Happy Thanksgiving

For several weeks the girls have been working on Thanksgiving plays to present to the adults at Thanksgiving dinner. They wrote a script, made props, decided on music and costumes, and have practiced extensively at Sunday dinners. It is, actually, quite impressive.

My job for the dinner was rolls, Jello-O salad, and pies. We decided on four pies this year: Pumpkin (I'm not a fan of pumpkin, but Ben insists. This year, I bought an auction item at the youth fundraiser auction at church, where one of the boys grew a pumpkin and made the filling with his homegrown pumpkin. Ben said it was delicious and one of the best pumpkin pies he has ever had), apple pie, peppermint chocolate, and Audra made lemon meringue.

We were glad we could get to Grandma and Grandpa's despite all the snow. It is still incredibly COLD, but at least the roads were clear for the most part.

DJ's parents also joined us, which was wonderful. It was so great to spend Thanksgiving in the best possible way: With incredible food (thank you, Ann!) and family. Truly, we are incredibly blessed.

Storm!

It did not come as a surprise- I knew about the storm since last Thursday, and I changed all my plans and prepared accordingly (as in, I did all the grocery shopping we would need for the week on Friday- there was NO WAY I was going to the store yesterday- and I was right. People said the lines at KingSoopers stretched all around the store. I have no idea why everyone waited until the last minute to get their gallon of milk when we knew about it for almost a week).

Anyway, it was still crazy to wake up to a foot of snow- with the snow still coming. In the end, we got about 16 inches, which is a lot- even for us.

The UPS which came to deliver something Ben ordered yesterday from Amazon (it's all Ben's fault) got stuck and had to be rescued by another UPS driver.

Our street still hasn't been plowed, and I don't know when it will get plowed. But, until it gets done, we are stuck. Without an SUV, there's no way we will even attempt to leave. In fact, Ben was supposed to go help shovel snow at the church, but there was literally no way he could go. Apparently the main roads are fine, it's just all the side roads that are bad. We are hoping we will get out tomorrow because we want to go sledding- even though it is only supposed to be 20 degrees for the high.

We are extremely grateful that Ben was able to work from home today! He said he had a co-worker from Chicago who was bragging yesterday about he would for sure go in today, but he stayed home, too, despite his bravado.

I made pancakes for breakfast, had the girls do the tiniest bit of school, then they went and shoveled snow for a couple of hours, came inside freezing and warmed up, we got a lot of excitement due to the UPS truck struggles, the neighbor came over to eat lunch and we watched "Klaus" on Netflix, then I kicked the girls outside again to go play in the snow where they built lots of tunnels.

All in all, it was a good day. This is the worst storm we have had for quite some time, but we used it to have a relaxing day at home.

The tunnels all connected underneath. The girls really enjoyed making these.

Cousins!

If we get to spend Thanksgiving break snuggling with baby Evan, we will be in Heaven!

The Dresser

17 years ago I moved to Denver- not knowing a single person, and not having a penny to my name. I would soon be starting a job at Bear Creek High School making $28,000/year. But, my first paycheck wouldn't come until September 31st, and it was only July 15th. I had to take out a $2000 loan from my future paychecks just to get by for those first several weeks.

All of my belongings fit in the back of a Toyota Corolla.

I slept on the floor for about a month. Finally, I was able to buy a used dresser, nightstand, and bed for $150. That was a lot of money!

Audra is in the process of moving to a bedroom downstairs because she wants her own room. With all of the moving, we are purging and reorganizing. We moved Camille into Claire's room.

And that left us with an extra dresser- the used dresser I bought when I first moved here.

We decided to take it to Goodwill. It was sad, but necessary. Goodwill, however, wouldn't take it. That's how bad of shape it is in. It's been through a lot! So, we took it to Arc, and they barely accepted it- but they did.

It's fun thinking of that time when I first moved here- to see where the trajectory of my life has taken me. That was a lonely and difficult, and exhilarating and incredible time of my life. I have come a long way from this dresser and sleeping on the floor. It has been a wonderful ride.

Be About Bliss

I volunteer with an organization called Be About Bliss. A woman in my ward started it, and we provide winter food kids to children in need over winter break. It's a great organization, and I'm happy to be a part of it.

So, I dragged the kids to our local grocery store to help collect food. They are AWESOME at this!

I told them if they got 50 "noes" then I would buy them smoothies from Jamba Juice. They were VERY motivated! They were so cute, and at the end of two hours they earned 99 "noes." Of course, in the process, they also got a ton of "yes'". In fact, the head of Be About Bliss said they are the BEST at this and will gladly give them whatever they want to come back and do it again.

Audra even got a $100 bill from somebody! She thought he was joking, and then he gave it to her. It was pretty incredible.

My major role in this is to collect 9,000 granola bars! Yikes- that is A LOT of granola bars in case you didn't know!

We hope to make 1,500 food kids for kids in need. It is always really awesome how it all comes together.

Baby Evan

Yay for a new baby cousin! The girls were making up songs for him and dancing all over in excitement. It's definitely pretty awesome and we are so excited to have a new family member!

He loves the Broncos blanket that Audra made for him;)

Tuesday Night Lights

For Audra's final game we had to drive out to Timbuktu. It was the third time the game was rescheduled, and I hoped it would be canceled, but it was  not.

It was at a field with lights- something new for her, so that was fun.

