I'm back!

Ok, so I haven't blogged or done much of anything else this week because I've been reading

This:

And This:

And This:

When my cute friend, Nicole, heard that we were going to St. George/Vegas last weekend, she said she had the perfect book for me to read on the way and loaned me her copy of Twilight. Love it! Now it's going to be hard to wait for the next one a year away!

And now, outside it's doing This:

Welcome to winter! We knew it was cold during our 8AM soccer games this morning, but SNOW?

Welcome to Birthday Week!

Present time!

Game time!

Mike has tried to make Birthday a month long, but I trying to get it down to one week. This week is SYDNEY's birthday week! We gave her a little friend party. Way low key and back to good old fashioned backyard fun! She had cute little friends over and we played all sorts of backyard games from Duck, Duck, Goose to Red Light, Green Light and more! She wanted cupcakes instead of cake....YEA for me! For her goodie bags we made candy/prize necklaces. Thank goodness my friend, Nicole, came over and helped me get throught the necklace part. Fun day. A couple of hours later when Mike got home, we left for St. George! But, not before stopping to see Cozette and new baby, Garrett! He's sooooo stinkin' cute!

We left St. George early afternoon to go play in Vegas before the game...which I will NOT be talking about..thank you. Except that I would like to say, if you are going to sit behind me and drink beer, PLEASE do NOT spill it on me and my children! Thank you.

The fam at the Factory! No cheesecake this day....but we are excited when it comes to the town near us!

We went to Ceasar's Palace because that's where Cheesecake Factory is. We haven't been in this hotel before and we really liked it. The kids loved it because there is a FAO Schwartz there and they all got something fun. Now, we will skip the part of us going to the humiliating game...

on the way home, Mike was SO tired and I was tired and my contacts (which do this often late at night) were blurry and we were a bit frightened about getting through the canyon between Mesquite and St. George. Luckily, we were blessed and made it home alive!

Cute Grandma helping Sydney out.
Jace offering his assistance opening Sydney's gift. She refused his offer.
It's twins! Can you believe Cabbage Patch kids are back?
Papa Gib, Andrew (Happy Bday Mr. 16!), Kris, Brock, Grandma A...Happy Bday tomorrow!
Amanda gets a birthday gift from G&G Arv tonight because they will be gone on her birthday. She was so excited!

We were on a time schedule to get back home to Kville today. We were having the grandparents and Kristine's family over for dinner. Her son, Brock, and Sydney share the same birthday! So, we decided to celebrate together. Mike was so tired from driving so much and being up so late (and he really hasn't slept in weeks) that he crashed (fell asleep)! I sent him to take a nap this morning while I cleaned the house and packed up the car. When I woke him up to go, he was a little out of it still. He couldn't believe how out of it he was. Sad, huh! But, we got home in time and we had a nice night and now that it's raining hard...we are flooding in our basement again. Curse word. Thanks to the Grandmas and Grandpas for the fun presents and to everyone for coming over tonight! I don't think I'm ready to start another week, but here we go!

Stop Oprah!

Ok, my blogging friends! If you read the following which is an e-mail I got from a friend of mine, and agree, please e-mail Oprah. I feel like we need to take a stand against this kind of perversion. My friend, Monica, who also attended, said that she caught Oprah's eye a couple of times (they were in the center 2nd row) and glared at her. Then Oprah said, "This is what's going on in America, folks." I say, NO IT ISN'T! The people she's talking to are a minority and the majority of married couples have wonderful and fulfilling relationships without 'extra-marital affairs, other partners, and pornography. etc' I know she'll listen if she receives enough protest. A show that was taped by Hugh Nibley's daughter with false claims was never aired after an e-mail campaign. Thanks all!


Looks like we haven't convinced her yet. If you will, when you get to Oprah's homepage, click on the blue button in the top left hand corner. Then, 'e-mail us' is at the bottom of the drop down menu. Thanks! Jill
----- Original Message -----
From: Ann M.
Sent: Friday, September 21, 2007 9:20 AM
Subject: Oprahs show titled 237 reasons we have sex
Hello everybody~
Sorry to bother you again concerning this show. I thought we had maybe talked Oprah into not airing her show that we attended the taping of a few weeks back. Yesterday she previewed what would show next week and it looks like it will be airing. Please send her a loud message, persuading her not the air that show she's calling, "237 reasons we have sex". Below is the letter sent last week about our experience with this taping. Please take a few minutes and e-mail her show again if you haven't already. Thanks so much!
Ann M.

