Christmas morning

After going through our Christmas pictures, I realized we didn't get a lot of GREAT shots. With Scott's new GoPro and our other video camera, our still shot camera got put on the way side. Oh well, there are still some pretty good ones. Warning......lots of pictures!

I woke up to the smell of what I thought was bacon and my first thought was, Rachel was up making breakfast for everyone. So I hurried out of bed and downstairs to find the ham we had put in the crockpot the night before, being the culprit. The house was still dark and no sound of any children. So I went back upstairs, woke up my niece and said, "Dallie, go wake everyone up. It's Christmas morning". I didn't think the old aunt could be the first one up! So I delegated. Just then, Molly woke up and I couldn't contain my excitement so I got in bed with her saying it was Christmas and we needed to go see if Santa had come. With just the little bit of noise and Dallie going in to her parents room, it wasn't long before everyone was awake. We were in the bathroom brushing teeth when Molly comes running in and said, "I went downstairs and I know Santa came because there is a bike down there" hahahahaha, we started laughing so hard. Like mother like daughter. I used to sneak into the living room before everyone else just to make sure "he" came!

So we hurried to the stairs, I grabbed the camera and got one descent picture of part of the group, Scott set up the GoPro and off the kids were in to the living room.

We had a tradition growing up of getting cereal by our stockings so mom didn't have to make breakfast the week us kids were off from school. I think the kids ate cereal a few times a day!

Molly and Dallie

Molly on her new bike

Isabella

Foster requested a flashlight for Christmas. Molly got one too so they could look for spiders under the beds together

Dallie got a violin

Emersyn

Madison and her new Scentsy candle

My sister Rachel and her new Barbies ;)

Foster's new flashlight and train set

Brother-in-law, Jason and his new cowboy hat

Isabella would close her eyes the whole time she unwrapped her presents, so Molly decided to try it.

Scott made Molly the cutest jewelry box. It's not a great picture of the box, but she was pretty excited. As soon as we got back home to Utah, she put all her special jewelry inside.

All us kids got my mom a Nook Color. I'm so glad she liked it!

Fos got this cute Viking hat from Cal......GO Vikings!!!!!

Scott sporting his new helmet (it's more of a GoPro mount)

Rachel and I preparing Christmas dinner

It was a great time being with family! I just love the holidays and just love Christmas! Thanks Johnson's for being great hosts!!!! Some day our house will be big enough for y'all to come and celebrate with us!

Christmas Eve

For Christmas this year, we were able to go to my sister and brother-in-laws in Oregon. It's nice to be only 6 hrs from them now and be able to make the drive as soon as Scott got off work on Thursday. We loaded EVERYTHING in the van and were in Vale before 10 p.m. The kids, of course, were all so excited. When we got there, my sister and her kids were all hiding in their house in the dark so we had to hunt to find them. It was a fun way to start of the partying! 

Christmas Eve we went to a little get together with my brother-in-laws family (I grew up with all of them too) then headed to the Lutheran Church for a program (It was really good and very Christ centered) then played a little basketball at the middle school gym, then home to hurry and decorate cookies and put the kids in bed. It was a packed evening, but fun!

I just love this one of Molly with her "skinny" jeans falling off of her!

Getting ready to open Christmas p.j.'s

Pretty good reaction for jammies!

You can't really tell, but this cookie has about half the bottle of sprinkles on it! Santa ate it first! :)

It's true

For those of you who have not heard, it is true, I am pregnant. Due April 10th. This is me at 27 weeks pregnant. Not the best picture because I had just gotten back from running, but the hat NEEDED to be on :)! Here's to only 3 months left!!!!

Molly's Dance Recital

Molly is in dance again this year. But with a different teacher and group. I like this one tons better. Her dance recital was all of 9 dances (she was in 3 of them) as opposed to last year when they had 36 dances and she was in 1. This year lasted 45 mins and last year was well over 2 and half hours. So, yes, much much better!

Molly and Kendall

Best buds

She sure knows how to pose! I love it!

