It's a New Year!

Our cute friends, the Francis family always throw a New Years Eve party for a group of us! We are starting to plan on it.....cute Nicole, even though she had 5 parties at her house in December, still let us come over and party out!  Yes, this includes kids!

 My cute friends Jen and Elise got to be guinea pigs for my new camera. Nicole also got a new camera, so we were checking them out.  Elise wasn't loving being the model :) but we think she's beautiful!

 Amazingly enough, Amanda didn't have plans with her friends, so LUCKY for us we got her the whole night!  I know this may not happen next year, so I loved having her hang out by me all night! She was texting friends, boys, and Boston Jarman came over when he heard Amanda was there, but she was my buddy and didn't leave my side. I loved it!

 Mike bought some awesome fireworks that he set off at midnight (and a one before and another the night before!)

 Cute Syd Syd!

 Then, everyone gathered to witness our family tradition of burning down the gingerbread house! Zoe even brought hers out to add to the fire and we also burned Brandon's house he built at school.

 The big kids setting things up as Dad went for some fuel....aka gasoline!

 And we sang, 'O Gingerbread House, o gingerbread house.....'I don't really know what words we sing next....

 It was a chilly night and the kids were huddled around the houses like a bonfire and warming their hands! So cute!

We had to keep calling the kids out of the road as cars would pass....but it didn't take them long to huddle back around!

The Utes won their bowl game on New Years Eve....that was awesome! It was a nail biter and even went into overtime!  Our friends, the Lallis hosted the Sun Bowl party in their awesome basement! We partied all day and it was a great way to end this great year! Happy New Year everyone!

Can you tell how quiet it is around here today now that everyone is back at school and work?  I miss having everyone home.

Last night, for FHE, we decided to have our own family Year in Review and asked everyone to tell us what were their favorite memories of this past year.  Here are the ones I can remember:  Lake Powell trips, San Diego for Jill & Mike, New York and Penn trips with the whole family, Mike & Brandon at boy's camp, ballet recitals and Nutcracker, Dad's new truck, St George trips, Kaysville parade and Sydney being in it, U museum tour as VIP's, Amanda's snow shoe field trip, YW retreat, girl's camp, Amanda's braces, Amanda's first baptisms for the dead with Mike, Bud & Kay in St. George, soccer games, Sydney starting cheer, Daddy and kid bike rides and our family helping clean up the trees limbs after the destructive wind storm.

We are truly blessed and have enjoyed so many things this past year.  All of our favorite things involve our family and that was the best thing to hear!  We have also started saying 'nice things' to each other before our family prayer each night.  It started to help stop some of the fighting and also help us to be more positive toward each other.  We all take a turn, even Mom & Dad.  Last night, Brandon who usually has a hard time thinking of things and then saying he hates his sisters, came up with his nice things super fast!  Hopefully this continues :)  That has been one of my favorite things to do this past month.  I love my  little family!