Christmassy Weather and Ginger Snap Cookies

Last night as we turned out the lights to settle in for a long winter's nap , the light glowed into the window. Inside the house in our beds, we were warm and cozy. But outside, a huge, severe winter storm was raging and the moon reflected the bright white snow into our window.

We slept soundly through the blowing, billowing snow as it swirled and drifted, covering the shoveled walks and driveways.

We awoke when the phone--first James', then mine, then the home, rang with a message from the school to make our children's heart's fill with glee--School was cancelled!

We snoozed on only to be woken again 3 more times each per phone with the same message. I have to give it to the school--they are thorough.

The little boys have been begging and begging for us to put up our Christmas decorations early this year. I'm not sure what it is, but they are prematurely excited this year. In a way--so am I.

Christmas is that "special" time of year that makes my heart race and butterflies flutter in my stomach. The feeling is also known as ANXIETY! I am doing everything I can to calm myself but I can see tiny ways that my attitude has crept into my older children's. They don't seem to be as excited about winter and Christmas as in past years. This year, I am smiling brightly and keeping my disdain for the cold and snow more to myself; for mothers have a great influence on their children's feelings of well-being.

Somehow this year, the swirling snow has glittered and sparkled and surrounded my heart and is tickling a tiny feeling of Christmas magic there.

Jenny Oaks Baker is gently playing her violin to the tune of Ave Maria on the CD player, and homemade ginger snap cookies are baking in the oven. Tonight, in my home, Christmas is in our hearts.

Even if you don't have snow, and you want your home to smell like Christmas, bake a batch of these cookies to share with family, friends, and neighbors.

Bishop Baumgarten's Ginger Snap (Sogs) Cookies
Bishop B. always called them ginger sogs because they are so soft and yummy.

3/4 C shortening
1 C brown sugar
1/4 C molasses
1 egg

Beat together til' fluffy

Sift:
2 1/4 C Flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cloves

Stir together. Form balls. Roll in sugar. Bake 375 degrees for 10 min.

*High altitude: Add 1/4 c flour and bake an additional 4 min.

Harry Potter and the Hole in the Wall

Harry Potter is a big deal in our house. We all love it, from the oldest members listening to the books on their Ipods, to the youngest members playing the Lego version on the Wii.

So, it was no surprise that we planned on seeing Part 1 of The Deathly Hallows on the day of the premier.

I knew the children of appropriate age would be giddy and on their BEST BEHAVIOR all day long in anticipation of Dad and Mom allowing them to tag along on their date.

I get a call at work from the youngest child tattling that the babysitter (oldest sister) is torturing the other brother.

I calmly put out the fire.

I call on my way home and tell them to be ready and waiting outside for a quick pick up for our rare and amazing adventure at the movies.

I get a call 2 minutes later. Everyone is crying and there is a hole in the wall.

I ignore the hole in the wall comment and ask if they still want to go, they assure me they do and promise to be better.

The movie was amazing and satisfied every one's high expectations.



We get home and I walk down the hallway to find a TEN INCH HOLE IN THE WALL. When asked why, the guilty party said that her sister drove her to it.

Hindsight.

My Winning Angel

After he stayed up the entire night working on his presentation, I have to say how proud I am of Alex (and myself). After all, behind every great and amazing kid is one exhausted mother, right?

After coming home late from a girl's night, I took one look at the panic on Alex's face and decided that he needed his Mom to pull through for him.

I wondered through the long night if I was truly helping him, or if I was truly hurting him by helping him. There is a fine balance in there somewhere that every mother must weigh.

I realized at some point between burning the pointer finger on my right hand and my thumb on my left, that he is so much like me. I like to say that we "work better under pressure." That seems easier to swallow than "always waiting til the last minute."

The next day upon entering the school, I was greeted by an angel with the biggest grin on his face.

Alex won FIRST PLACE on ALL THREE categories that he entered at Drama Districts.
Yay, we get to do it all again for STATE.

Way to go, kid. You are one amazing Angel! (You too Mom)!

Maybe You Should Fly a Jet! Maybe You Should be a Vet!

Last night, I stood next to my tall son who was wearing a wife beater tank, white pants, and white dress shoes, as he worked on his "mouse trap" auto--spring angel wings prop to complete his Drama Districts costume. Drama Districts will be on Saturday. The wings were started on Wednesday after "the mom" ran around two different towns compiling supplies for him.

