Coming Soon!

Video clips from all of our concerts! (This will be coming soon, right Tracy?)

Stay tuned!

Just Another Blog Post

Here's Finlay in the Fourth Grade County Fair with his clay diorama of Bryce Canyon. He had Garfield county. I didn't even know where that was, but now I do! (The entire population of Garfield County is less than 5,000 people). He did a good job on his project.

We had a great Thanksgiving dinner at home. Sure wish mom and dad could have joined us, though.

We bought a Christmas tree the day after Thanksgiving and decorated it on that Saturday. The kitties think it's the best toy ever. Between them and Xander the poor Christmas tree hardly stands a chance. At least they haven't knocked it over yet. (Knock on wood.)

Ryan went to a Snow College open house and walked with a two-year full tuition scholarship! Way to go, Ryan. All that hard work in school has paid off. I'm so proud of him. I know he'll do great in college. It kind of freaks me out to think of him leaving home, though. My babies are growing up!


Well, I hope you are all enjoying the Christmas season. If you live anywhere near Springville, my Musettes Concert is next Sunday, December 12, at 7pm at the church at 355 E. Center St. Please come! Ryan and Tracy are playing a piano duet for us. It's going to be a great program.

A Little of What You Missed

Here is a video of some clips we got of Ryan performing in Les Miserables at the high school. The performance was amazing! Those kids are so talented and they put their whole hearts into the play. I pretty much bawled my eyes out the whole time.

(Honestly! Tracy got the video ready, but I couldn't upload it with blogger. I had to upload it on YouTube and embed it. Sheesh! This is why I don't post videos often.)

 In the final scene, Ryan at the back of the stage a little to the right of center. Watch close and you can see him here and there.

Anyway, it was absolutely incredible. If anyone lives close enough to drive down to Salem Hills High School, tonight it their last performance. You should go see it! You will be glad you did. 

On Saturday, Tracy, Rusty, Sam and Finlay wen to the annual ward turkey shoot (shotgun shooting) and Tracy and Rusty both won a turkey!  Here are some pictures:

Rusty and Bryce strike a pose

I just love that look on his face

Finlay awaiting breakfast

Sam looks happy

Our New Additions

Our two old cats, Rugen and Button, just aren't catching the mice anymore. It was time to get some new cats. I wasn't very happy at the prospect, but we had a mouse in the house last week. Ick! So, it is definitely time to do something. Our neighbor, Jay's cat had five kittens out in his hay stack, and we are now the happy owners of three of them. The kids are thrilled. They are really cute.

Hazel and Skippy playing

Alice, the most wild of the three, in the basket

Hazel, the tiniest and most cuddly

Skippy, the male--the biggest and most brave

We ROCKED October!

Here's how:

Rusty and Sam performed in their first concert of the year:

Ryan performed in his first concert also. It was awesome and included the choir and dance company too. We neglected to bring the camera, but it rocked!

Tracy caught a great big fish:

(He let it go after that.) Tracy also went to L.A. for the Adobe Max conference last week. It's a big computer conference. He had a great time.

The Marching Band garnered two more first place trophies and two second place finishes a point or less behind first. They were also invited to perform for the crowd after the 5A bands at the Bridgerland tournament at Utah State yesterday. They rocked the house! They have one more competition this weekend in St. George. Good luck, guys!

I set a goal to finish the novella I was working on. That would require twice as much writing as I would normally do in a month. And I did it! I finished "Renegade" on Friday. Wrote 89 pages this month, which doubled my previous monthly record. Read about it on my writing blog. I also started exercising regularly for the first time since I sprained my ankle six months ago.

We had a great time at the Taylor Family Halloween Party:

I even made sugar cookies (a minor miracle). I love how they both have big gobs of frosting, but no cookie.

We had some Halloween fun too. A hail storm complete with thunder and lightning hit just in time for trunk-or-treating at the church. We did it in the gym instead of outside. When we came out of the church, there was the brightest and most beautiful double rainbow I have ever seen. Here's a picture of the kids after we got home. They made out like bandits on the candy!

 

Here's hoping November will be just as great!

Xander's Birthday, Fall Break, etc...

(Blogger is driving me crazy tonight! Argh. I can't get it to do anything right!)

Xander turned 3 years old a couple of weeks ago! He thoroughly enjoys his birthday, after witnessing four others in the month beforehand. If someone wished him happy birthday, he would get angry and say, "No, it's my birthday!" Very funny. Tracy got a video clip of it, but again, I have not yet learned the secrets of video posting. Sorry. Here he is blowing out his candles. Don't look at my poor crooked, pathetic cake. It tasted good!

Over fall break, we went to Cornbelly's at Thanksgiving point. All in all, we had a good time, but it was hot! I got sunburned. That's not supposed to happen in October. After Cornbelly's we took everyone out to dinner at Chuck-A-Rama. It was a fun, tiring day.

Squinting into the sun when we arrived.

A little bit lost in the corn maze.

Xander found a walking stick, er, stalk.

Most of our little piggies.

 

In the world's largest rocking chair.

The boys had almost as much fun in the princess playland as Camary did.

More Pics

Camary blowing out her candles on her sixth birthday in September

Ryan's Homecoming group

Ryan and his date, Kaylynn at Homecoming

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finaly blowing out the candles on his tenth birthday last week

Pictures from the Winning Competition--Enjoy!

Their show is called "Recharged: The Music of Styx." They play Mr. Roboto, Show Me the Way, and Come Sail Away. It's awesome.

Congratulations, Guys!

I'm a little late here, but last Saturday (Sep. 25), the Salem Hills Marching Band competed in their first tournament of the year, the Nebo Tournament of Bands at Payson High School.

(Argh! Blogger won't upload my pictures and it's just too late to fight with it. Maybe I can post them another time.)

Anyway, they did awesome! They won First Place and Outstanding Visual Performance and Outstanding Musical Performance.

Way to go!

Has Anyone Seen my Brain?

Just wondering. It seems to have gone AWOL. Like when I went to the story to get hamburger buns and tortilla chips. I came home with buns and Ruffles. Yeah. I didn't even notice I had got the wrong chips until well after I got home. And right now, I can't even remember any of the other stupid and dingy things I've done that I was going to post here. Oh, well. That's probably for the best.

A couple funny stories: The other night while praying before family scripture study, I asked, "Please bless that our testimonies can be shaken...I mean strengthened!" That was pretty much it for scripture study that night. Tonight we were listening to some music, and Camary asked, "What did she say?"
"Be a little bolder."
"Be a little boulder?" (You could tell by the look on her face that's what she thought I said.)

Okay, it's late and this feels really random. I'm going to bed.

G'night!

Yeah, so I'm a little behind in the blogging...

The school year is in full swing now, complete with homework, football games, soccer and Musettes. It's fun. We went to the zoo Saturday as part of Sam's school project to plan and execute a family activity. Here are some pictures from our trip:

 

We had a good time. It's birthday week! Mine was Friday, Camary's is Monday and Tracy's on Tuesday. As a bonus this week, my mom and dad are here! They are refinishing our deck for us. Thank you, thank you, thank you! It's fun to have them here.

Here's some fun with birthday balloons:

Finlay

 

Sam

Princess Camary

Xander Man