Fun Family Home Evening Activity

Last night our FHE activity was a lot of fun.

My mom set up a few relay games for us.

One of the favorites is pictured below.

We put a tennis ball in one leg of panty hose and then put it on our head.

Then we had to knock over water bottles with the ball, no hands allowed!

Isaac and Anna starting us off.
Dallin and I going head to head :)

 I think Dallin left us all in the dust on the paper airplane relay

We also had a good lesson on journals from Dallin

and Marcy made some delicious blackberry cobbler
(with fresh berries from her backyard). We added some ice cream too!

Later we played 2 dollar basketball

and this cutie was the winner!

Games on the floor

Something I love to see,
so I had to sneak a picture :)

The Chocolate

On September 21st (since I'm so far behind, I'm putting dates for my benefit)

Noah Dallin and Isaac went to watch a BYU football game

with a lot of the guys and some of the gals.

Mom, Marcy and I decided that while they were away the rest of us would get together.

We went for yummy dessert at The Chocolate,
a cute little dessert cafe in Orem.

Grace and I shared a delicious treat. It was a giant warm

cookie with ice cream and chocolate on it.

They had a wall of windows that looked like picture frames.

Grace, Anna and Holden had fun with that :)

 After we finished our treats we came back to my house and played some games and just had fun.

 Have I mentioned that I am enjoying living near family? 

Well I love it!

Jenn and her boys come for a visit!

My friend Jenn, and her boys came for a visit.

 I was so happy that she would make the drive from North Carolina

to come and see me before we moved across the country.

Not only did we have a good time catching up, talking,

playing games etc. She helped me pack...

because she is SO nice like that.

She also got to take her boys to do some sight seeing

since they had never been to D.C. before.

Our kids got along so well.

They really had a great time together.

And her boys LOVED Sasha!

(and who wouldn't!)

While she was here she had a birthday.

We got to go out to lunch together and get pedicures.

She totally made fun of me for how ticklish I am :)

She did some purple for me

and I did orange for her since it's her favorite color.

Fun times!

I'm not sure when we'll get to see each other again, 

I'm so glad she came for a visit.

Noah's Day

Noah enjoyed being in charge of his day

He wanted to make breakfast.

He made scrambled eggs

We went bowling

and had a lot of fun!

 Mike's excited face after getting a strike :)

He actually got 3 strikes in the 10th frame and made the same face again!

Lunch at Cold Stone

Yum!!

Play Boggle

 Listen to non-Christmas music :)

We did Nutten for Christmas

...nutten much, just ski, snowboard, play in a waterpark, play games, watch movies, eat food, hang out, have fun at Le Club, etc.


This year for our Christmas trip we went to Massanutten.

Our good friends the Chwaliks own a time share there and invited us to join them for the week.

We had a great time!

On the slopes

This was the first time skiing/snowboarding for Mike and the kids....and it was the first time for me in over 24 years. Everyone enjoyed it and I think we will definitely be doing it again.

 The Waterpark

The day we chose to go to the waterpark was a rainy day, so it was a good choice. We had a lot of fun! 

  The flowrider was a new and fun experience for all of us

Other Fun

Some of the best times we have are when we play games and just hang out together.

A big thanks again to our friends the Chwaliks for their kindness and friendship :)

Thankful

*Etch A Sketch artwork by Grace*

Thanksgiving has come and gone...here is how we spent it.

In the morning, Mike and Noah went paintballing with some other leaders and young men in our ward. 

They had a great time...Noah came home with blue hair and a smile on his face :)

After I finished making 2 batches of rolls, rainbow jell-o and 2 pies, we went over to our friends, the Volk's, house for Thanksgiving. It was a wonderful low key day, filled with delicious food, games, conversation, and laughter.

The kids (and the adults) had a ton of fun with the X box Kinect and the Spirograph. We also played Apples to Apples and the name game.

Boomer and Sasha were very attentive while Duane was picking apart the turkey.

I love this picture of Anna relaxing with Sasha :)

It was also Grace's birthday and though we had already spoken to her and decided to celebrate on another day, we still put some candles in one of the pies and sang to her :)

(Yes, that is more than 10 candles...Grace got a little carried away putting them in!)

Thanks Duane and LeeAnn for opening up your home to us...having great friends to share holidays with makes it a little bit easier to not have family close by. 


We are blessed and thankful for so many things. Family, friends, the gospel, work, health and so much more!


...and I'm thankful for technology, we were able to Skype with some of our family...that was really nice!