February 2013

It's been so cold and snowy that the pets' favorite spot has been the heater vent in the front room/office, especially while I'm working in the mornings. Here they are on the 1st.

The kids went sledding again this day. They've been sledding so much with all this snow! There's a big pile of dirt from the construction of roads in the new neighborhood behind and to the south of us and it's made a perfect sledding hill. Buddy keeps sledding on his face (hopefully accidentally) and it's so scratched up! One of the days he nearly got frostbite on his feet before he finally came in, but overall it's been a ton of fun.

On February 3rd we hosted a Super Bowl party for Tony's side of the family!

Faith made, printed and hung some awesome decorations,

and, of course, there was amazing FOOD there! Tony made his fabulous hot wings and salsa, I made Snickers salad, guacamole and seven layer dip, and we had the chocolate fountain going, too.

At the end of a long game made even longer by the fact that no one was particularly fond of either team and a power outage caused a half-hour delay, Buddy was ready for some quiet time playing his iPod while snuggling grandma ♥

Attending were Brian & Tina, Zach, Tyler & his girlfriend & her cute Yorkie, Larry & Lana and Tammy.

Christian wanted me to get a pic of his fun jammies & slippers that night.

On the 6th I took Faith to New Beginnings. I was stunned when I got the email invitation to the event, thinking they'd gotten the wrong person. "My baby Faith is barely over three years old!" I thought :). But they were having all the girls who were entering Young Women's this year be introduced by their dad at the event. Tony had to work too late, as usual, so I got to gush over my awesome girl in front of everyone.

Christian brought his iPod and was going to sit outside the room and play until we were done, but when we got there and he saw that it was a dinner with soup, homemade rolls, and salad with Olive Garden dressing, he was not about to sit outside. So a bunch of girls ages 11-17, some parents, and one cute little guy ate dinner and listened to a program by Holly and Kami Wood (Holly is the author of the book Invaluable).

Faith loves her gift of a temple picture and her name mod podged onto wood and got so excited to enter Young Women's that she came right home and started working on her Faith in God book. I told her that even if she finished early, she would still have to wait until her birthday to be promoted!

The night of the 6th was super foggy and frosty, so when we woke up to a bright and clear morning on the 7th I drove the back way for kindergarten carpool to get these gorgeous photos:

 Winter here would be more bearable if we had a few more days like this and less of the inversion! I saw on the news once that the Native Americans who lived here long ago called the bleak, freezing grey of the inversion a word that meant "white death." Yup, that about sums it up.

On February 7th we got to attend Christian's Chinese New Year program. They got to show off some of the Mandarin Chinese they have learned this year with introductions, songs, and kung fu.

Buddy even struck a cool pose for us after the program!

He got to take home a decorated sack with Chinese candy and a red envelope with real money in it for good luck this year.

This is Faith's January book report for the latest in her favorite series, Dork Diaries 5: Tales of A Not-So-Smart Miss Know-It-All. 

We barely squeaked by with our annual tradition of getting a new Christmas ornament when we snatched this baby up for 90% off. It's supposed to represent getting our new couch this year which has cool cup holders.

Buddy wrote this cute book in kindergarten. I love that "I have a family" only has pictures of Skittles and Dusty (and one head which he erased because he didn't have time to finish the person), and "I have a TV" shows more of our entertainment center and new electric fireplace than the new t.v. above it.

Faith did this art project in school. They designed a tile and then it was copied 11 more times and the students could arrange them however they wanted. I love how awesome Faith's turned out!

On the 10th my mom gave the grand kids some Valentine gifts. I love how she has such cute decorations for every season and makes a big deal out of holidays. I know exactly where my obsession with holidays comes from ;)

February 11th I got to volunteer at Christian's kindergarten 100th day of school party. I ran the center where they made little books where they drew what they planned to look like at age 100, what they could eat 100 of, etc. They also went to centers where they made 100 day headbands, colored their picture on a 100 dollar bill, built towers with 100 plastic cups, and each brought 100 little snacks that they mixed together and redistributed as "100 day stew."

