Grandma and Grandpa Elton came on Wednesday of this week to spend Thanksgiving with us!

It was so much fun to see them and have them in our home. Grandpa got to read books to Beth and Benjamin. . .

We visited a lot and, of course, ate lots of great food! We even had homemade pies. Sarah made us some apple pies and Mariah made pumpkin. It was so fun to have them help!

 

Grandma and grandpa even took Kevin and I out for Indian food on Friday! Yum, yum! We didn't do any shopping on Black Friday, but Savannah worked 8-2 at her little store because of it. Sarah and Megan got in on the action, too, since friend Allyson wanted them to come with her to the mall. They were out the door at 7 and spent the next six hours at the mall. They had a great time, going in every store in the mall and taking advantage of the free hot chocolate and being giddy and silly.  They even provided us with some entertainment that evening by singing the preamble.  You can even watch if you want!

 

Grandma and Grandpa left us on Saturday. We are missing them already and can't wait to see them again!

 

They probably shouldn't have left us since on Saturday night we got the crazy idea in our heads that we should give Ben his first haircut. Even though we have been parents for almost 16 years now, this was something that we had never done before! Lucky for us that Ben likes all things that make loud noises (such as hair clippers) and sits very still to watch such things. Also lucky for us that he is way too young to care how short his hair was when we were done! It turns out that he is cute no matter what we do to him! Lucky again! Hopefully we will get better with practice, too, ya think?

 

Mariah's birthday is on Tuesday, but since our week is going to be busy, we decided to celebrate on Sunday over at Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik's house, as is traditional! We had a lasagna dinner, opened presents, and ate cake amid the balloons and banners. Mariah is going to be eleven years old! She is so responsible, though, that sometimes I think she is that old already! We love that girl and are so glad to have her as part of our family and happy to get a chance to celebrate her on her birthday!

Our week started off with Ben destroying our computer. :( Maybe I should be one of those people already camping outside of BestBuy? For now, we are trying to get along with the iPad. Although we really like the iPad, there are a lot of things that are just easier with a real computer. Like blogging for instance . . . So I am trying to get used to this new way and putting it off effectively as well, obviously. :)


We had a fun week regardless! Cali and Cheyenne had their last two games of basketball this week. On Thursday I had the older girls come to cheer on their little sisters and take some pictures. It was great fun. Although I think I got lots better at understanding how little people and basketball mix, I still think I had lots to learn! I think it was tons of fun to watch C&C start to play the game!

On Friday, I got to do something wild and crazy! At least it felt that way since I don't ever do things like this . . . I went to go see a morning movie of Breaking Dawn with two girlfriends from my ward! Crazy, huh? My neighbor is a big Twilight fan and asked if I could go with her the morning of the release. And I thought, "Well, . . . maybe I could!". And I did! It was such fun. I think I ought a do stuff like that more often. I'm glad my neighbor asked!

Friday night was not quite as fun, though definitely rivaling in its emotional intensity -- Benjamin got his first stitches. That kid. He tripped and hit the side of his head against the piano bench. It wasn't a very long gash, but it was deep. We drove him over to the instacare where he scored three stitches. It's a good thing he didn't need more or he might have screamed himself into apoplexy. He is not a fan of doctors, examining tables, papers over his face, nor being held down, and the poor kid had it all happening at once! Of course, he was back to running around again as soon as we set him down. I am glad that he is okay, but I am sure that those won't be the last stitches in that boy's life!

We also got to see my sister Diane for a brief visit this week as she headed up to Logan for a funeral. It was so fun to see her and her husband and her sweet little baby!

Our last big news was that they had the assembly for the PTA Reflections contest at the elementary school. Mariah, Cheyenne, and Calianne entered. Mariah won 2nd place in musical composition for her age group and Calianne won 1st place in musical composition for her age group. Fun, huh? We were so proud of them.





- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad -- a couple of paragraphs anyway before the program crashed on me when I tried to add video. . .