Tiny shards of wire and bits of foam core board cluttered the counter table and floor. He held the wings out and as he popped the trap, the wings snapped open. I marveled at the clever apparatus made out of wooden dowels, foam core board, a mouse trap (of course), various nuts and bolts, and lots of hot glue.

"You are so talented," I said. "You should be an engineer!" I wondered how a brain could even come up with such a contraption!

He looked at me with a half smile, then started listing off several careers that he's interested in; Fire fighter, actor, costume designer, blacksmith, Coroner, and Rock Star. His interests are varied.

The sing song way his voice named the careers made the words to Theo Le Sieg's (AKA Dr. Seuss') book, Do You Want to Fly a Jet, immediately come to mind.

I began quoting the book to him and we laughed. It was a frequent read from his childhood, and memories flashed through my mind of a brown--eyed boy with a damp blond bowl cut, smelling of baby shampoo, cuddling with me on the couch. . . .

This career talk is new and strange and a little frightening--at least for me. I am learning how difficult it must be for mother birds to push their babies out of their nests and let them fly. I want to grab my boy and put my arms around him and protect him and keep him safe and cozy. But if I do that, he'll never learn how to SOAR!

Tonight, when the windows reflect the dark night, Alex will once again be in my kitchen furiously working and creating and hot gluing and carefully and meticulously gluing feathers to his mouse trap wing contraptions.

And when he dons them, I will think . . . exercise those wings, flap hard and prepare because very soon you will be leaving my nest,

and what I wish most for you is to SOAR.

All Photos by Laura Walker Photographies

Sunday Morning

"The ants go marching two by two, Hurrah, Hurrah!
The ants go marching two by two, Hurrah, Hurrah!
The ants go marching two by two, the little one stops to tie his shoe . . .
and they all go marching down . . .in the ground . . .to get out of the rain!"

The sound of marching feet and young high soprano choir boys singing at the tops of their lungs is what roused me from sleep this morning.

I had snoozed 30 minutes past my alarm and had been dreaming of a combination of Rachael Ray and Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. The food was being prepared by lunch ladies with British accents on airport conveyor belts, and as I oversaw the food going round and round on the conveyor, I was being praised for my food innovation and how I was single handedly saving lives with my healthy options.

Okay, weird. . . it must be that another round of my diet, Game On, is getting ready to begin, and I've been recruiting. Either that or I've been watching too much Rachael Ray :)

It was a great way to be woken up. I smiled as I made my way to the shower.

Aloneness (AKA back to school)

I sit here all alone feeling guiltily giddy. Everyone is gone . . . well, everyone except for the puppy and kitty.

"The Jimmy" has been going in to work early lately, since we all are getting up so much earlier for school. Even he is gone.

Connor is in the first grade!

Ahhhh, the peace and quiet. Ahhhhh the clean house. Ahhhh the smell of baked goodies wafting through the cavernous house.

Oh the possibilities! I wonder what large and fearsome task I should accomplish for the day. It would be uninterrupted--the most effecient way to work.

(Mom: "I'm going to be all alone today!" Connor: "Awwww!" )

Or I could just sit and read one of the library's finest, pausing only to take the puppy out, or to refill my water bottle and pop some Hershey's Kisses?

Hunter's in third grade!

Carpe Diem I must sieze the day!

And I don't need to feel guilty for enjoying myself on days like today, when all is quiet and I'm home from work.

I get to refill my cup so to speak, so I can fill every one elses. They will all come home to a fresh, clean house, something warm and wholesome and amazing smelling in the oven, and a mom who actually has a smile on her face!

Back to school really is the most wonderful time of the year!

Pikachu Party Photos

 

The Perfect Pokemon Pikachu Party

Hunter turned 9 and wanted a Pokemon party.

Dejavue! It seems that every party Alex ever had, I'm redoing for Hunter.

I'm always last minute with these things, yet it came together with the help of the entire family and had great results--except for the weather.

As I was scrambling around, trying to decorate the cake and get some last minute game ideas off the web (5 min before the party started) I heard the weather service warning come on the radio! I was not happy but hopeful that it would kind of pass around our area. Not to be so. It hit with a vengeance right after all of the kids arrived. We had to rearrange a few things and have the party inside.

