Christmas Eve - Gibby Style

As previously mentioned, we did the Gibby Christmas Eve.  We stopped on the way from skiing at Tepanyaki and got our tradition sushi dinner.  Sydney did Chinese with the Gibbys and they did order us some wontons!

Here's most of the grandkids in their Christmas jammies!  Evan & Jamie couldn't make it out this year, but we are hopeful for next year!

Brandon and Zach after the cousin gift exchange!

 Here's the family sitting down for dinner! Merry Christmas!

 The next day we got to face time with Jim & Renae from New Zealand!  It was good to see their faces and we are getting excited for them to get home in April!  We also visited my parents and then went to a movie.  We also had dinner at Bucca de Beppo...the only place we could find open on Christmas besides McDonalds :)

During December and Christmas Break

Before I blog Christmas, here are some of the things we did in December.  Nicole and I held the 8th annual neighborhood donation party.  We had Amanda help pass out flyers and deliver the donations as part of her YW Personal Progress Value Project.  I got her out of school to deliver everything to Safe Harbor Womens Shelter in Kaysville.  When Landon Kartchner heard she was getting checked out, he asked if he could come. I said yes if his mom called the school....which she did, so he came along!

 As usual, the Shelter was so appreciative.  Our donations were down this year. Not sure why, but not as many people came that night.  But, we still gave them over $1000 and these items.  After we delivered everything, Amanda and Landon started asking questions about what the Shelter did, so we had a nice discussion about how blessed we are and how there is always someone worse off than us.  We went to lunch at Cafe Rio and then back to school they went!

I held a piano recital on Dec 23rd, the first day of Christmas break.  It was short and sweet and very casual.  Brandon played, but the girl refused. Mom fail....

 Nice sunset on the way to pick up Mike to go see the Christmas lights at Temple Square. Super fun. Super crowded.  We had dinner at Cheesecake Factory.  Good family memories!  And, we found the best picture taking spot ever!!!

 Amanda is learning to drive. The best story so far is that we told her she could drive if she could identify the gas pedal. After pointing to the brake pedal, we made her wait.  But, she's been practicing.  This day, I had her take Brandon to the church without me because I was teaching.  It was so cold out that he couldn't ride his bike.  Obviously, she and Sydney were liking being without mom!!  She was parked when taking this, just fyi!

 Amanda's jr high won the basketball championship. She got a ride to the game on the spirit bus.  Looks like a party!  Her friend Ally Megill is sitting by her....

 Amanda did lots and lots and lots of snowboarding during the break!  She has a pass to Snowbasin this year along with all her friends.  Mike has driven her up there about 5 times so far.  She's getting so good and we are so glad she loves it!

This is Amanda and her friend, Taylor Woods, taking a different approach to getting down the mountain....on their bums instead of on their boards.

 Amanda's friend, Chezney, is a hard core skier, so the both of them went a million times during the break!

 Some more of the friends at Basin.  These guys she boards with push her to go faster and be a better boarder. They also make her try the tricks and rails, etc....which scares me, but she loves it!

Mike & Scott took the girls skiing on Christmas Eve at the Canyons.  I drove up there with Brandon so that about half day when Sydney was done, I could pick her up and let Mike & Amanda still ski the day out.  My plan was to take B and Sydney tubing at Gorgoza Park after, but an unfortunate incident involving the inability to get snow pants off in time to pee, left us running to WalMart instead to get Brandon some new clothes to wear to the Gibson Christmas Even dinner.....Oh well.

 More Amanda and friends...

 Max takes lots of naps....he's in a lot right now because the temps are frigid!

We also got Monopoly for Christmas and played a few family games. I was the winner every time....but Sydney and Amanda both gave me a run for my money!!

Stay tuned for Christmas post!

Christmas 2013

So hard to believe that we have experienced another Christmas and now are onto a new year!  The kids went back to school today, so I find myself with a quiet house. After 2 hours of ironing, I decided to sit a bit and try to update!

 Well, I had a birthday.  Forty-four.  When did this happen? Ugh....My family was awesome and we had dinner and the cake (Mike ordered it a few days ahead!!!)  We saw a movie together.  All in all a great day except for the turning one year older!