As I am usually a big fan, I flew to Chicago to attend a taping of Oprah's show with a few girl friends. Initially it was very exciting and fun, but once they announced the topic (you never know beforehand) that excitement turned to disappointment and embarrassment. The topic was "How to Spice up Your Sex Life". Oprah started by promoting a book By Dr. Pepper Schwartz called "Prime" which deals with her sexual adventures as a 60 year woman on countless one night stands around the world. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/books/324356_pepper20.html. She advocates adding sexual adventures (one night stands, anonymous partners, etc) to your life for women over age 50 whether or not they are married. The show went from bad to worse as Oprah posited that Erotica and Pornography could be acceptable and her guests encouraged people to use porn (movies, magazines, affairs) to enhance their relationships. She then interviewed a couple who was advocating and practicing an "open marriage". Oprah's panel of experts that offer advice for relationships said that they regularly prescribe pornography to couples as a positive means to spice up their sex life and intimacy. At no time, did the panel discuss or did Oprah argue about problems or devastation that these ill-conceived ideas can have on a marriage. I'm writing in hopes that I can convince each of you to help get the word to Oprah that this topic is exactly the thing that is destroying families and individuals in America. We must protect our families from the pornography and filth that is so prevalent today. We have to take a stand and convince her producers that this show should not be shown. Go to http://www.oprah.com/ and click on the link on the left side that says e-mail us. The sooner the better. As of yet, this show does not appear on her upcoming show list. Let's keep it that way. Thanks,Ann M.

Not Again!

Brandon's new shiner...left eye under his eyebrow
Since I grew up with 4 brothers, I know that accidents always happen. Now that I have my own son, I know that accidents constantly happen! Today, we had another Brandon accident.

He was sitting next to Sydney who was playing on the computer, when he fell off the chair and hit the desk. I was outside trying to finish mowing the lawn. That job was interrupted 2 days earlier because Mater bit Brandon's ear and drew blood and lots of tears. I told Mike that I guess I'm not supposed to mow the lawn this week.

Anyway, Sydney came to me in the backyard ushering her little brother with blood dripping down his face. I could tell from across the yard that this would be stitches. So, I called Mike and told him what I thought. He told me he would come up and help me. Honestly, that was the best thing he could have done for me today. For some reason, I was feeling really drained trying to deal with this minor injury. I was so glad to have my hubby there to support me and comfort our son.

Brandon did not like the doctor or the exam table. He's been to too many doctors and knows what is going on. We bribed him with a lot of dum-dum suckers (God bless the person who invented those!) and had to hold him down as he screamed in protest!

When he was all glued up, the tears stopped and we went to Cafe Rio for lunch before Mike headed back to work! Brandon fell asleep on the way home and took a good 3 hour nap today! So, as soon as I got Sydney on the school bus, my house was pleasantly quiet (a rare occurence).

I always feel so bad when my children are hurting. It's hard to look into their sad little faces and try to tell them that everything will be ok. But, you can tell by the time I took these pictures, he was pretty proud of his new wounds!

He's here!

Another new little miracle added to the Gib clan! The baby has no name, but he's gorgeous! Congrats to Roger and Cozette and the girls!

Birthday without the birthday girl!

Hillary, the birthday girl!

Dear Hillary,

I hope you had a great birthday! Here's what we did to celebrate without you. The Arvy girls got together for lunch and had your favorite: Cafe Rio! As the party was breaking up, Cath said we should have at least called you and sung Happy Birthday!
Then, we went to the Real Soccer game with Kat & D & fam, and Roger and Elyse! Brandon and Zach had the greatest time!Bad extreme close-up! Scary!Roger was getting glares from being 'too loud' at an outdoor soccer game! Come on, people! By the way, his wife is in labor.....
We miss you, but hope you had a great birthday! Love, Jill & fam

Dear Grandma A.,

Here's what's left of the treats you sent home for the grandkids! Gone in 60 seconds! Thanks for lunch and a fun afternoon! Love, your grandkids

Dear Mater,

Could you do something more useful with the lawnmower beside SLEEP on it!?!?!

