Merry Christmas

I cannot believe Christmas Eve has allready come. Wow what a fast December. We had a fun time this month, going to parties and seeing many friends and family. A couple of the neat things we did this month were to go to a live Nativity, and to sing in the Ward Christmas Program. We found out about a Baptist Church in Layton that acted out the entire "Journey to Bethlehem". It was so neat. The hard part was waiting in line for 2 hours, but once it was our turn, it was well worth it. They took groups of 50 people at a time through the journey. We had a family from Nazareth and they lead us the whole way. 1st we visited the carpenter shop, only to for them to tell us that Joseph and Mary had allready left. There were Roman soliders all along the way, dressed up and with real horses, who stop us many times and made us show our pretend passports so we could freely go through to Bethlehem. We saw the 3 wise men and thier gifts, and their real pet llamas. Next were the shepards, an angle appeared to them while we were watching. Then we moved onto other travelors, who shared their fire with us, so we could warm up. This whole time we are walking through trees and bushes with torches to light the way. When we made it to Bethlehem the Soliders stopped us outside the gate to again check that we were free to go. THen they stamped our passport and we entered the town of Bethlehem. They had it all set up with people selling things like bread, and herbs and they were even roasting a real pig over the fire. They gave Brinlee a fake loaf of bread that she was able to give to the begger in the town. She loved that. Then we were led to the Inn, where they said they had no room, but they had sent Joseph and Mary to the Stable. We walked there where we saw Joseph and Mary with the Baby Jesus and they spoke and sang Silent Night and Oh Come All Ye faithful. There was a real donkey and sheep. It was so neat. IT was a great way to remember the true meaning of Christmas and it really helped our kids understand as we acted it out. They gave us yummy hot chocolat at the end to warm us up.

This past Sunday Budd directed our christmas musical program in sacrament meeting. He got put in as choir director a few months ago. He did an amazing job, expecially since we didnt start practicing for it until Dec 7th. Everyone really enjoyed it. He has brought our choir to a whole new level, and it is fun and educational. Budd and i sang "Oh come all ye faithful" in an accapella quartet and it turned out very nicely, even thought my heart was pounding and i had to skip a note to take a breath so i didnt pass out. Budd also did a mens acccapella quarted of "Abide with Me". That was amazing, my favorite of the program We also played recorders, Budd, Shun and I, for the first verse of "That Easter Morn" We sang another 4-5 songs with the whole choir and a couple with the congregation. The primary children also say 2 songs. It just turned out lovely. It has been such a great experience for Budd and he has been teaching me so much about singing and the recorder and we are enjoying doing those things together now.
MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT!!!!

Thanksgiving and More Events

We have had an eventful past few weeks. Thanksgiving was so much fun as we were able to celebrate with Kate's family the Saturday before and then able to fly to Arizona to be with Budd's family for 4 days. We had a lot of fun seeing everyone, especially Budd's family that we only see 2 times a year. The kids loved playing with their cousins. We had a lot of fun in the warm weather in AZ as we were able to play at the park and outside. The highlight for Brinlee was going with all her girl cousins to a place called "Glitter Box" where they all got their hair done like a princess, and they put a lot of glitter on it making it sparkle. I still can see the glitter on her scalp. She was dancing around and having so much fun. All the girls looked so darling. I would have some great pics to put up here, but we had another technical problem with our computer and so we had to reformat again and the disk that we saved everthing on seamed to not work, so we lost those photos. I was so excited to post them and to send them to all the cousins. I am so sorry we lost them. I have learned that I can't put off blogging, I have got to get my pic up as soon as possible in case things like this happen. I was a wreak about it but have decided that all i can do now it write about these memories so we can remember the fun we had.
Spencers highlight was playing with the swords with his cousins. He still talks about how he wants a power sword like Brayden. Luckily the sword he played with and loved, we had allready gotten him for christmas. Spencer is really an active guy and so into swords and Star Wars and tries to do kung fu moves like Kung fu Panda. It is so funny, until someone gets hurt of course, but he has been good about not hitting people. It was so funny, the other day he was playing with a round cork hot pad that I have. I was not sure how he found it but figured it was something he couldnt really hurt. Well, a few minutes later I saw that is was broken in half. He has somehow bent it and broke it. I went up to him and said, " why did you break this?" He looked up at me innocently and said "Because i am the Dragon warrior, Mom." He was so serious about it. I tried to teach him that we dont have to break things to be the Dragon warrior. But we still seam to have something broken every day. The fun of boys.