Texts from my brothers and friends and a phone call from my parents. It's so nice when people remember my birthday during this crazy busy time of year!  It means a lot to me.

 Amanda has been taking photography in school this semester.  She's becoming quite good! I find pictures on my Canon camera a lot these days. Here are few fun ones....

 Amanda and Sydney took the camera out one day to take pictures on the rail trail behind our house...so cute!

Some of our happenings...

The girls getting a pedicure during our quick trip to Park City....

I went as a chaperone to Amanda's photography field trip to the zoo. It was really fun and not crowded at all.  The best part is that we got in for free! Manda took some amazing pictures of the animals....as well as lots of her friends...The above is the kids we hung out with all day...including a couple that didn't get in the picture.

Amanda, Susie and Maddy and they rode the carousel!

The lighting that day was so good for pictures, too.  No editing done on any of these.

The tiger was so vocal while we were there!  Amanda caught him in action!  He is so pretty, too!

Sydney had a Christmas recital for hip hop last Saturday. Her costume was so cute!  She did a great job and can't wait to join this studio next year.  It's going to be hard to keep her interested in ballet for the next 6 months....

Classic Sydney posing....

I finally blocked out two days (during the day before piano) to get the office painted! Mike did the ceiling and patchwork and then I primed and put two coats on the walls.  It took forever, but the girly room purple is gone and it's ready to be an office!  I am refinishing a desk to put in there. That's my next project....but hopefully it will be done soon.  Maybe I'll have time to work on it tomorrow...cross your fingers.....

It turned frigid here last week! I wouldn't even let our kids sit at the bus stop because it was 0 degrees and they won't wear coats!  I was even cold....and that doesn't happen often.

Amanda stayed home from school last Friday, so we met Mike for lunch. We went to Mel & Becky Mauris' new restuarant, Bountiful Greek. It was soooo good!  Mel is Amanda's soccer coach.

The first Saturday in December was a busy one!  After Sydney's dance recital, Amanda had some dance rehearsals and then we went to the Arveseth cousin party. Bowling and dinner at Doug & Cath's again. It was super fun and I'm glad we got to stay this year instead of running off to an indoor game.  Maddie had to do that this year.....Super fun and I hope we keep this tradition up actually...After that, we headed to Festival of Trees and the girls and I bagged trees.  We took Susie and Maddie with us to the cousin party because they needed a ride down to SLC.  Did I mention it was a blizzard!  The roads were icy all day long.  Treacherous drive, but we were safe. Mike took Brandon home after the cousin party.  We planned to stay at my parent's house because they were out of town and I didn't want to drive home, but when the girls started talking about an all nighter and showering at my parents and eating, I changed my mind. Even though it was icy and 2:00am, I didn't want these girls to destroy the house!  Plus, they needed to be at Susie's house by 7:45am to go deliver the trees on Sunday morning and I didn't want to get up that early.  We made it home safely, of course.   I decided to sleep through Sacrament meeting and just go to Primary.  I got a call at 9am from Shanna asking if I was doing Sharing time today.  Argh!  So, I had to get up and get the lesson ready. It all worked out :)  But we all took naps after church!

Here are some pictures of our Thanksgiving day trip to St George and Vegas.  Sydney and Mike doing the book where you unfocus your eyes and see different pictures...kept them busy all morning!

After hanging on the strip for awhile, we decided to leave and go see the Temple! We had to clear our minds!

Girls in front of Caesars Palace

We rode the roller coaster at New York New York and Amanda dreaming of going back!

We went to Serendipity!  I tried so hard to go there in NYC.  When I heard they had one in Vegas, Mike made us some reservations.  They are famous for this Frozen Hot Chocolate and it was ok.  The waitress suggested the deep fried Oreo sundae and that was delish!  Super fun weekend!

I'm going backwards here, but since it was just us and my parents for Thanksgiving, we decided to go to Little America!  It was great food and no clean up!

Amanda loves loves loves chocolate covered strawberries and had 22?  Chocolate all over her face, but she was happy!  We left for St George right after dinner and my parents stayed with us.  They hung out with the Smiths and with Bud & Kay, too.  It was a great weekend and so great to spend it with my parents!  Great weekend!