Oooohhhh, Baby!

(11) UCLA 6, Utah 44

I'm not going to lie to you...it's been really tough to see our beloved Utes, shall we say, not up to par. We aren't trying to be fair-weathered fans at all....come on...we are the ones that stay until the VERY END of every game and also sit through the freezing drizzle rain and snow. We have even taught our little kids the Ute Fight Song. But, we gave up our football tickets this year. Our kids are involved in a lot of things right now and it was difficult to do the kid thing and still try to support our Utes by attending games.

We are taking all the 'smack' being handed to us by various loved ones.

It's ok...we can handle it.

We weren't sure what we wanted to do when Jim offered us 2 tickets to the UCLA game.

We were at the UCLA game last year at the Rose Bowl.

Let me remind you that the game was NOT FUN!

We cooked in the heat and then got spanked on the football field.

However, we decided to go to the game today.

Oh, how SWEET it is!

We experienced this game as we had so many in days gone by. Hearing the fight song everytime they scored. Jumping out of our seats at each interception or worthy play. Kisses and high-fives for touchdowns! Let me tell you...it's so nice to see my hubby smiling on game day once again!

Thanks to my Mom and Dad for watching the kidlets so we could have FUN! We'll enjoy this win for awhile...hope is alive!

One of my favorite moments of the day was when Brandon told his Dad to put on his twiner Utes shirt. I wish I had a picture, but Brandon was so tired after last night (Mike's plane was late and we didn't pick him up until 12:30AM) and missing his nap, that he didn't make it home awake. Also, we enjoyed getting phone calls and texts from the 'various loved ones' all throughout the game.

GO UTES!

I'm NOT crazy!

This post is for my bro-in-law, Scott, and the rest of the Arvy's who were teasing me about wanting to go to Serendipity last time we were in NYC for frozen hot chocolate. I found this gal (who lives in NYC) off of my brother's blog! I'm not crazy! It's obviously a GREAT dessert!

You guys owe me a frozen hot chocolate next time we are in the Big Apple!

Thursday, June 28, 2007

Mmmmmm, mmmmm good.
Peanut-butter frozen hot chocolate. Is it wrong that I have now been to Serendipity for this delicious treat 8 times in the last 5 months?I don't think so, either.
Posted by chiggidy at 9:43 PM

The Power of Music

The other day as we were in the car running errands, I had Def Leppard in the cd player. One of those classic rocker ballads came on and Sydney said, 'This song makes me cry.' I asked her what was up and she said anytime music is soft and pretty, it makes her cry.

So, I never thought as Def Leppard as 'touching' music, but as I thought about her comment later, I understood where she's coming from. First, she's inherited the gene my Mom and I have that makes you cry at ANYTHING, but also that the power of music is an incredible thing.

Music has always been a part of my life. I have learned to enjoy all genres of music and can listen to almost anything and find something enjoyable in it. My parents were always (and still are) extremely involved in music for as long as I can remember. They met in Symphonic Choir!

On the wall in my living room, above the piano, I have vinyl lettering that says, 'Where words fail, music speaks'. I think this quote comes from Hans Christian Anderson. But, it really rings true to me. Music can touch your soul. Music can heal. Music can remind you of times long ago. There is music all around and I am so grateful my Father in Heaven gave us this wonderful gift.

And, I'm glad that my daughter can 'feel' this gift already in her young, precious age.

I miss you!

I miss my honey when he goes on business trips. In fact, all of us left at home really miss him. I think we realize that our family isn't complete without him. Little Sydney cried her eyes out the night before Mike left. Amanda has been e-mailing him every day. I have been stress eating. Brandon has even told Mike 'I love you' on the phone....the first time he's ever said 'I love you!'