The week after thanksgiving we had Budds company party. It was so much fun. The had it at a new event center in South Jordan called "Noah's Place" They rented out the whole building, and had activities in every room. They had dinner and a DJ, doing contests and giving out prizes every half hour, and later they had dancing. There were photos with Santa, where they printed out the photo right there and gave it to us. They had 6 different crafts for kids to do, christmas movies in many rooms, wii games on big screens, pool tables, bingo, and they were giong to have ice skating, but it was outside and the weather had been too warm. It was so neat. We met some of Budd's co-workers and we realized what a great company Budd is working for. They are so family oriented. We feel so blessed to have found this company. Budd is really enjoying the job.
Here is Budd and the kids jammin at the party.


On saturday the 6th I did an Art birthday party during the day. We talked all about Van Gogh and did Starry Night. There were more than 15 kids and they had alot of fun. Here are some pics of the great work they did.
That night we had our ward Christmas party. We had a dinner and program which we were a big part of. Brinlee sang with the primary, and Budd is the choir director and we did a couple fun numbers with the choir. Then Budd, Shun and I played "Angles we have heard on High" on our recorders. The gym was loud and did not have good accousitics so you could not hear very well, but it was fun. Here is Brinlee with the primary

Walking in Leaves

We wanted to spend the last good day of fall outside and enjoying the leaves so someone told us about the Farmington Trail that goes by the side of Lagoon. It was beautiful and perfect for enjoying the leaves. We took alot of fun pics of the kids.
Brinlee loves to pose and here she is with some attitude. She is loving her preschool and is learning some spanish. She is always telling me what the Spanish word is for things i say. She is starting to sound out words and actually read her first little book all by herself this week. Even thought the only words in the book were, "I , See and Sam," I was so proud of her. She has been calling me "Mother" all the time lately. I am not sure where she learned to say that instead of Mom, but it is cute.
Spencer is our true boy and an active one. He is also so sweet. We try to read scriptures and say prayers every night before bed, but some nights we forget and put the kids to bed by just saying prayers. So last night Spencer said,"but Mom we didnt read scriptures" so I started to recite a scripture for him, but he said,"no, we need the book" so I got the Book of Mormon out and read a verse that he recited after me and he was much happier. Then we said prayers, I gave him a kiss and said goodnight. A few minutes later he was calling for me. I went into his room and he said,"But Mom we didnt bless you to get better" I said,"why do I need to get better, am I sick?" He relplied that he just wanted to, so I let him pray for me and said goodnight again. Then a few minutes later he again called for me. I went in to see what was the matter and he said, "but we didnt pray for me to get better." So I helped him say a prayer again and made sure we prayed that he was safe and would sleep well. It was so cute of him. Although he doesnt really understand what to say, he know that he wants to bless people. We truly learn from our sweet children.

Fall leaves

I love the fall leaves and it has been so much fun watching so many fall in our backyard this year. It is so pretty. Here is a pic of our yard. It just doesnt do the real color and beauty justice. I love the fall.

More pics

Budds full costume, if you look close you can see the eye liner. Nice!

i thought this was a sweet shot of Spence with the sword looking like it is glowing.

Here are the kids after trick or treating and needing to go to bed but still playing.

Finally Halloween Pics

We had a really fun Halloween. The kids are both old enough to enjoy it this year. They loved running up to each door and yelling " trick or treat" It was fun watching them. We wanted to cordinate as a family this year, but didnt end up pulling it together, so Brinlee decided to be a fairy and our friends were able to help us get a costume on good discount. She loved it of course. Spencer was a ninja guy. We used the awesome Japanese clothing that we got from the Japanese boy living with us and he looked great. His favorite part was the sword. Budd pulled together a great pirate costume with things he had and his goucho (brazilian cowboy) boots and belt from his mission. I was a just a farmer, since I had Lasik the day before and couldnt wear any make up or anything. I got Lasik as a gift from my Mom and it was neat that i got it the day before Halloween and I was still able to do everything with the kids. I was even able to drive the next day and we went to a Halloween parade at Toys R Us with Brinlee's friends. My eyes are doing great and i am so happy about it. I keep thinking i need to take my contacts out or something. It is amazing. Thank you so much Mom!!
Needless to say, we had a great Halloween. The kids are still hyper from it all.

