super fun utah trip

So I am finally posting about my amazing and theraputic weekend away with my girlfriends. It was so much fun. We went to Provo to watch my friend, Jamie's sister perform in the drill team state finals. It was pretty cool. We laughed, shopped, sang, and even hung out in a jacuzzi in the snow! We stayed a Jamie's aunts house which was amazing! She was so sweet to let us. And Jamie's sister ended up with second in state, which was disappointing to them because they won state last year. Anyways, here are some pics of all the fun:


stocking up on goodies for the trip


Katie riding the tram


Jamie and Katie on the plane


Ouch! but cool



the drill team


Jamie and Kailee (I hope I spelled that right)


this one is for my father-in-law. Hee hee this team actually used tires for their props.


our good friend, Shannon came down from Idaho to play with us. It was so great to see her.


"steaming" up the jucuzzi

It was so fun to hang out with my girls. Can't wait for New York! *wink*

Selling autographs

So my sweet Zachary is always thinking of ways to earn money. Last summer he wanted to open a lemonade stand, and over november break he set up and omnitrix stand where he tried to sell his homemade (with old toilet paper rolls) omnitrixes. they were priced from 5 cents to $20. Unfortunately, he did not sell any. so his latest money making scheme was to sell pictures that he drew of the Ben 10 aliens signed by the artist. After a long discussion about what type of things we can sell, what value is, and goods and services- all of which I am pretty sure went all over his head- he decided that he would just give his priceless pieces of artwork away. Sadly, though, he only had 2 customers...

more catching up

Here are some pics from Christmas eve. We went to my mother in laws house for dinner, and when we got home something was waiting for us. The kids were so excited to find that Mrs. Claus had left us with some jammies.


Here are the tough boys in their hulk jammies:


and pretty girls in their jammies:


the family:



leaving cookies for Santa:



sadly going upstairs for the longest night ever...

Eternal Flame--not so much!

So our little thriving metropolis rarely makes the national news for being more than the meth capitol of Arizona, so I was a bit surprised when I started up the computer and went to check my yahoo mail only to see this fabulous piece of investigative journalism I'm not sure whether to be proud or embarrassed. Yes folks we are the town that extinguished our "eternal flame" when the first gas bill came. Sheesh!

Don't get me wrong I am so jazzed that my little town made yahoo news! and to be featured- I am just gushing pride. I'm just not so excited about why we made news. Anyways, I thought it was funny- so go check it out.

Making Gingerbread houses

A couple days before Christmas we had a bunch of friends over to make gingerbread houses. It was so much fun! And it was great to see how creative the kids got. There were no 2 houses alike It went a lot better than I was planning to be honest- not too much chaos. The really young kids weren't that interested, but that was fine. It might be a new tradition for us. It was great to be with friends and have a good time.
It cracked me up that the Baxter girls are the ones that got the messiest! They used their hands and ended up dirtier than the 5 year olds! But there houses were fantastic, so whatever works.

workin off the blackmarks

Growin up in the weeks before Christmas, the stinkin elves would show up and start watchin us. If we were caught being less than good we would get black marks. And if Christmas arrives and you have black marks- you don't get presents. Those stinkin black marks!!! We couldn't tease our siblings, or talk back to mom, or "forget" to clean our room. When december rolled around, we became angels. And, interestingly enough, now that I am a mom those stinkin elves came back, But they weren't watching me anymore. My kids learned about the elves this Christmas, and since I didn't remember how we got rid of black marks I made up my own way. My kids had to perform service to get rid of black marks. So here I have caught them in the act. I think this was just a day or two before Christmas so they were extra happy to do anything to get rid of the black marks. Now I know why Mom was so happy when the elves came!

kids christmas program

Okay so I haven't been the best blogger over the holidays. And now that they are over it is time to get caught up. We'll have to go back in time a little bit. There is a lot to report, here goes:

First the kids school christmas program. Zach and Hannah were so great. I have video, but as I have still yet to figure out videos on here you won't be able to see them. Hannah was a little reindeer and the entire kindergarten sang, 8 little reindeer. which sounded remarkably like 5 little monkeys,

so you can imagine that by the time it got to 1 little reindeer with 50 kindergarteners singing it sounded more like "yaa yaa yaa yaa" very loud! but still cute. Zach sang some country ho-down Santa song AND he was one of the 5 kids chosen to dance with a partner on the stage. He was way nervous, but way cute dancing with his partner. That's a cute video- I wish I could get that one on here. He even boogied off the stage! Here he is with his buddy, Zach before the performance started.


okay now i'm tired, maybe i'll blog more tonight later.