I don’t know what we did this week.  But then, I never do when I sit down to write a blog post.  My camera helps me remember.

The Young Women did a photo scavenger hunt at the new library on Tuesday night.  Savannah and her advisor had my camera, so I have a lot of great pictures of them having fun at the library!  Megan says her pictures are better, but alas, we may never know.  We don’t know about Sarah’s pictures either!  But we do know that the library is a great place to be!

As always, Ben gets a lot of photo attention.  Lately, he loves to cook.  Since he has already made eating dinner nearly impossible, now he has made cooking dinner a near impossible feat, as well.  With the end of good weather, I can’t send him outside at this time of day, anymore.  Oh buddy, what am I going to do with you?

We’ve gotten used to cleaning up the chaos Ben makes at the dinner table, but on this particular night he started to show some architectural flair.  There may be hope for the boy yet!

He is also very sweet when he has his bottle and his favorite blanket.  Then both his hands are occupied.  Ever inquisitive, he still needed to check out whether Cheyenne could use some help with her piano practicing.  He just sat and watched! He can be so sweet!  We love that boy!

 

On Saturday, we had rain all day, but when I went to pick up Savannah from work, the sun broke through the clouds at the horizon just enough to light up the tops of the mountains.  Savannah stopped in the middle of her recital of how things went at work to remark on how beautiful it was and when we got home, went straight for the camera!

So, when I got the camera out on this Sunday evening, I decided to document everyone’s current activities to give you a reality TV moment.  Kevin left us Thursday morning for a big conference in Toronto and won’t be back until later tonight.  Cheyenne and Calianne wanted to make him some snickerdoodles that he could have when he got home.

Sarah was working on friendship bracelets.  She is making one for each of her friends for Christmas.  She has been working on them all week.  She likes to listen to a book on her ipod while she works.

And so we come to Savannah.  This is where we usually find our dear girl when she is home.  Yes, she is facing the wall.  There is a heater vent there, so she turns the chair around to get the most heat and reads all the good stories she can find on the computer.  She loves fanfiction.

Mariah helped get the cookies off the cookie sheet when they were done cooking.  She didn’t want to smile, but then I asked her if she wanted me to help her get rid of her hiccups again (I am ever helpful) and the smile just jumped out!  (While we were in the kitchen getting ourselves lunch before church today, Mariah had the hiccups.  She kept saying, “Mom!  I have the hiccups!  I can’t get rid of them!  Mom!  Do something!”  So I was just gliding around the kitchen singing a lovely rendition of the song we had been singing in choir that morning, but just to help her out, as I passed by her I leaned over and screamed, “AHHH!”  She didn’t have the hiccups after that!  In fact, if everyone in the family had had the hiccups right then, I would have cured them all.  It was pretty funny.  See?  Even when my children think I am not listening to them, I really am!) Now, doesn’t Megan look lovely?  Straight out of a Jane Austen novel – in a dress, her hair in a bun, AND she is PAINTING!  How 19th century of her.  She needed to catch up on some watercolor painting for art class, so she brought it home.  She says she doesn’t like art class, but I think she might have a knack for it.

We did do other things this week that I didn’t take pictures of.  Afterall, we are in basketball season here at the Skinner house.  The twins played twice last week and either they are getting better or I am just getting used to how 1st and 2nd graders play basketball.  In any case, I am starting to have fun, too!  I’m even starting to like the boys on my team!

Sarah and Megan’s team played their first games this week.  They played Tuesday and Wednesday nights and they had a tournament Saturday morning.  Kevin is coaching them and they are looking really good.  He couldn’t be there Saturday, of course, (Toronto, remember?), but they are having a good time together.   I’m really impressed with how hard they play.  Their games move fast and they are fighting for those wins (and those loses)!