The Creative Family

I saw this book on another blog and it looks really neat.
Here are the blogs that talk about it.
http://sewliberated.typepad.com/sew_liberated/2008/04/post.html
http://petitelefant.blogspot.com/2008_10_01_archive.html on 10.23.08
both of these blogs look like they have fun ideas.
Hope you can Enjoy

Fall Festival

This past weekend we got together with my brothers and their wives and girlfriends. Jay was the onlyl brother that wasn't there. Ruth had called me during the week suggesting that we have a fall festival, meaning we all get together for the day, play games and have a dinner. So we called everyone and it turned out to be so much fun. Garrett and Ruth came down from Logan with thier girl Adalaide. Chris and Meg came up from Sandy with their girl Lily, and Jeffers and Britny and their girl Emberlyn came up from Provo. They also brought Quinn's girlfriend. We played alot of sports. We set up a badmitton set in the backyard. It was beautiful with all the leaves falling, There are a bunch of large trees in our yard adn neighbors yards that are turning bright yellow and i love to look out the window. We also went to the park and played frisbee. Then the men played basketball while the women decorated cupcakes with the kids. They loved that. Then we all went to the church where we all played volleyball while the kids played on the side. It was such a blast. Volleyball was something we could actually all do together and everyone enjoyed it. Budd and Iwere happy to find this out of course, since we love volleyball. Oh, i almost forgot, Shun, the japanese boy staying with us and his friend Kohei, also spent the day with us and we enjoyed them being part of the family.
It is not over yet. We came home and enjoyed a great dinner together, with Chilli, artisan breads, pasta salad and a great spinach salad. Somehow we had enough for everyone and extra. Later we let allthe kids get their Halloween costumes on and took pics and then they went around to each door in the house and did trick or treating. It was so cute and they really had fun. After all that, we still had enough energy to carve pumpkins, until the kids got tired and everyone needed to head home. What a fun time. We are so happy to have some family closer now and hope that we can keep getting together each month.
Here are some pics from the day.
Brinlee in her fairy costume. What a pose!


Cute baby Emberlyn with a great smile

Brinlee with a cupcake at the park

All the cousins

Biking in Zion

A few weeks ago Budd and I and the kids were able to go to St. George to visit my parents for the weekend. Saturday was a fun filled day. In the morning we drove over to Zion with my Dad and brother Jay. We took the bikes with us and biked in Zion. They now only have shuttle buses that are allowed on the main road so were able to bike with no traffic. You just have to stop your bike when the shuttle buses come and let them pass and that only happened 3 times. It was so beautiful. What an amazing way to see Zion. We really enjoyed, and after that we want to get back into biking more. The bike ride was good work out and when we got back to my parents we crashed for a bit. Then at 5:30 my mom and I went to the dinner and General Relief Society broadcast. Right after that I met up with Budd and we went out the the Tuachan, the outdoor theater. My mom got us tickets to Les Miserable for my bday and, wow, it was amazing. We really enjoyed the night out. Thanks Mom

Emberlyns Blessing

My little brother Jeffers had his little girl Emberlyn blessed on Conference weekend while we were all together. My oldest brother Chris just moved back to Utah from Hawaii, so we are happy to have them closer so we can do more with them. So we were actually to able to have my whole family together again. That is twice since July and hopefully we will be able to do that more with everyone in Utah now. Here is a pic of my family and the kids swinging at the lunch after the blessing. It was such a nice day. We love baby Ember. Oh and one pic of Spence that i forgot to put in the last one and is a classic.

Kids!!

Here are a few photos of what the kids have been up to....messy as usual. They love to help me when we make cake, cookies or zuchinni bread, mostly because they get to lick the beaters. Spencer has been way into swords and so Budd made some out of a swimming noodle and pvc pipe, hoping it wouldnt hurt so bad when they hit eachother. It is the orange one Brinlee is holding in the pic. THey have been a hit at our house. And of course I threw in a photo of them being the darling kids that they are. I made sure to take one of them ready for church before we went out the door. They are full of energy.

