5 Going on Eternity

Time is usually seen as a negative thing. Time crawls when we are looking forward to something fun; family get-togethers, Christmas, Spring Break, or the quiet hours after putting the kids to bed. On the other hand, time flies by as we watch our children grow up. This is the side of time that I usually curse the most. Little children are so precious, almost too precious for this world. I wonder if Heavenly Father feels the same. Watching us grow, triumph, slip and fall, get up again, all the time aching for that child-like love.
My children are my joy. I love them for different and unique reasons, but how I love them is the same.

I have known and loved My Miley for 5 years. She is 5 years old now! Yikes.

Whenever I get reminiscent, I first feel happy thinking about the great and beautiful times we've had. Then I get a little sad. Not very sad, just a little tweak in my heart knowing that I'll never see My Miley as a chubby-faced tot again. I won't be able to feel her porcelain baby skin against my cheek, or rock her and sing Away In A Manger as a lullaby. No matter how many times I write in my journal, I will never remember all of the cute things that came out of her mouth. Watching Mary Poppins for the first time will only happen once. Hopefully, I will never forget the energy in her body and the excitement in her face as Julie Andrews snapped her fingers to clean the nursery.

After feeling this sadness, I try to anticipate the the great things in store for us. Recitals, competitions, holidays, vacations, and everyday finger-snappin' magic. These thoughts make my heart do a quarter turn back in to place and I am even happier than before.

These pictures of Miley make me happy.

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Miley's Birthday party was at Pirate Island Pizza! It was amaze~ing! The pizza was as big as the table, and her presents took up the space of another table. There was hardly any room for us to sit. We were too busy playing games and eating junk to sit down anyway.


It was awesome to see Grandpa play too. Here he is in the flight simulator.
So much fun!

I found my camera!

Now it's time to play catch-up with all the pictures that I found!

Here is our slew of Holiday Randomness:

Miley had a Christmas Program and Activity Day at her preschool. She had been practicing "Feliz Navidad" all December long, and she tried to sing the loudest during the Screaming Program--I mean, Singing Program.

Just look at Miley's teacher. This picture says it all!


My big girl makes friends so easily. She is so genuine and caring toward all of her friends. These are a couple of her BFFs.




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What Christmas Vaca wouldn't be complete without:
1- a trip to Temple Square?
2- a Family argument?
3- a car getting booted?

Lucky for us Snodgress', we only did #1, a little bit of #2, and barely missed doing #3.



Uncle Ricky and Izzy

Jas and Lee (doesn't he look British?) :)

Jack and B


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As for the Richards Fam, we went sledding.



I don't know if you remember last year's post about sledding. It had to do with Don and him laughing hysterically at my kids as they tumbled willy-nilly down the frozen hill. Kids crying, Don laughing.

This year...
Isaac, Miley and Don all piled on the sled and did a Clark Griswald down the hill and a half mile to the road. Don couldn't grab Ike in time.

As a result...
Oh, Ike was fine. I was not! Don spent the rest of Christmas Eve humbly asking for my forgiveness for bringing my baby home battered and bloody. As I understand it, he screamed and cried all the way home from the hill. Not from being hurt, but because he couldn't go sledding anymore. My little TOUGH GUY.


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Christmas morning was magic! Santa filled our stockings and ate the cookies (even though Isaac blamed Ava, "Ava did it!" He blames her for everything.)



Miley was making sure she didn't miss any presents.

I did a mostly handmade Christmas this year. My kids got the brunt of it. I made them pj's, robes, bean bags, personalized Book of Mormons, hats, a super hero cape, and a wedding dress complete with veil. The wedding dress is my favorite. I made it from Don's old missionary shirt that we were going to throw out. I just added lace, beads, and pearls. $0. My baby bride.


After breakfast with the Richards, we went to open more presents at G & G Snodgress' house!


We opened traditional British Christmas Crackers, thus the funny crowns and toys.



When it was all said and done, this is how we felt:

! ! ! ! !

Hooray for Christmas! It's coming down to it--crunch time! I have many lists and sub-lists in which I try to keep organized, but they're not working! Come on!


(I realize that was a whole paragraph of exclamation points, hehe!)


