5th Grade Christmas Concert

Jacob had his 5th grade choir Christmas Concert last night. The choir is optional. The only reason he does it, as do a lot of the boys, is for the Sea World Trip in the spring. It's not that he hasn't been to Sea World, just not with his friends. He wasn't very enthusiastic about the concert or the clothes he had to wear. He was on the front row, first one on the left. It was hard to get good pictures since I was in the back video taping and the lighting wasn't very good on that row. Here are a few pictures and video snippets of some of the songs.

Doesn't he look excited... This s about a third of the kids

Jacob and his best friend Thomas.
Jacob is trying not to laugh...

He smiles :)

I think they did a great job for 5th graders!!

Scuba in the Pool

Yesterday Night the Priest Quorum had a scuba diving activity at our house. We heated the pool and it was a good thing since it hovered around freezing all night long. All the men and boys wanted to still do the activity even though it was so cold. The mom's on the other hand weren't so sure. Me, I say let them go since I spent 2 days heating the pool and cleaning all the leaves out!One of those guys is Matthew
Jacob is in the middle and Dale is on the right.
We let Jacob skip Pack Meeting so he could scuba dive. He had a great time!
Dale

Jacob

My 3 handsome guys in the hot tub after their scuba expeditions

One of the blobs is Matthew. Jacob said he was the ugly blob.

Matthew along with others

Dale jumping from the hot tub to the pool. We had all the heat going to the hot tub at that time so the pool wasn't as warm.

Dale and Jacob under water

A Taste of Winter

We had a little taste of winter yesterday. We had a few flurries, but mostly little ice pellets that didn't stick. Most people got enough snow to make a few snowballs and even snowmen, but not us. I went to pick the girls up from the church last night and it snowing by the church. As we got about a mile and a half from our house it stopped. I was disappointed to not have any snow on the ground this morning.

Ice pellets on the patio chairs

Nothing to do with the weather, just a cute picture of Sammie on her first snow day.

Sideways Flurries. I had the camera sideways and I can't flip the footage around.

Another shot of the flurries and the steam coming off the pool. We were heating the pool for a Priest Activity.

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

Living in Houston, Texas you don't exactly get the feeling of Winter during the Christmas Season, although today is the exception. It has been between 34 and 36 degrees all day with strong wind and rain,in fact it just started to sleet, but it will warm up in a few days. Back to my point, since we don't have too much winter weather, I have to decorate the house to make it look like Christmas. This is what I've been up to. Sorry that there are so many pictures, I was going to do a slide show, but then I couldn't describe my pictures.

The Nativity in my Living Room

All the stocking s hung with care

This is my Music Tree. You cant really see all the instruments on it. It has french horns, violins, trumpets, notes and ribbons and angels, bows, gold, cream and burgundy ornaments and cream and burgundy stuffed fabric hearts. This tree is in the piano room.



The Nativity in the entry way

Looking up the stairs

The Dining Room. I have 3 small Christmas trees and put lights on my ficus tree. There is also another Nativity just below the mirror.

This is my Sports tree. I had a zillion sports pictures of my kids so I laminated them and got some sports ball ornaments and slapped them on a tree. I also have stars with their names on them. There is gold and silver star garland on it. I need to make one of those mums I talked about in a previous blog to put on top.

Close up of Sports tree

This is the potpourri tree. My mom gives all her grand kids a ornament every year so they are all on the tree. It also has all the ornaments the kids have made and all the ones we get from others.

The Family room upstairs.

Another view of the potpourri tree

This is my Food tree, at least that's what the neighbors call it. I string popcorn and cranberries, make real gingerbread men, add some candy canes and real cinnamon sticks bundles together. Some of the non edibles are fake apples, bows, bells, and pine cones. Kind of an Old Fashion Tree.

Living Room

Another shot of the living room

Outside

Another outside shot

Hope everyone is have a safe and happy Holiday Season!!

Why I Haven't Done Any Christmas Shopping

It was a busy week and even busier weekend. I spent most of the beginning of the week putting up Christmas decorations and trees and even got the outside lights up. I usually have it all done just before Thanksgiving and put the finishing touches on right after. Well this year with football, basketball and soccer it just didn't get done that early. This weekend was full of basketball, soccer and lots of driving. Brittney was in a basketball tournament Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Makenzie was in a soccer tournament Saturday and Sunday. Friday I picked Dale up from work and we drove to Britt's game. It was about an hour north of us, actually on Friday it took us about 95 minutes with rush hour traffic. On Friday night Makenzie headed to her tournament with some teammates and stayed in a hotel since her games were 2 hours away. On Saturday, Dale drove to Makenzie's games and I drove to Britt's games. Brittney's team won 1st place in the tournament. We got home late afternoon. Dale got home around 6:30 and we cleaned up and went to his work Christmas Party, oh sorry, Holiday Party. I don't want to offend anyone. We got home late and got up early and headed back to Makenzie games at 5:45 am. She had an 8am game. Makenzie stayed there with the team. After winning both games and winning 1st place we came home. After 575 miles on the new Suburban and 250 on the old one, we had a successful sports weekend, but very worn out. I spent today doing laundry, ironing, grocery shopping, cleaning house and blogging. When will I get my Christmas shopping done?

Brittney is the only one ever crossing her legs. I guess that's her 5th grade Cotillion paying off..

She was warning me to put the camera up. She is playing and doesn't want another injury.

I will defend you with my white eyes. What's up with white eyes. I can get rid of the red, but not the white.

1st place!! That's 2 tournament wins!

Good stop! It was a chilly morning!

Kick!!

Kick again. A little warmer this game!

We are #1

Makenzie with Dad, her favorite soccer coach!

Mom and Makenzie

Team with their 1st place medals

Tired from a weekend of soccer or staying up late with friends in a hotel.

You decide.

Is there a hole in the bucket?

Why am I always filling this thing up?

Mystery solved!

Our Thanksgiving

Our Thanksgiving Day started out with the Annual Ward Turkey Bowl. It was a foggy morning but warm. Dale was the QB for the Adults and Matthew was the QB for the Teachers and Priest. The Young Men were doing well until Matthew had to leave to go to REAL football practice. his team was bummed but not as much as he was.

They also had a game for the younger kids.

This kid can jump!

On to Dinner

Don't make Mom laugh

Dale not amused with us being silly

It's sparkling cider...really

Tired and stuffed