Scott turns 35

Half way to 70 and my man looks and is AMAZING!!! We had a nice quiet birthday celebration for Scott when he got home from work. Had two of his favorite things to eat that I won't made often because of the smell they leave in my house, Fried bread and Bacon. Then opened presents then ate some triple berry homemade pie. Happy Birthday darling. You are truly the best!!!

These two are the best little helpers when it comes to handing out presents (and opening them)

Mike got a long time favorite gift of Lifesavers. 

The anticipation.......

.....a GoPro. Scott thinks he has to be more extreme now with this :)

And from his mom and dad, a Canucks shirt. He's always wanted one and loves it!

Love or smothering?

Our handsome little fella

The pie.....complete with maple leaves :)

Gingerbread houses

We made our first gingerbread houses this year. It was on my list of traditions I wanted to start. So we called our good friends over for Family Home Evening and made these masterpieces!

Molly and Carter. Jason and Molly have two darling boys. Their youngest and Foster are complete opposites.......Fos can't stand being dirty and Brady has chocolate on him even if he's not eating it! It's too funny!

Molly and Scott built this one. It was pretty cute and creative. Especially when you compare it to Foster and I's.

I will improve next year! hahaha

December 1, 2011 Wind Storm

I didn't think I had anything to blog about but then saw all these pictures. We woke up December 1st to wind blowing pretty good. Since it was still dark we didn't know the extent of it. Scott drove to work and saw 6 semi trucks blown over. Also, he said he thought he was playing a video game while driving because he was swerving and dodging debris everywhere. It was crazy. Glad he made it safe to work, but after a while I was wishing he had stayed home to protect our little family. The wind woke Molly and Foster up earlier than normal. Fos came down the stairs crying saying, "our house is breaking". It was still dark so I still didn't know what to expect when I looked out our back window. I was on the phone with Scott when it started getting light and saw that part of our fence was down. Then I kept hearing this loud noise against the side of our house. I thought it was the neighbors garbage cans slamming against the house, but then I saw siding blowing in the back yard and into the neighbors trees. I ran outside to see and sure enough, our whole north side of our house was losing siding. There wasn't much I could do except put it in piles so it didn't cause more damage to neighboring houses. I ran out a few times collecting flying pieces and got trapped behind our gate (it blew open and pinned me in the corner with sharp siding wrapping around my legs). I thought for sure I was going to get cut. As soon as the wind died down enough to get away, I ran in the house. Only to go out a few more times trying to time it just right in between huge gusts! Needless to say, it was crazy and amazing and a little scary at times!

Neighbors back fence

Neighbors tree snapped right at the base

Our south side fence

The noise I was hearing!

Notice our play house still standing strong with no damage at all. I think I want Scott to build our next house. It'll be able to withstand 100+ mile/hr winds

I walked around after it all dyed down quite a bit and took pictures of our neighborhood

Most pine trees were down. In fact, the golf courses lost about 70% of their trees......so sad!

Just down the street this guy had this car port thing that didn't hold up!

Friends back yard! The kids were playing in the tree.

Our storm inside the house while we couldn't go out! So blessed that it wasn't worse. Thank goodness we have insurance and things will be taken care of soon!

Thanksgiving

For Family Home Evening we made Thanksgiving Tee Pee's. Got the idea from my friend and the kids loved it. I think they loved eating the candy mostly! Believe it or not, these are the only Thanksgiving pictures we have. We forgot to take our camera to Las Vegas with us. But hopefully I can snag some pictures from someone in Scott's family!

We really enjoy having Mike here with us. He even gets in on the craft fun!

He made an angry bird and Molly wanted to make one "like Mike's".

Project

Man my husband is quite handy to have around. We started another project before we left for Disneyland. We have been wanting to refinish our table and chairs since we redid our kitchen. Guess it wasn't a huge priority because over a year later, we finally got to it. Nonetheless, it got done. And I love it. Our 2-toned gold/yellow table is now a beautiful brown. I must say I helped more than I thought I would on this. Guess I just wanted a normal table and chairs back in our dining area. We even fed the Missionaries on a skinny little plastic table.

Before

During

And After!