Okay, it's my goal to have a relaxing Christmas vacation before I start nursing school in January. So, I've done all my shopping (that's the easy part). Now I just have a mountain of fabric, ribbons, and beads that needs to turn into homemade presents. That's right family... look out! Start working on your surprised and happy faces now! I also have mountains of pecan brittle to make--yum! And fudge! And cookies! And marshmallow gooies...!


(I'm getting dangerously close to another exclamation point paragraph. Let me calm down a minute.)


I love Christmas. I love the snow. I love how my house is positioned in a vortex where the wind carries all the snow on to my driveway! Dead serious. The whole neighborhood jokes about it. The other day (when it didn't snow) the roads were clear, and grass was showing, but somehow... somehow (!), there was a foot and a half of snow just on our driveway.... :-! I did my best to shovel it. Then good ol' Father-in-law stepped in to show me how it's done. He flung that snow clear down the street! (He shoveled coal back in the day.)


I wanted to throw in some pictures of Don, Aunt Holly and the kids at the Dinosaur Museum (Ike's favorite place).

Ike LOVED the shark... Miley did NOT!

I just love Miley's lips in this picture!

I love Ike's face here. He is watching parachutes fly up the tube.

Well, this will have to be my post for tonight. I fear I am procrastinating... darn sewing projects. I am NOT doing this homemade Christmas-thing next year.


Yeah, right. ;)

This makes me an Elvis fan

Everyone knows Elvis. I think he was the one that started the first name only fad. I love his younger years. How good looking is he?

Dark hair. Army uniform. Guitar in hand. Whoo!


My mother-in-law is a big fan. My little sis has everything Elvis--calendars, blankets, Christmas ornaments, toothbrush--maybe. But what got me to adore Elvis is this song. I love how sweet and slow it is.


Romantic.


Sad.


Make sure and turn up the volume, you have to hear this.


This song really turns him into a person. He has a real human moment here. He's laughing at that lady, right? I wonder what she is doing--besides the high-pitch wail. She sounds really in to it.

Haha! I love it! "Sing it, baby."

Trick or Treat!

I am going to try and make this a quick post. I wanted to show Halloween pictures before I do a nose dive in to bed. What an exhausting day! Up at 7:30 to make hotcakes and watch Shawn of the Dead on TV. HI-larious! I do enjoy a bit of British comedy now and again. ;)

We spent our morning and mid-afternoon at Gram & Grampa Snodgress' house. Everyone was all dressed up (except for Ike, he was having trust (?) issues with his costume). I was nervous to see how Ava would react to a tall, dark, scary Gramma witch. But what made Ava cry hysterically was Aunt B's costume. It was absolutely horrible. You'd think Aunt B stuck her with a pin to make her cry like that! By the way, Aunt B was dressed as Tom Brady. I know! Sca~ary, especially if you're a Buccaneer's fan ;).

Non-scary Witches standing in a graveyard.


We started the party with a treasure hunt. The kids thought it was the greatest thing in the whole world! It was so cute. The clues were in the cemetary, the BBQ, Aunt B's car, and on the oak tree. The kids got stuck on one clue. Not because it was difficult to find, but because it was being guarded by a GIANT spider! Auntie Tom Brady came to the rescue.


Gramma hid the treasure chest under a big pile of oak leaves. It was filled with candy, toys, miniature skeletons, and big, red, beautiful shiny apples.



We also made ghost suckers. Ava ate hers in like, 3 bites--I swear! She then experienced her first sugar rush. Kind of like seeing a kitten high on catnip.

We watched the traditional cartoon Halloween specials and ate David's awesome pulled pork sandwiches. Good times.


On to Trick-Or-Treating!!!!

The weather was unusually warm, I thought. No jackets for trick-or-treating, hooray! That always makes for a good Halloween.



Ding-dong.

"Trick-or-cheat."

"Oh, my! What a cute little witch. And this little boy is a...a... Hey parents, what is he?"

Our reply, "Yah, we don't know either."


Fabulous Witch!

????? Robot-Buzz ????? (That's what he claimed to be.)
As deemed by Gramma Witch; Loofa Princess.Woody & Jesse



Oh, had to post a pic of our Jack-O-Lantern! He's a cannibal. >:0 (gasp!)

