONE DIRECTION trading cards :)

At the recital - watch for videos of our trip later !

My Favorite Things

I received this cute invitation hanging on my door - a party at Wendy's is quite a TREAT !

She is absolutely the greatest decorator I know, seriously.  She pays attention to every little detail.........

Heck - who even KNEW that ornament hangers could be FANCY??  Not me, that's for sure :)

The menu was divine, thanks to Janene's careful planning.  Sweet and sour chicken, strawberry/spinach salad, ribboned jello salad, cranberry/jalapeno salsa for appetizer, and  yummy cream pie for dessert.  Wendy had also made chocolate and caramel dipped giant stick pretzels for a treat to take home. 

We had all brought gifts of "Our Favorite Things" to share - but FIRST we played LRC (Left , Right, Center)  Wendy had made prizes -  two loaves of home made bread, a cute "gift wrap" gift, and the one gift that EVERYONE wanted (see below)

"The Magic of Christmas in not in the Presents, but in HIS presence"

Some of us struggled to play the game ................:)

Some of us WON BIG !!
(That would be lucky me :)

Then we got down to serious ;) business, and each of presented the others with "Our Favorite Things"

Some were DROOLING in anticipation  (love you Carol!)

Cindy Bangerter brought us each a journal, and some See's chocolates

Jill Judd brought us each a Browning manicure set

Annette Prescott brought her favorite bowls AND her favorite (and mine) movie candy 

Gaylene Kimbal couldn't be there because her hubby surprised her with a CHRISTMAS CRUISE to CANCUN  (lucky girl), but she sent us each a decorative snowman

Janene Walker made us each a "corn" bag to keep our toes toasty warm (or cold) as needed, and  Nutella (I've heard so much about Nutella, but have never tried it.  I'm excited)

Wendy Waldron (our host) brought us each something to get the wrinkles out of our hard to iron clothing.  I do believe I heard "What is an iron?" - but I won't say WHO said it, Carol ;)

Carol Wilkinson bright us each her favorite perfume (smells great !) and a ONE BILLION DOLLAR chocolate bar :)

Vicki Rose brought us "Lemi Shine" and we were all excited to try it out.  Since  all of the dishwasher soaps have changed their phosphate content, have you noticed how GROSS the dishes come out, with a white filmy substance?  This will fix you up!   I'm running my dishwasher right now with it, and can hardly wait to see the difference.  Also CHOCOLATE..........  YEA!!

And last but not least, I brought everyone some plastic wrap (with the little zip razor which cuts the edge PERFECTLY!) and some HONEY.

It was a GREAT TIME!!
I love all of my friends.
Thanks EVERYONE !!

Our Weekend

Thatcher Batcher (our new nickname - Tagg loves it) Something cute -  Tagg loved their little dog Rusty, and would  play with and love on that dog constantly.  After poor little Rusty died, Tagg became much more interested and interactive with Thatch.  He will lay down, and Thatch will crawl all over him, and Tagg will mug on him and nibble on his ears, and they will giggle and giggle.  I need to get some video of this. 

Scary sight on Morgan Main Street on Saturday.  What a trooper !

Mom and I went to Morgan's Hometown Christmas, and look who we met up with!  Mrs. Claus aka Grandma Shirlee.  It was a great thing that happened in Morgan this past Saturday afternoon.

Zac and CJ are almost moved in.  New carpeting comes tomorrow.  I'll post more pics soon.

Grandpa Roger and Payson

Prayers for Stan

Stan Rees - 2006

Landon and Stan 

This was posted on Morgan Moms (Face book) by Larissa, Stan and Kendra's daughter-in-law: 

My father-in-law is in need of a liver transplant. Each day he gets sicker and sicker. Stan is 57 years old. He and my mother-in-law Kendra are the parents of 7 children, and grandparents to 10 children. The disease that has damaged his liver is an autoimmune disease called sclerosing cholangitis. He has been on a transplant list for 2 years, but he may not live long enough to make it to the top of the transplant list. We recently became aware that the family or guardians of an individual in a situation with no hope of recovery can designate their loved ones organs for donation to a specific person. This is the reason for my post. I want to make others aware of Designated Organ Donation. I know this is a sensitive subject, and I mean no offense. But the tragic loss of a loved one can be softened through organ donation. Livers have become increasingly hard to come by because of an increase in those needing liver transplants, and fewer people willing to donate. We are literally praying for a miracle to save Stan. I know God answers prayers, but it’s usually through others. The family of the donor, can let the doctor caring for their loved one know to whom they would like a particular organ to go. In turn, the doctor can notify the organ procurement organization in that region as to where that transplant recipient is listed. Stan is currently listed with the University of Utah Liver Transplant Clinic. 

Stan was Landon's baseball coach at Morgan High, and we have always thought so highly of him and his family. Our prayers go out to them.

Stan and Kendra and children

RIP - little Beauty

After two days of increasing misery, we finally put our little girl goat "down".  I'm glad she's not suffering anymore.   Don't know what or how to tell Cam about this............  Probably just avoid the issue until it comes up, then just tell her she died.  I can't bear to tell her the truth about the wild pack of dogs, it would really really upset her. 

The life and times...............

SANTA BABY

Treyson with the babies

What ?!?  You guys won't let me take your picture ??

Checking out the eggs.  One of Roger's "babies" laid her first egg this weekend.  It was minature.  We will soon be having eggs coming out of our ears.   EXCEPT, this morning, tragedy struck in the barnyard once again.  When Rog left for work about 5:30, there were two "dingo-like" dogs WITH COLLARS in the barnyard raising hell.  We grabbed a flashlight, and went out to investigate.  Dead chickens everywhere, traumatized goats stuck in feeders, and no piggy to be found.  After searching around, we found the pig, sound asleep, buried in the hay in the barn.  Beauty, the little girl goat will have to be checked out when there is more light.  She's alive, but looks to have some injuries.  Those damn dingo dogs !  If I would have had a shot-gun I would have blew them to pieces, and then taken their collars and all of the dead chickens and laid them on their owner's doorstep.  If ANYONE knows of whose dogs these might be, please let us know.  

And lastly........  Payson had a nasty fall down some stairs a few days ago, and seemed to be okay, except for a small goose-egg on his forehead.  This bump continued to grow and grow, and Kacey took him to the doctor, and they said it was a small hemotoma (sp?), and a couple of days later, it contnued to grow more and more, and so last night they took him down to the doctor again, and they sent him to Primary Children's for a CT.  The poor littleguy has two skull fractures!!  Thankfully there is no bleeding, and they just said to watch him closely, and it will heal on it's own.  Seriously, except for the Frankenstein forehead, you would never know there was anything wrong.  He is a very content baby, and happy as ever.  In fact, they didn't even need to sedate him for the CT scan, he just lay there very still while it was done.  Amazing.

Saturday Fun

Treyson is quite the little HAM in front of the camera - he told me to be SURE and post this to my blog !!

The boys came up and we made sugar cookies!

Even the babies got in on the action.  Don't worry, Payson is NOT standing up there alone.  See mama Kacey's head?

Frosting Fun :)

I doesn't get any better than this :)

It is SO SO SO good to see Roger happy and relaxed, and more talkative, and not so tired and stressed. I told him to remind me of this, when we get short on money (haha)