Unfortunately, even though I told her she needed to win to make the drive worth it, they did not win.

But, it was still a great season.

Because her teams kept disbanding and her teams were always terrible, we decided to try a new league called "Rec-Plus." It is still non competitive with no try-outs or tournaments, but they are a step above recreation. They have a paid coach at one practice a week. Admittedly, I wasn't very impressed with the paid coach. At least at the practice I saw, all they did was play various types of tag- they never touched the ball. But, at least they didn't lose every game, and the games they lost were all very close (except the last one in Timbuktu where it was a total blow-out). So, it was a much better season than in years past.

Sadly, even though this team ha been together for several years, I don't know if they will stick together next year again or not. I feel like we have finally found the right league for her, so I'm hoping she can stay on it. Time will tell.

At least the harvest moon was beautiful- the picture obviously does not do it justice.

Thanksgiving Tree

The Thanksgiving Tree has become quite the annual tradition- one we really enjoy. Claire made the tree this year ("it's tradition" as she would say). It's nice as they get older and come up with more insightful things to be grateful for- it is really sweet to see what they have to say.

Here's some of my favorites:

-DCSD Security guards (Audra)
-Disneyland memories (Ben)
-Hanging upside down (Claire)
-Books to open my mind (Claire)
-Jazz band (Audra)
-Eternal families (Camille)
-Cousins at Bear Lake (me)
-The ocean (me)
-Friends who help me when I need it (Claire)
-Joy and hope (Camille)
-Napkins (Camille- this was fitting. She uses A LOT of napkins! I have to buy a lot of napkins for her!)

The Season That Never Ends...

The soccer season that never ends (thanks to bad weather and the continued cancellation of games) finally ended for Claire.

She had to switch to a new team this year. She was on a great team that had stuck together for a number of years- we loved the team. But, the coach and his wife divorced, and that disbanded the team as well. If only they had stayed together for the team!

At any rate, this year she joined the Mermaids. Her first comment when she  found out was, "We always beat them." Sure enough, The Mermaids, despite their name, are not the fiercest team ever created. They tied their first game, won their final game, and lost every game in between.

But, they did have fun. The coach is great, and Claire did improve. At some point we will likely switch her up to the same league that Audra is playing in, which is a step above rec but still not competitive. Until then we will ride this team out and see what happens.

Space!

As always, time goes faster and faster and we are already over 1/3 of the way done with our school year.

We have been very eclectic this year! As I mentioned earlier, I am trying to be a little looser with our curriculum.

So, we are doing a Space unit. The girls have wanted to do a Space unit for a couple of years, and we simply never had time because of our very structured curriculum. I love a structured curriculum, but one of the best parts of homeschooling is our ability to learn things that we are excited about. So, this is the year where I am taking the plunge and trying to incorporate the kids' wishes. Hence, Space.

We have spent far longer on it than I thought we would, but we are having a lot of fun with it, so it's worth it. We have read lots of books (The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy is so far a bust, we may just switch to the movie instead), are working on a fun lapbook, visited a Planetarium, and made this really, really cool diorama. It's one of my favorite things the girls have made in all of our years of homeschooling:

We learned about the phases of the moon, courtesy of Oreo's. This was their favorite:

And so, we continue onward. There are good days and bad days, but overall things are going very, very well. We really do have a lot of fun together!

Denver Zoo

This week is full of co-ops! Normally I try to not do more than 1 co-op a week, but there were some great ones so we signed up.

Today was Free Day at the zoo, and we had a co-op that focused on classification. We hadn't been to the zoo in a couple of years, so it was great to go again. We had a great time! Even though it was super crowded when we got there at 1, by the time we left at 4 it was pretty empty.

Camille was super excited for the penguins.

Claire took this picture- and I think it turned out really cool:

Traffic was awful coming home, but we survived.

Then, for FHE tonight I thought I would do a cool experiment that Emily Freeman recommended in regards to Hebrews 4:2: "...not being mixed with faith in them that heard it," which refers to a group of Jews who had the gospel preached to them, but because they lacked faith the gospel didn't mean anything to them and had no affect on their lives. The idea was to make caramel corn. When we added baking soda, or faith, to the caramel, it was supposed to expand and explode in the pan to show what we become when we add faith to the gospel.

Let's just say the result were...underwhelming to say the least. It didn't expand at all and was quite disappointing.

Trunk or Treat

We couldn't get the building until tonight, so we had our Trunk or Treat the day after Halloween. Somehow, I am on every committee for every activity, so I was part of the committee for this activity. I put together our flyers:

I decided to actually try for our car this year. Normally I just throw some of our decorations in the back and call it good. But, my friend did this idea and it was pretty easy and cute. Plus, the girls got really excited and into it:

Our numbers were down from last year, presumably because of the day. It's a bummer, because it really was great. The owners of our favorite, though now closed, restaurant Piere Michele made the dinner- three different types of soup (pumpkin, French Onion, and Ministrone), and mac and cheese- not Kraft, the actual good stuff with real cream and good cheeses. They even made a gluten free pan for people like me who can't eat gluten!

It was a great night. And, now Halloween is officially over. Hallelujah!

We brought Audra's friends Brooke and Sarah with us:

Ben and Camille came late because of Camille's basketball practice, and when they got there we pretty much never saw our kids again because they were off having fun.