Kate is 30!

I cannot believe it, but yes, as of Sept 22, I am now 30. Life really does fly and I am determined to enjoy it even more. I loved General Conference last weekend and it caused me to reflect on my life and how I want to choose to joy in this lifes journey. It is a choice we have. I realized that sometimes I just let life happen to me and I don't think about how i am reacting. I get stressed and down and stuck in a rut. But after listening to the Prophet and Apostles I realize that it is truly my choice to be happy and laugh more and love this wonderful life we are given. I feel so blessed.

So, onto my bday. I wanted to make it somewhat memorable, since is was my 30th. So when we got a free nights stay at a B & B for going to a condo presentation, I chose to go on my bday. So my great friend Mary offered to take the kids over night. Which of course they were so excited for the sleepover. Budd and I took off for Salt Lake where we ate at our favorite restaurant Thai Siam on State street and 13th S. We love that place and suggest it to everyone. Then we stayed the night at the Armstrong Mansion, a beautiful 100 year old victorian house made into a nice B & B. We stayed up late watching movies and slept in the next morning. What treat. We had a delcious breakfast and then headed up little Cottenwood Canyon to the very top, where we hiked to Cecret Lake. It was a beautiful day and we even saw some snow. It was so nice to go hiking, so refreshing. We have become determind to do it more often. The overnight stay and day was such a breath of fresh air and it made us feel sane and free again. We realized how badly a short vacation like that away from the kids and with your spouse is needed once in a while to keep your sanity. SO we want to start switching with other friends where we will watch their kids over night once in a while and vice versa. We are totally willing to do it for anyone that lives close and wants to switch off, so you better take us up on it. Here are some pics of us at Cecret Lake and the Armstrong Mansion. I love the one with Budd and the reflections.

Girlfriends

I am sitting here during priesthood session catching up on everyones blogs. But man I sure wish i had something fun to do. Next conference i need to plan a girls night out. I truly miss just hanging out with girlfriends. It seems that as we all get married and start having kids that those fun and crazy, act like silly teenager nights just dont happen any more. I miss those days and think I need a few of those days still to keep me young and free. What do you think?
Who is up for one soon? I know I am!

I have a working computer (laptop)

Hooray, I am back in business to blog. The sad thing is that all the fun pics I wanted to post of our fun adventures in the past few months were lost when our computers hard drive crashed. We just found this out a few days ago and that it is not very possible to retrive our data from it. I was thinking about what was on there and I realized it was pretty much my life. All the baby pics, music and documents from the past 5 years. At least i had printed some and posted some on here. We had not made a back up, so I am strongly suggesting to you all to back up your computers regularly, like every month. We learned a big lesson the hard way. I hope i will be able to do better at keeping up with my blog now and move on from here. Besides the bad computer luck, great things are happening for us. Budd got a great job that starts next week with a company called Comp Health out of Salt Lake. He will be a Physician recruiter. It is the kind of job he was really hoping for so we feel blessed. I am also able to work 4 hours a week teaching art for a homeschool group co op. Then meet once a week all together to take specialized classes like art. I am really ejoying it and feel so blessed that they found me. I am able to teach all ages 3-17 so it is great. I just turned 30 last week
The kids are darling as ever. Brinlee is in a little community school in our neighborhood. There are 7 kids and all the Moms take turns teaching. The great thing is that all the moms have degrees in teaching different subjects. I teach the art of course. We have it 2 times a week for 30 min. The School meets 3 times a week for 3 hours. Moms choose what they would like to teach and it is very hands on. This week was all about anatomy and Brinlee made a full size body of herself with a heart, lungs, stomach, and intestines sticking out. It was great. The kids also have music for 30 min each week and they have Spanish every day for 45 min. Brinlee is loving it and learning so much. It is great to live in such a great neigborhood.
Spencer is being the true boy that he is. He loves swords more than anything. It is fun having more time with him alone while Brinlee is at school. We also go on field trips each week with the school and Spencer gets to come. Today we went to the Police station and the kids really liked it. They even got kid badges.
We have 2 teenagers living with us right now. My 18 yr old bro Quinn and a 15 yr old from Japan named Shun. They keep me on my toes and a little crazy, but even amongst all my craziness I feel truly blessed and i know that the Lord truly loves us.