For Mardi Gras on the 12th, we made fake beignets by frying up some canned biscuit dough and rolling the pieces in powdered sugar. The kids also had fun with bead necklaces we got at the dollar store, but there was no flashing involved.

Faith woke up the morning of the 14th and begged me to take an hour off work to do fancy hair for Valentine's. We'd seen this on Pinterest, and although it really was simple, it took me most of the hour to complete just this one side. We decided that one side would do, and it looked really cute!

I forgot to get a pic from the front, so Faith did a selfie in the car.

I organized the kindergarten party and got to oversee and make sure everything ran smoothly instead of running a center this time. Here, Lathan's mom Amy is having the kids decorate sugar cookies.

They also got to make "love bug" crafts,

"shoot Cupid's arrows" by blowing q-tips through straws,

and a "minute-to-win-it" type candy throwing game. The party was a huge hit!

I'd been meaning to do homemade valentines for several years and last year Faith specifically wanted personalized ones. They never came to fruition, so this year I put some effort in and finally made some! I showed the kids a bunch of ideas I had pinned on Pinterest (yes, I do have a Pinterest problem, why do you ask?) but Buddy wanted one with Star Wars characters on it, and not himself. I did a bit of a makeover on that one and photoshopped his face onto Obi Wan's body!

Faith wanted to be holding something and I thought these turned out darling.

That evening, although I tried to tempt them with other ideas, the kids requested "fancy dinner" again. They sure love that spaghetti with jarred sauce plus homemade alfredo combo! It's definitely the fancy dishes, goblets and lit candle that make it.

The super fancy part was dessert. Christian had seen these heart-shaped ice cream cakes in an advertisement and hoped he could try one. Tony usually gets us a Dairy Queen one, but since I had a coupon it made this one from Cold Stone Creamery nearly the same price. Plus, I special ordered it with coffee ice cream, Heath bar and chocolate cake inside!!

Grandma & Tammy ding-dong-ditched the kids, leaving fruit roll-ups, valentines, gift cards from YogoTogo and a mylar balloon attached. A little while after the kids found their goodies on the doorstep, they came up to the door and we invited them in for dessert. I can't believe I didn't get pics of their cute gifts!

The animals aren't the only ones who love that heater vent. Here's Buddy on the 15th getting a bit of extra sleep while I worked.

We went ice skating on the 17th. Faith's getting pretty good!

For some reason I took this pic of myself snuggling my fuzzy button on the 21st.

 Here is my Boogie Board (that I use for work) after Christian wrote his Chinese numbers on it on the 22nd.

He's getting excited for St. Patrick's Day, so he drew a picture of a leprechaun & a rainbow.

The 24th was Stake Conference, but I had to work and Tony usually considers it "day off from church" so after I was off we had a snowball fight,

and went to the ice skating rink on the last day it was open this season.

This month Faith entered the History Fair with this website. She won 3rd place in the school contest and went on to district where she got honorable mention! 

Another milestone is that I finally got a gym membership, something I have never done before! I got it at Sportsplex because it is the closest and some of my friends go to classes there. I have only been to a gym class once before in my life. I was a young, chubby teen and had gotten a temporary pass to the Ogden Athletic Club. I went to a step aerobics class where I couldn't keep up with the choreography and finally tripped off the step, spraining my ankle. Of course everyone else in the class was a beautiful, 120 lb, twenty-something. So embarrassing! I've been to the gym to work out a lot, but still haven't worked up to attending a class.

The other big deal this month was my bidding for a new work schedule for this summer. I ended up getting my first choice - 7:00 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Monday & Friday. I begged and pleaded for two weeks on Facebook trying to trade away my Sunday hours from 11-2:30 for church and get those hours on Monday and Friday so I would have four full days off (including Saturday, for the first time in a year!). It finally worked out, and there was even a last minute "perm trading" miracle that made my final schedule for April 28-August 24: Sunday 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. and Monday & Friday 7:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Those eleven hour days will be long and dreary, but I'm looking forward to working so few days per week in the summer. Maybe we'll even have to finally take advantage of my flight benefits!