So here is what we did:

1. Okay, so this one took a lot of prep time: We made a Pikachu piniata using a balloon for the body, a paper plate slit to the center and slightly overlapped to create his cute pointy nose and face, attached with some crumpled newspaper under it to get the perfect angle and shape. Hands and feet were created with toilet paper tubes slit down the side and bent. Streamers cut into fringe covered the body. Printer paper rolled into a cone shaped the ears and card stock made up the features.

2. Welcome Craft: Create a Pokemon. After coloring a Pokemon picture, the kids each got a paper bag and craft supplies to create their own Pokemon for a future game. They put some crumpled up newspaper inside and twisted the bottom. Then they took feathers, sequince, crayons, googly eyes, etc. and made a Pokemon. Then they tied a string to the bottom. I told them not to be too technical because they may get ripped in the game.



3. Games: I think the pokemon game is way too complicated, so we played some simple games with a Pokemon theme. "Gotta Catch 'em All" was adapted from a game that I found on familyfun.com The kids sat in a circle with their Pokemon in the middle. One person is the "catcher". I yelled "gotta catch em all" and the catcher would try to catch one of the pokemon with a bowl or lid at the same time the children try to jerk their Pokemon out of the way. They loved this game. It can also be played with candy on a string and you use dice. If the catcher rolls doubles the lid comes down.

James played "Ash says" with the kids while I prepared the Pikachu ears party hats. (this should have been done before hand, but since it's me we're talking about, it happened during the middle of the party)

The next game was a relay. Pokemon Trainer Practice: The kids had to put on a baseball cap and back pack, run through a tunnel and tent, up the stairs (since it was indoors :( , shoot Team Rocket with a nerf gun, throw a Pokeball (practice golf balls painted half red with black line around middle) into a bowl and run back and tag the next player.

If we would have been outside, we would have done one final game of catching the pokemon. The older siblings would have dressed up like a specific Pokemon or worn a picture of a Pokemon on their backs and the kids would have had to try to capture them with their pokeballs. Then they would have recorded the captured Pokemon in their Pokedex made from printer paper folded into a booklet and stapled with a picture of a pokeball on the front. It would have been awesome.

4. Food: I am learning as I get older to simplify things if possible (yeah, right). Well, I simplified with the food, anyway. I like to have parties in the afternoon--too late for lunch, too early for dinner. It also helps if I have the morning to prepare since I always wait until the last minute. So cake and ice cream it is. I made the cake in my round Pyrex bowl and added a round cake pan to make the circle a little bigger. I used way too much red food coloring and it made the frosting really yucky, but the kids didn't seem to mind.

5. Presents: I always take a picture of Hunter with each gift and gift giver. It's nice to have a record for those thank you notes ;)

7. Piniata: Still raining, so we just dumped the contents of the piniata onto the carpet and let the kids go for it. We taped an image of a pokeball to a clear goodie bag and gave each child a bag. They loaded them with loot from the piniata. I'm glad we didn't have to smash up Pikachu after all. He was way too cute for that!

The party went over about 15 min, and then they all went home. AAAhhhhh. The perfect Pokemon Pikachu party!

Happy Birthday, Hunter!

The Winds of Change

July 22, 2010

The winds blow a lot in Idaho. If I stand and face the wind and look up at the sky, it can take my breath away. The wind can pick up my large inflatable pool and hurl it into the air and up and over the roof of my house. Dead leaves and debris are swept up in a whoosh and spin in the air. My hair whips my face and tangles in knots. I feel dizzy watching the clouds waft by.

“The Jimmy” as James sometimes likes to refer to himself, decided to go on a bike ride to the lake the other night. He hasn’t ridden much this year. He felt glorious pumping his legs as the bike cruised to full speed. He had the wind at his back and nothing could stop him. He felt like he could ride on forever. He hit the lake and slowed into a U--turn to go back toward home. He immediately felt the strain on his legs as a stiff wind hit him in the face and made his hair lay flat back. He hadn’t realized how hard the wind was blowing as he was riding along with it. Now, as he faced the wind, his face turned red and the ride was becoming a great effort. He down shifted to the lowest gear and pushed ahead. He did not let the wind stop him, but it did whip him. He was beat when he got home. He walked in the door panting and red faced, beads of sweat trickling down his face. I was a little worried about the toll he had just taken on his out-of-shape body, but he recovered nicely and wasn’t even sore the next day.

I marveled at the strength of the winds he faced.

I feel the winds of change coming in my life. . . they seem to be picking up speed.