So, I stay up late....stalling about going to bed. It's 12:30am and I'm still lurking on other's blogs. Brandon is still sleeping in our bed because I haven't moved him yet. Maybe I don't want to be alone in my own room!

I'm so glad that Mike doesn't have to travel very much. Before we had kids, he took a job that had him gone all week. It was hard then and I at least had a job to go to. But, I'm so glad we realized that this wasn't how we wanted to live....only together on the weekends. I am grateful that the travel is limited....can you imagine how crazy we would be at home if he were gone more?

Saturday Soccer!

Amanda, trying not to smile, and Sydney. Our soccer girls!

Soccer season has arrived! We started the day with Amanda's game. Her team is called EXTREME and they have an awesome cheer! Amanda SCORED A GOAL! We were really proud of her as she is much more aggressive. She actually had 2 other attempted goals....

Way to Go, Amanda!

Amanda's team doing their cheer!

Sydney's game was this afternoon. This was Syd's first ever soccer game and she did great! She scored a goal...she says. I was with Amanda at a ballet audition and Mike said he didn't see it. Anyway, we just told her we believed her! It's so funny to watch the group run around the field! She did a great job and got lots of kicks! Way to Go, Sydney!

Sydney running off the field during a quarter break!

Living in the 80's

Any children of the 80's out there? Well, we took a little trip down memory lane last night. Our friends invited us to go see Def Leppard and Styx and Foreigner at USANA ampitheatre and it was a blast!

We all met up at Crown Burger (we needed a fast place) and by the time we got on the road, traffic was horrible! We spent an hour and a half heading west. We missed Foreigner all together and got there just in time to see Styx. The girls needed a bathroom which was an experience in and of itself. The mens restroom door was completely open and 'Jethro' was our new best friend! Imagine our horror when he was sitting 2 rows behind us! There was definately a different crowd there....but, there were plenty of 'normal' people like us....Mike even ran into a mission companion, Ritchie, who lives not too far from us. We were joking that we missed ward temple night and came to Sodom and Gomorrah!

We had a great time rockin' to our old favs. Def Leppard sounded just like they use to. They gave a great show and it was fun to be at a rock concert again where you could feel the base guitar beat in your chest. We had a great time with our friends, Brad & Jeni (Jeni was my friend who would dance with me....I don't know how you sit still at a rock concert), Casey & Nicole (Nicole who didn't know most of the songs because she's too young), Tony & Hillary (Hillary who didn't know any songs because she's even younger than Nicole), and Brad & Jeni's friends, Rod & Jill. Getting out of the parking lot took about an hour, but we found a quicker route home without any traffic.

Thanks to Renae who came and watched our kids! I felt terrible that she drove home at 1am! We tried to get her to sleep over....the kids would have loved that. Thanks for taking them to dinner and the park!

The 80's had some great music and it was fun to go back in time if for only one night!

West Yellowstone

Our kiddies posing in front of the buffalo.....
We had our annual Labor Day trip with the Arvy's this past weekend. What a great time we had. These are times that I wish that inner poet or eloquent writer would surface so I could do justice to our experience. But, you'll just have to deal with what you get.
We left after the school open house and didn't get to W. Y. until after midnight. When we got up the next morning, it was raining! But, it was a nice rain....and made the town look even more beautiful. We went right into Yellowstone Park to start exploring. Our first adventure was this elk that was grazing right next to the road! We had to stop and take pictures.

Kristine's boys checking out madam elk.

Then, on to Gibbon Falls (I probably remembered that name wrong). What an amazing sight.

Corvin and Sydney

Then to see some cool geysers and paint pots.

Maddie, Sydney, Amanda, Brandon, Zachary and Jace...so much fun with cousins!

Whoops...where's Brandon?

Oh! There he is! With Brock, Andrew, Kris and Daddy.

Next, to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone: They look like they are going off the edge! I was nervous.

This next picture is my favorite because Maddie had just punched Zach as I took the picture! Ah, sibling love...

Kellie and Emily

Our next little hike led us past a fallen tree which became a great trampoline! This was a great activity for the kids as they played there for a good 20 minutes. We would have a few opportunities to play on fallen trees throughout the weekend. Lots of giggles...

Amanda and I took the hike down to get a better view of the falls. It was a pretty steep hike and Amanda did it like a pro!

More poses at the falls....Amanda and Zach in a cool little cave along the trail.

Sydney and Jace
Mike thought it was cool to see this ribcage at one of the geysers. Circle of life......
I can't remember the name of this area, but Mike had taken the girls to see it because Brandon had fallen asleep in the car. I stayed with him and can I just tell you that it was a wonderful, relaxing time of renewal for me. I just sat in the car, eyes closed, feeling the breeze on my face and listening to sounds around me...mostly of nature, some of humans. But, it reminded me that I don't get time or I guess make time to just sit anymore. I could feel my soul being filled again as I experienced all that God has given us to enjoy in the world around us. I could have stay there forever. I enjoyed every minute of this personal spiritual experience. It was so peaceful.
Sydney is famous for not walking very far without complaining. Mike ended up carrying her around this area. What a good Daddy! Syd doesn't know how lucky she is!
Nice rack!
The kids favorite: Buffalo!

We spent all day at the park and couldn't wait to get back the next day. We woke up early and Mike and Scott took a bike ride into the park. The elk were along the road again and as they were riding up along side of them, a photographer took their picture. He told them it was a great picture! After they guy left, Mike thought I should have had him e-mail it to me! Oh well. When you see it in a biking mag or a hunter's mag....let us know!

I was amazed as we drove into the park this day at the beauty. It was a little foggy and earlier than we had been there the day before. As we past the area around Bald Eagle Mtn, the sunlight shone through the majestic Lodgepole Pines (my fav trees) and you could see glistening spiderwebs on the branches. I'm talking a ton of spiderwebs! It was an incredible sight and I was sad that we weren't allowed to stop along that part of the highway because it would be nice to capture that in a picture. We saw many buffalo and elk. We were able to stop and have a picnic lunch with the whole family that was a lot of fun. The kids ran around and played to their hearts content.

Visiting more hot pots, geysers, etc. Sydney was really hungry this morning and wasn't happy at all. We talked about getting a picture of her to take and show her school class. This is the best we could get! (Sorry it's sideways again. It was too funny not to put on the blog)

Greg, Maddie and Amanda

My boys!Old Faithful! Hillary, Amanda, Maddie, Syd, Zach, Corvin and Brando

Can I tell you how much I love my family!?!?!?

We were able to go to the Playmill theater and see Annie Get your Gun. The girls really liked that and keep repeating their favorite parts. Sunday, we went to church and were pleasantly surprised to see Elder Wirthlin in the meeting! He bore his testimony and it was so simple in its truthfulness that Mike and I were touched. We took the kids up to shake his hand after and tried to tell them they may never get to shake an apostle's hand again...this is a big deal! I was also touched throughout that testimony meeting with some of the testimonies given. We are all God's children and are experiencing similiar things. It was heart-warming to hear Ray Ray tell us how he used to come to the door with beer and cig in hand when his home teacher came over so he would know he wasn't welcome and to hear the break in his voice as he told us of his change of heart and how he was just called to be High Priest group leader. My favorite part was when Elder Wirthlin said we have gathered together to be counted with those who love the Savior.

After church, we took a ride into Yellowstone one more time. Our favorite part about this day was the buffalo that was walking along the side of the road as we came by. We slowed to get a good look and Sydney said she could almost reach out and touch him! We also saw a coyote and a bull elk pretty close as he was hanging out near a campground. It was fun to experience the kids seeing the wildlife. I really enjoyed this vacation. I love, love, love to spend time with my little family without any of life's normal interruptions. Being with them gives me pure Joy.

We had a great family meeting on Sunday. We are grateful for Jim & Renae giving us the opportunity to be together as a family. It was so great to be with those that live back east and to see their new babies. Monday morning, we all went to the IMAX and saw "Yellowstone" and then we were on our way home....mourning the passing of our vacation. We stopped in Rexburg and drove by the new temple. Also, a quick bite with the family and we were homeward bound!