Thursday, January 15, 2015

What Parents Go Through For There Children

This year Olivia did a report on an endangered species.  She chose the Blue Macaw.  It is a beautiful bird and I have to say our family knows a lot about it now.  So, she had to do a model or a costume.  Olivia opted for the costume.  I thought it would be a cinch to find a royal blue sweat suit with a hood.  
The hoodie was key because we had to put the eyes on it.  What I discovered is that royal blue is not in style at this time unless you are BYU or Boise State, and I wasn't interested in the logo.  So after checking every store in town, I finally I resorted to ordering online. We were set. Or so we thought. 
So the night before the presentation, we were scrambling to come up with something because the sweat suit had not come.  It was too late to find something.  She would have to wear her navy blue charter clothes instead.  Jeff helped her with a cardboard beak , cardboard wings with crepe paper on them, and a crepe paper tail.  We colored a parrot stuffed animal blue with markers and put some fake feathers on it.
I can't remember what time the unveiling was for the parents and the school, but at 10:00am the blue sweat suit showed up.  I ran it over to Olivia and she got it on just in time.  When I saw her with her costume flapping those wings as happy as a lark,or blue macaw, it was such a relief. It is crazy what parents go through for there children.
 


Friday, January 9, 2015

Decorating the Christmas Tree

Because we snuck in a trip to Disneyland, I was so afraid that I'd get behind on Christmas.  So before we left I put up many of the decorations.  The tree on the other hand was something else entirely. 
We are those people who love a fresh, real tree.  I know we will go the other way someday, but not today. We arrived home Saturday night.  Monday at lunch Jeff called me and said I can help you with the tree at lunch if you want.  So I ran down to Fred Meyer.  We usually get a 9 foot tree, so there aren't many choices.  I looked at three trees and picked one.  They loaded it up and I drove home and Jeff put it up.  I spent the rest of the day putting on as many white lights as I could find and we were ready for family night to decorate the tree.  This is a record for us. 
Even before the ornaments, I think the tree is magical.  I can't exactly remember what they were singing, but the magic had begun. "Oh Christmas Tree Oh Christmas Tree How Lovely Are Thy Branches."
 This little gem, we still don't really know what it is, maybe a star.  Either way, Olivia made it with care.
 There is a Salt City Candle that is called Christmas Trimmings that Kristen and I really love.  They must have put old pine needles, tissue paper and cardboard boxes in the formula, but it reminds me of the smell of getting out your ornaments from the past. 
 What I hear a lot of is, "Mom look at this one."  Or, "Do you remember when we got this one?" " This one is so beautiful!"  Can you picture Kyle saying that?  Haha
I do love the one's with a picture when they were little.   I'm thinking this is from nursery.l
 Homemade one's from Grammy and Grandma.
 The Ornaments that we got them last year. 

 Our Disney Princess Ornaments.










Now the tree is perfect.  All of the ornaments on the front and a few on the back.  We have to save a place for Annalisa's ornaments.  Then kids kept asking if we were going to get Kate's out.  No, we don't want them to get broken while she's gone.









Monday, December 22, 2014

The Christmas Cup

Last Saturday we had our 2nd annual Christmas Cup Competition.  Because we were all at our niece, Jessie's wedding over Thanksgiving we didn't hold the Christmas Cup Competition the day after like we did the year before.  I figured we'd just continue it next year.  That little glitch did not deter my husband, Jeff Jones.  So on December 20th we gathered at Freeman park to continue this new tradition. 

 Last years champion, Michael kind of looks a little too comfortable with the Christmas cup like he might keep it.















As usual Jeff made snack bags for everyone to take with them for sustenance on the frisbee golf tournament. 

                                                           Let's get started!
Jeff explained all of the rules and split up the teams.  Now to level the playing field, he gave a point off for each unintentional hitting of trees.  If your par was higher than 8, you could take off 4.  Then if you hit the post and didn't make it in you could take one off.  Lastly if your disc landed on top of someone else's disc, you could get 4 off.  Each hole had winning possibilities.  For instance whoever got the furthest drive or the shortest  drive or the least amount of throws, etc.  So as you can see anyone could be a winner.

Some of us weren't sure that the weather would participate, so we came in boots, hats and gloves.  Kyle did not wear boots and we learned that that was a mistake because the grass was snowy and a little slushy.  He hung in their anyway as did many others.
These pictures were before everyone had frozen, wet feet and gloves.See how happy they are! 
We ran our first course with various approaches and styles.


These two girls played, but found their own kind of fun in the trees.

When we got back from our first round, Jeff had hot chocolate to warm our bones and we started the car heaters to help people make it through the next part.  Jeff matched the couples who played the next round and we were able to play the best throw on each team.
Kyle pretending to be mad because he is tied for 2nd place.  Anna and I got matched with the same score of 34.  The lowest score was 27 for Jeff and Nathan and Kyle at 28.




We learned a few tricks when we played the second round.  1. If you don't want  to soak your gloves every time you pick your disc up out of the snow, then step on the edge so it will flip up.  Then hit it on your boot to get the snow off. 2. Bring an extra pair of gloves.  3. Wear a mitten on the left hand and glove on throwing hand. 4. The thicker you look the longer you will last. 5. When you throw the disc into the locked tennis court have a small person sneak under the door to get it. 6. When climbing trees to retrieve your disc, do not wear your nice coat, unless you want to smell like sap for the rest of the winter.  7. Don't wipe your runny nose with your throwing hand.  OK, now we're ready to play the final round.
Guess what ?  We had a surprise ending, even to the winners.  With the tree rule and the bar rule and the lucky throw that I had that landed on Spencer's frisbee, Annalisa and I ended with 17.  It probably was our best throwing ever. Since Anna and I started with the same score and added to our 17, we won by a hair. Michael passed it on to us.  We signed the cup realizing that this probably will never happen again.  I forgot to mention that everyone signed the certificate/ entry form at the beginning and we received it at the end.


Kyle was Second place by one point.  Jeff and Nathan were right behind him in thirdl.

It ended up being so fun in a diehard sort of way and Jeff made it happen.  I always say that Jeff is the fun one and it's true.