Technical Difficulties at our house

Ok, I havent posted forever, but i am going to use the excuse of the technical difficulties at our house, instead of my just not doing it. You see, we have had two teenage boys (my brother Quinn, a senior and Shun, and 15 yr old Japanese exchange student) move in with us 3 weeks ago and so we decided to move the computer from downstairs to the main family room. Plus we had to clear the downstairs office out so that they could have bedrooms. All in all it has been going well with them, but on the the computer stuff. When we moved the computer we couldn't get the internet to work. We tried a wireless adapter and that worked once and then kept failing. We also had our laptop crash on us right before all this. We dont know what is going on, but one day the keyboard stopped, then the mouse, so we cannot do anything with it. All my photos and my photo download program are on the laptop, so i have also been sad to not have my recent photos. This has caused me not to want to blog also. So when we do get things working, I will have many things to show, like my first mural that i just did for the little preschool and some neigborhood ladies and i are doing next year. We are very excited about it.

Fried Zucchini

I saw this recipe on Good Day Utah yesterday and decided to try it tonight and it was really good. It is always hard to find new ways to prepare all the zucchini from the garden so if you have a lot of zucchini give this a try.

Prep by cutting zucchini in 1/4 inch slices
1/2 cup flour in a bowl
2 eggs whipped with a fork in a bowl
Put many Ritz type crackers(I used generic brand) in a baggie and use rolling pin to crush until fine. You can use any cracker you want, i also tried French fried onions.
Put cracker crumbs into a bowl.

Heat frying pan to med heat and melt 1/4 cup butter and about 2 Tbls of Olive oil, it helps the butter not burn. Turn heat down to med low.

Dip zucchini slice in flour first, thin coating on both sides, then dip in egg and then dip in cracker and grab some to pour on top.
Set in the pan
Continue with as many pieces that will fit into the pan.
Now here is the secret. While cooking on one side sprinkle upside with salt, pepper, garlic salt, and lemon pepper.
Let cook until brown on the bottom. I didn't watch my time, maybe 3 min each side. I used tongs to flip them. Then sprinkle with seasonings on other side and let is brown. Place on a plate lined with a paper towel and wa la, yummy yummy.

I also did it with some salmon tonight and it was scrumptious.

I have to say the I was actually quite proud of myself for trying it out. I am not one to try out things i see on TV, but this sounded good and it was defiantly worth it. Too bad Budd missed out (He is gone to Scout camp all week) I think he would have loved it. I will have to make some for him when he get back.

Snuggling earling in the morning

One of my favorite parts of the day is first thing in the morning when my kids come in and get in bed with me. They have been doing that a lot lately and this morning it was Spencer who came first and he was being so cute. I love to just snuggle him and squeeze him. It is in that moment with our faces right next to one another, looking into his big brown eyes, that the world stands still, all my worries are gone and nothing else matters It is so precious. We do this thing all the time where we say, "Guess what?" and the kids respond "what?" and then we say, "I love you". This morning Spencer asked me "Guess What" and I responded "what" of course and then he said "I love you" with a big smile and then started laughing as I grabbed him and started to tickle him. A few minutes later he whispered to me "Let's play paper, rock, scissors" I didn't even know he had heard of that. He told me he learned from grandpa. So we played as he made the cutest little scissors with the wrong fingers. These are the moments that keep me going and make life worth living. Children are a gift.

Oakcrest 50th Bday

Oakcrest is a girls camp for girls age 12-14 that i worked at the summer of 1999. I was a counselor and each week I had 8-12 girls in my group. Oakcrest is kinda like an outdoor EFY. We did all kinda of activities all day like playing sports, archery, zipline, hiking, arts and crafts, playing in the river and lots of singing and being silly. We also went on an over night hike each week (it rained almost every time) where we had to build our own latrine, and make our own dutch oven meals. It was exhausting, dirty and amazing. It was probably the greatest job I have ever had. The greatest part was that we were able to have little devotionals with our girls each night and share spiritual thoughts. Whatever I felt i needed to share with them i would. THe spirit of that place is so incredible. I truly felt the lord carrying me and helping me all summer. I also was able to work with the most amazing people. All of the counselors created such a strong bond over that summer and we are still friends. It is so great when you can see someone that you haven't seen for a long time and it is like no time has past. That is what it is like with these women that i worked with. Wow. I know that they want the best for me and would do anything for me and i would do the same for them.
A few of us got together for Oakcrests 50th birthday celebration and drove up together. It is about 30 min south east of Park City. It is so beautiful. It was so great to see everyone. We would be walking around and remembering the good times there and then we would run into another person we knew and we would all throw our arms up and hug everyone. They had a presentation and a photo video of all the years. There was even a lady there that worked there 50 years ago. We sang songs and reminisced. It was a really neat night. I love Oakcrest. It is my dream to create a similar place someday and i hope that it will happen.
The pics are 1) Other counselors and I front of a cabin 2) Me posing for the sunset and my friends husband jumping in the pic, classic! 3) a beautiful sunset just before we left. isn't it amazing.

4th of July

I am back tracking to the 4th. We started the day by handing out flyers for our business in the Ogden parade. Garrett and Ruth were so kind to come down from Logan to help us out. THen we all headed down to American Fork. It is a tradition for my family to meet ever 4th at the park near my Grandma Nilsson's house. We always have a lunch together of fried chicken and all kinds of sides. The best part is the homemade rootbeer. The dry ice slush that is left after the rootbeer is gone is always a hit. We talk for a while and then the waterfight starts. My uncle brings all kinds of water guns and squirt bottles for the kids. It is a lot of fun. Then we also always play frisbee golf around the park. It is a great time. After that fun we hung out at Grandmas for a while so we could talk out of the heat and then we took the kids to Kung Fu Panda. It was a fun show. On our drive home we were lucky enough to be able to pull off the freeway and watch the Thanksgiving point fireworks. We didnt get home until after 11pm and we were exhausted but what a great day. I am so grateful for this country and our freedom.
These pics are of the water fight, us watching fireworks and the kids with my brother Quinn that is going to start living with us.

What a crazy week

Last week was crazy and i am so happy we made it through. I taught an art camp Tues, Wed and Thurs and this one had two sessions. One was 10am-12 and the other was 1pm-3pm. In the morning i had 8 kids that were from 4-8yrs old. In the afternoon I had kids that were from 8-12 yrs old. We had a lot of fun and did a lot of projects. I think some of the favorites were tie dye, paper mache and coil pots made of model magic. It was great, but i do have to say that i don't know if i was do two sessions in a day again. It was very exhausting to me. I couldn't believe how much it wore me out. We also had my Dad here on wed to help us start to finish our downstairs bathroom. So we listened to some banging and hammering that day. To add to the craziness, I also had one of my close high school friends, Megan, stop by on wed during my one hour break since it was the only time we could see each other. It was great to see her and i am so glad we at least had a few minutes to catch up. Then Thurs night after I had fished art classes and rested a little, I cleaned the house and prepared our guest room for a Japanese lady and her 4 yr old son who arrived and are staying with us for 3 weeks. They are very nice and both speak English very well. Luckily my mom, and lifesaver, was here the whole time to help me stay sane and to watch the kids while i taught. She is great and i always love having her here. I couldnt have made it through the week without her. Thanks Mom.
What a great week!!
Pic of Tie Dying and the kids playing bubbles with Daiki the Japanese boy staying with us. They have become good friends

Spencer becomes a member of Star Trek

Spencer woke up the other morning with a bit in the middle of his forehead. It swelled up until allround his eyes were swollen. He actually looked like a cling-On (however you spell that). It wasnt until a day later that i thought of taking a pic so these are not even a bad as it looked the day before. I was so worried it might not go down and he would look silly forever, luckily a few days later it went down. We still dont know what bit him but we hope it doesnt find him again.

Big Cookies

While grocery shopping the other days the kids caught eye of some big cookies that were decorated with lots of yummy frosting and plastic rings with different disney characters on them. I gave in to them wanting them, since it came with a little toy that i thought would be fun. Brinlee picked Snow white and Spencer picked one with Lighting Mcqueen and Mater. They loved them and couldnt even eat the whole thing, and of course the rings were lost or broken before the day was over, but they did enjoy the moment. Here are some fun pics of them taking a bite.