My goodness, this post has something about everyone except Bethany, my little princess.She continues to play with little girls whenever she gets the chance.  Cali was sick Friday and stayed home from school, and Bethany had the best day ever playing with big sister all day all to herself!  Today I came to nursery during church about the last 20 minutes because I had to change Ben’s diaper.  Beth saw me and said, “Oh, Mom, I’m almost done.  I have to just sing some songs with my friends.  Can you go back to your class for just a little bit?”  There is one self-confident little girl!   We love her to pieces, too!

We started out this week with Halloween!!  Aren’t we cute?  For your viewing pleasure, I have included some close-ups before the girls left for school.  In the  older grades we had a wizard, a witch, and, a pirate.  Aargh!

 

In the younger grades, we sent off a bag of Jelly Belly jelly beans, a scarecrow, and a tin man girl.  They’re pretty cute, huh?

I forgot to get a picture of Bethany before she got mussed up by the day, but you can see that she is a ballerina fairy, of course.

I was supposed to report for Jury Duty on Halloween.  That does sound rather ominous doesn’t it?  Fortunately, my trial was cancelled and I didn’t have to appear.  That was very nice, becuase, really, Mom is a good person to have around to help with hair and make-up and costumes in the last minutes before charging off to school on the day of Halloween!  Not that Kevin wouldn’t have done wonderfully, of course.  But, that also meant that I didn’t have to miss the Halloween parade in the afternoon!

I also got to watch Mariah (and all the rest of the 5th and 6th graders) do the Thriller dance!  Somehow, Michael Jackson made that look a bit more scary.  Still, watching them was a blast from the past!

That night Megan left us to go trick or treating with a friend.  They went to the more expensive neighborhoods and sprinted from house to house (since houses there are also farther apart.)  She was actually sore the next day!  She definitely worked for her candy!

Savannah and Sarah did not go trick or treating this year, but they did a lot of handing out.  Savannah especially since she worked that afternoon and helped hand out candy for the Main Street trick-or-treaters that mob the area in the afternoon.  She walked home afterwards and was rewarded with left-over candy from other Main Street businesses that wanted to get rid of it.  She was thrilled to help them out, naturally.

That night we went to our church trunk-or-treat, though the numbers were small this year.

Then dad and I took turns taking the younger girls around.  The weather was sooo nice!  Beth in her little dancing costume didn’t even need a coat!  Yay weather!  It was a fun Halloween.

Wednesday night was a special night, too.  We went to a Stake Youth Talent Night at the church.  Participation was open to whoever wanted to and was willing to go through the process of one “audition” and one practice.  Sarah participated!  She played Pachelbel’s Cannon on the piano and she did great!  All the youth who performed did exceptionally well.  They also had a slide show of youth visual arts and youth athletes.  Savannah had pictures in both of those.  It was a fun night!  I think Sarah felt overwhelmed by all the people who expressed admiration at her courage to perform in front of such a large crowd.  Finally, she said to me, “Two things!  First, I didn’t know most of the people there and they didn’t know me and I kept telling myself that.  Second, you always say that if you want to get better at something, you have to do it more and I don’t want to be so scared playing in front of people, so I signed up!”  I think she told me that so I would stop thinking she was so cool, but it kind of had the opposite effect.  I really think she is so cool!

The twins and I had basketball twice this week on Tuesday and Thursday.  I think I’m getting more used to the way 1st and 2nd graders play basketball.  This is a good thing.  Cali and Cheyenne continue to think it is tons of fun! 

We also did something fun on Friday night.  We were all invited to a sleep-over at Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik’s house – us grown-ups, too!  It was a lot of fun.  We had dinner and visited, then the kids got in their PJs and we all watched a movie together.  We got to sleep in Grandma and Grandpa’s recently finished and very comfy basement which has three bedrooms, a family room, and a guest bath just begging to have us come fill them up!  In the morning, Grandma made us all a big breakfast.  It was just like old times when we’d come visiting in Idaho!  We’re so glad they live close now, though!  And we’re so glad that they like having us over -- even in all our chaos!  We love you, Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik!