Belated Christmas FHE

I got this gingerbread house kit at the store (I know I'm extremely craft challenged and not afraid to admit it) and thought it would be fun to make for FHE, but Chan played raquetball on Monday night, so we decided to do it last night instead. McKinley was extremely excited to make the gingerbread house, she was jumping up and down and wouldn't even stop talking to breathe. She has started to say "Take it down a few knotches" since she hears it so much from Chan & I.

Chan did all the frosting and then let McKinley put on the candy. Whenever I would make a suggestion she would say "Oh, that would be perfect," or "That's just a great idea."

This is what is was supposed to look like.This is what it really looked like, not too bad for an outdated jock, a 3 year old, and a craft challenged woman...well ok, it's pretty weak but we like it. We'll say it has personality.
McKinley took this photo of us at the end and I thought it turned out pretty well. Maybe photography is in her future.....
Merry Christmas Everyone!!!

Just the housekeeper

Frequently McKinley likes me to be the "payer girl" aka the cashier at a pretend store where she purchases our household items with credit cards aka Albertson's preferred customer cards. Tonight she came up to while I was on the computer and said "ding, dong." This means she is ready to make her purchase. So I said "Hello, what would you like to buy today?" She sighed and said "Nothing, I just have to pay the housekeeper," and handed me her "credit card." I have no idea where she even learned what a housekeeper was but apparently I'm it. It reminds me of a cartoon my mom used to have on her desk where a child was looking at a picture of his parent's wedding day and asked his dad "Is that the day Mom came to work for us?"

Happy Birthday G-DUB!

Today is my little brother Garrett's Birthday. Garr- this is a picture McKinley drew of you for your birthday, she also says she wants to get you lots and lots of presents, so we'll try. Garrett is such a wonderful kid who always tries hard to do what's right. He's the more soft spoken of the Wahlen Clan but when he speaks up we can expect to be laughing, he's quite the comedian. He's a great uncle to our girls and a great example to us, especially of non-materialism. It's like pulling teeth to get that kid to spend money or to say something he wants. Happy Birthday Sweet G, Buckwheat, G-Dub, etc. we love you! We'll see you tomorrow night at the Ririe game, hopefully we'll get to party afterwards. We fully expect you to beat your 3-point record this year. For those who don't know - last year Garrett scored EIGHT 3 pointers in one half of a basketball game, yes he's quite the baller!

I think someone must have been playing with my camera since I'm not quite sure where this photo came from.

Rise and SHOUT, and the rest of our Thanksgiving weekend.

Well, my camera went defunct so I don't have many pictures of our great Thanksgiving Day which we spent in Aberdeen at my parents home. The "highlight"of the dinner was when it got really quiet and McKinley looked at all of us and said "I hate you guys" AAHH, how do you react to that? Everyone was laughing and I knew McKin was joking but we should probably try to kick the habit of expressing "hate" right now.

The highlight of the weekend was definitely going to the BYU game and seeing our Cougars beat the Utes once again. Is there anything sweeter in the world? There are not many things in this world that will result in Chandler and I jumping up and down, screaming and hugging each other but 4th and 18 from Hall to Collie did it do us. Not quite as awesome as Beck to Harline but we'll definitely take it. I definitely need to repent for finding such immense joy in the broken hearted faces of the Ute fans. Even though I could tell they were hurting I had a overwhelming urge to look right at them and scream "Go Cougs" or even worse "Utes Suck." Man, the things sports do to us.... well maybe just to me.

Finally to end the crazy weekend we went to the Choir Broadcast on Temple Square Sunday morning and then to the Little America Brunch (yummmmm) and towards the end of the feeding frenzy I put Halle on the floor right next to me with a toy. I perhaps should have surveyed the area first because a minute later my mom found Halle with a piece of broken glass in her hands and in looking around there were pieces everywhere. The waitress hadn't done a very thorough job at picking up a broken glass. We did a quick inspection of Halle and didn't find anything and she wasn't crying or anything. When we left a few minutes later I saw that I had blood all over my shirt and checked out Halle and both of her precious little hands were covered in blood. Halle was so brave and didn't even cry as the waitress rushed us to the back to get her all bandaged up. Of course all the management was very apologetic, but now the question is to sue or not to sue? Just kidding...........sort of!

What Team? Wildcats!

Saturday my mom and I took Whitney and McKinley to Salt Lake to see Disney's "High School Musical, the Ice Tour." After she stopped screaming that she couldn't have a $40.00 t-shirt McKinley had a great time. She was singing, dancing, and clapping and it was a really cute show. We tried to take a picture out front, but couldn't get McKinley to take her eyes off her "High Schoo Musical Yearbook."

McKin just singing along, wearing her $10 plastic hat (it did come with cotton candy)

The Plague

So the last few weeks have been full of constant sickness on some level for our family. After all the ear infections, sore throats, runny noses, smokers coughs, and our kids waking up covered in throw up we are now only left with lingering coughs that I hope won't turn into anything more.

A lovely combo of green beans and amoxocillin.

Happy Late Birthday to the Best MOM Ever!

Sorry mom that this post was very late, I had a one track mind last week (primary program, primary program, primary program...) so here's hoping you had a great birthday, even though you spent your day celebrating Aunt Lovinia's. Thanks for being a great mom, my best friend, and a wonderful nana! We love you!