January news

Elise entered Olivia's picture in the newspaper for babies born during the year 2008. It turned out pretty exciting because she won a $25 gift certificate to the store Storks Landing!

This July our Stake is taking the young men and young women on a Trek to the Willie and Martin Hand Cart Historic sites in Wyoming. We will be divided into groups and Bob and I have been asked to be the "Ma and Pa" of one of the groups. We are so excited to be able to be a part of this great spiritual event!

Wow and double Wow! We had an ice storm here on Thursday with freezing rain. Something I've never seen here before! Our driveway had been clear at the top the day before, but on Thursday it became an ice skating rink! No Kidding. I went visiting teaching and literally slid down to my partners car. We had to put ice melt on the driveway to get the car in the garage! Bob had parked our green car on the driveway after getting home and looked out the window an hour later and it had slid off the driveway into the road! And he always puts the emergency brake on! The next day, Friday morning, the trash truck (you know how big and heavy they are) came to pick up our trash and when it started to go again, its wheels just spun and spun! He had to back down the road and get another start to make it up the hill! We have had one interesting winter!

Christina is having fun (?) going to early morning practices for the high school musical Peter Pan. She leaves the house at 5:30 every morning! The performance will be Feb. 10-Feb14. Then maybe she can sleep "in"!

New President

When I was in SLC yesterday I tried to watch the Innaguration of our new President while waiting. I didn't get to see the swearing in. I just got to hear a lot of the commentary talk afterwards and part of the drive of the president to the White House. It's exciting to have a new president. Lets pray that his overflowing energy and strong desire to bring change to the country is good and in the best interest of the people. Now let us all do our part to make this country stay great!

The moral of the story is...

I took Dad and Mom to Salt Lake City to the U of U hospital yesterday to have a cancerous spot removed from Dad's ear. The Doctors were quite surprised at how big it was. It has growen down into his ear canal. She cut out all that she could, but Dad will have to go to an other surgeon to get the rest of the cancer out of his canal. She stressed over and over again to have suspicious spots checked right away and to never let them get that big! She wants him to see a dermatologist every 4 months to go over his skin to check for other skin cancers. The VA will approve that for him. Once they start growing they happen more often. The moral of the story is... to check your skin often and if there is any spot, sore or odd looking thing that doesn't go away in a couple of weeks have a dermatologist check it. If caught early most sun spots can be "frozen" off or if it is Basil cell carcinoma scraped/cut off and have no lasting effects from them. If you have fair skin or tan a lot you are at a greater risk. I highly rcommend checking your skin. I have had a few frozen off and it is so much better then leaving them there.

Happy Birthday!

Anthony and Trudy both turned 21, Anthony on the 8th and Trudy on the 15th! Happy Birthday to them! My babies are getting older!

This is their birthday dinner. Olivia had been eating mashed potatoes. There was a bunch hanging on her chin like Colonel Sanders of Kentucky fried chicken, but I missed the best part. As you can see she is wiping it away.

Fun Family Happenings

Here is a little information about what our family did over the holidays. We had a great Christmas with family coming over for dinner on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. New Year's Eve we played games and watched movies. It was just Christina, Bob and I. Anthony and Trudy came over around 10:30 and spent the night. The next day Bob and Anthony finished putting together this beautiful dresser (below) for Christina. Anthony built it for her and Bob and I financed it!

This is Christina wearing some of the new fashions she got for Christmas. Olivia and Savannah opening presents. We had all gotten together to open presents from brothers and sisters.

We received a huge snow storm on Christmas and this in what we found when we opened the door! It is an imprint in the snow of the door! You can see the drifting snow by the porch.

We watched Savannah and Olivia while Tom and Elise went out for the day. This is Dec. 31. The snow had been great to build snowmen the day before, but today it was too cold and crispy to do anything with it. Savannah had fun in it as long as she didn't have to walk in it. It kind of scared her to walk in the snow.

Olivia, Savannah and Christina playing in a big box we had.

We got together and went sledding on New Years Day. We had lots of fun (other then a few crashes).

Bob Christina and Savannah.

Olivia and Elise. This way is a lot safer!

Bob staying warm on the run down!

First BIG crash of the day. They hit a rock and went flying! Anthony is sprawled out on the ground. Trudy and Christina slowly get up. Then (below) Trudy gets up to go see if Anthony is still alive. Christina eventually goes and retrieves the sled. They are all in pain the rest of the night.

Anthony is alive! Even though he is smiling now, he moved slowly the rest of the night.

Tom's turn. Looks fun! Whoops! He hit a bump and went rolling! Christina gets tangled with a tree.

Trudy is a little nervous after that big crash.

After sledding Tom and Elise invited us to there house to play games. It was good to get together and have fun (the bumps and bruises are the risks we take!)