How to NOT DIY

As many of you know, I am a Do-It-Yourselfer. Let me rephrase that; I try to be a Do-It-Yourselfer. I am one of those who scour the internet searching for sites labeled, "DIY," "Penny-Pinching," "Make your own...," etc. It has actually become a nasty habit. Allow me to explain;

DIYs are awesome. There are many great things which accompany a DIY task.

1. Sense of accomplishment.

2. Bragging rights.

3. Money saved.

4. Creative muscles stretched.

5. And on and on...

But my bad habit is DIY--to the extreme! As many of my family members have experienced my "Homemade Christmas," they could tell you that maybe buying a nice bar of soap would have been better than me spending weeks and weeks curing my own homemade soaps. After buying all the ingredients (glycerin, dye, lavender petals, scented oils), that came out to one expensive bar of soap! After that sudsy Christmas, my soap making days were over. "Wow, two bars of soap. It makes me wish I had bought you another sweater..."



My latest adventure is labeled, "Reversible Disaster."



It is my Mother-in-Law's birthday. Stressing over what to give, I went to Don for help.

......

No help.


Being the practical and thrift savvy woman that I am, I came up with a reversible tablecloth for the holidays.

Perfect!

Find 2 scraps of festive fabric, twist it through my magic sewing machine, and viola! A much-needed tablecloth. Easy. Cheap. Practical. And most importantly, a DIY! (my favorite thing!)


That was my thinking, anyway.


$40 and 18+ hours later, I realized that I am not as cool as I thought I was. :)


I was having a hard time with the fabric bunching together. I was worried that it would look all frumpy and wrinkled on the table, so I came up with a brilliant idea.


Get ready, here it comes...


Make tucks and swoops in the tablecloth so the wrinkles would look on purpose! Haha! Genius! At this point, I am thinking to myself, "Look at me! I am fabulous! I should start my own craft blog!"


And after working on this splendid tablecloth (swoops and all) for the past 3 nights... it still just looks wrinkly.
:/


I can just imagine Vicki opening her gift. She might say something like, "Oh Kelly, how pretty. It's a... bedsheet? Curtains? Patio furniture cover?" And I will say, "No, no, no. It's a shabby-chic tablecloth, worth it's weight in gold." I can call it shabby-chic. Things like that are supposed to be wrinkly and homemade-looking. :P


Happy Birthday, Vicki. I love you.

Mill 'Crik' Canyon

The weather is so beautiful in Northern Utah! I am fully appreciating the cool-chilly air and loving all the reds, oranges, and yellows. I love that I can eat soup and drink hot cocoa while I watch the dark clouds roll across the mountains. Could Fall be my favorite season? Possibly. The thing that might put Fall a smidge above the rest is the fashion! I love Fall fashion. Tall boots, turtle necks, light jackets, funky scarves, and (so excited about) hats! Am I right, girls? Hats are so cute now-a-days.

I am glad that I can spend this Fall in the blustery climate of Northern Utah. It is my goal to do all the fun things; hay rides, pumpkin patches, Halloween parties, corn mazes, etc. But the thing at the top of my list was dutch oven cookout at Mill Creek Canyon!

When I was a kid, my parents would take us up the canyon to see the changing leaves. My mom has it down to a science. She knows exactly when the leaves are going to be at their peak. I love my mom for so many reasons, and that is one of them. Another reason, is that she calls it Mill Crik Canyon. She is well-aware that there is no I in creek, but that's just how it is.

"Careful, now. Don't fall in the crik!"
Post Challenge: How many times can you spot Buzz? Hint: It's 3 :)



Here is classic Grandpa: Plaid flannel, pocketknife on belt, and Coke in hand.There are so many reason why I love my dad. I love his smile. And I love the smile that he puts on my kids faces.

I also love my sisters.

I love that we can make memories from an ordinary day. Memories that we will laugh about for a lifetime. I'm going to laugh about this picture for a while...
Aunt Jas is going to England for a while. "We'll miss you so much, sis!" (Notice the cute bambushka hat!)
Silly Parents... :)
We had a wonderful time hiking up and down the trail, eating delicious Mountain Chicken, throwing leaves into the crik, and eating the 5 desserts that mom brought! Oh, I can't wait 'til next red-leaf season!