I caught myself playing the “this-is-the-last-summer-we-get-to-be-with-you” card on my up and coming senior, Alex, today as he argued reasons why he didn’t want to go on the family vacation. We are already down one child–Emily–who is helping my cousin for a month this summer.

It’s amazing the difference being down one child makes in a family. When Alex was at scout camp last week, we were down two children. Someone called and asked why the house sounded so quiet. “We are down to only three children,” I said.

They are coming. And I can’t stop them. If I stand against the winds of change they will gust against me. If I lean into them, they will bite into me, eventually forcing me to submit my will. But if I turn and open my sails to the winds, will I be carried gently along, or will I be hurled forward out of control reaching out to grasp something to hold on to?

I don’t know if I’m ready to start downsizing yet. I don’t know if I’m ready to turn 40 next month. I don’t know if I’m ready to have all of my children in school full time. I don’t know if I’m ready to watch “the Jimmy” color his graying hair.

ALL of these things are leaving me breathless–just like the wind.

Hunter

Yesterday we took Hunter, Connor and Hannah to see The Sorcerer's Apprentice. During the opening scene, I leaned over to Hannah and said, "Oh great, a zombie movie, the boys will freak out!" The movie ended and I looked over at Hunter who was standing in the row with his hands spread out in front of him creating the perfect ball of lightening. He chucked the lightening at the screen and then produced another and another. Then he looked over at me with wide eyes and a huge grin and told me that he loved the movie!

In the lobby he told me that he wants to have a Sorcerer's Apprentice party for his 11th birthday. He's really planning ahead, since he's only turning 9 next month!

As I was dozing off last night at around 1:30 am (gotta love summer bed time), Hunter staggered in saying he was dreaming of zombies. I was so groggy that I pulled him into my bed with me. After a while I came to my senses and sent him back to bed. He was back 5 min later.

I pulled him over me and into the center of the bed where he slept soundly the rest of the night. He woke up giggling to himself which startled me awake and I thought he was having zombie night mares again. I patted and shushed him back to sleep.

We were late for 9:00 am church again.

Kamas Valley Fiesta Days 2010 Schedule

I'm not sure why it is so difficult to find this online, but here it is for your convenience: The Kamas Valley Fiesta Days 2010 Schedule :)

http://www.kamascity.net/ for the city website and click on the Fiesta Days link in the left hand column,

or

get the actual schedule of events: the PDF copy

For Future Years, please visit http://www.kamascity.net/ and click on the Fiesta Days link.

Have fun! You know we will be!

3rd of July Madness at Bear Lake

Even though we were headed to the airport the next day, we decided to head down to Bear Lake and celebrate our adorable little niece Phebe's 4th birthday.



Here are the highlights of our trip:

Scaring our new friends by playing SHARKS!Sand Castle Wars! (where everyone wins)

Romantic Get-a-ways (leaving the kids on the shore)

Teenagers who don't like getting their pictures taken!

Grannie!

Eating Oreos

Trying not to freeze to death!

The Birthday Girl!

Birds in Sync!

Relaxing!

That night we stayed in a condo which we almost got kicked out of for bringing our puppy! We also ate Bear Lake Raspberry shakes that were to die for! It was a great whirlwind of a time!

Girl's Camp June 2010

I had a whole bunch of plans for the summer . . . but they changed once I was asked to be the assistant camp director for Girl’s Camp. Half of May and all of June became consumed with planning for camp. We took 6 Tues night activities and did crafts and practiced the skit for camp with the girls.

(The leaders. We had so much fun together!)

I loved working with the young women. Camp was a huge success!

More than half of my family went to camp. James came along to help set up tents, build fires, cook, and be a priesthood leader. Alex stayed home with Hunter and Connor and played Mr. Mom. He took the boys to their soccer practices and swimming lessons, made them beds on the living room couches, and never made them shower or change their clothes. Thank goodness they were able to wash off in the pool ;)

Highlights from camp were: Watching the skits (ours was really awesome), the theme: Be Loyal to the Royalty Within, spending time with the girls, testimony meeting, the beautiful hike, and the 100' slide.

(James had all of the girls in stitches)

It was amazing being out in God’s beautiful world. It was amazing being with the young women of our ward. I was blown away by their sheer goodness! It was amazing being with my incredible daughters (and Hubby) and watching them take on responsibilities.

Next year? Bring it on!