The Nutcracker!

My friend Tricia has a ballet studio here in Lander and she asked me to help her this year with the performance.  It was so much fun seeing all the cute little girls in their costumes and they did such a good job! I was sad I didn't ever get to really see it being backstage but I definitely can't wait to have little girls of my own!  I even got Raymond to come...just to give him a little taste of what he has to look forward to!  Secretly he's excited! :) But in his words he's fine with all the girly girl stuff as long as they go hunting with him too! (My dad tried that with me too...didn't turn out so well) I just hope that when we do have little girls of our own we can find a teacher like Tricia!  I only took one picture at the end since I was so busy but a lot of other girls I know from Primary and school were in it too and they did such a  great job! Here's Tricia with her girls...

Halloween in December!

I'm totally late with this post seeing that it's December but I was looking through my camera and I realized I never put these on! So here they are for my mom! :) Our friends the Johnson's had a spooky backyard for Halloween which was so much fun! Raymond loved it because they had him dress up to scare the kids as they went through.   I was sad that I never got a picture of him all dressed up on my camera... but it was such a fun night!

Cute little Ruby!

 I loved Linda's costume!

 Ava & Josie!

Raymond and I were kinda boring this year on Halloween and we didn't start carving our pumpkins till six at night.  But for being thrown together, they turned out pretty good! Happy Halloween...in December! :)

Willoughby's Visit!

Raymond's sister Marinda and her family came to visit us and we had such a good time while they were here!  We were so glad for no snow too!  On Sat. when they got here we went to Riverton to go to the Pumpkin Patch and the Corn Maze...Noah was loving all the Pumpkins!

 Especially the ones he could carry!

And of course Raymond had to take him to go see the "trac-too"

This picture makes me laugh every time I see it! Raymond told Emmie to be tough!

Noah found some dried corn and started eating it! :)

We went to Sinks Canyon on Sunday, it was cold but the kids had so much fun exploring...especially Kirk!

Ethan & Emmie

How gorgeous!

They loved all the big fish! Too bad you can't catch them! :)

We made Monster Tacos  that turned out pretty darn cute I think!

Marinda has a lot more pictures from when I forgot my camera so I'll have to put more up but we are so grateful that they came to see us! It was so good to have family close by even if it was just for a weekend! We miss you guys already!

Primary Halloween Par-Tay!

My new friend Emily Vorwaller and I are in Primary together and we had a halloween party and it was a HUGE success! Having 32 kids show up probably doesn't sound like very much to most people I'm sure, but for our branch it was amazing! We have seen such a huge growth of kids coming to primary these last few months.  It just makes me smile thinking about all the little miracles that are happening! We had such a good time! We have such cute kids in Primary!

We made Pumpkin Spiders...

Had Face Painting...we're so lucky to have an actual artist in our branch, Sister Cox.  She was the definite favorite of the night! The kids loved it and she did such a great job!

We had relays, decorated cookies, played pin the nose on the pumpkin, ring toss with a witch hat, and had such a fun night!  I'm so glad to be in Primary and to have Emily here now too!

Josey and Ruby, my friends adorable girls!

Only YOU can prevent forest fires!

We had the firefighters come to school this past week and the kids were SO excited! We saw them in the morning and I don't think they stopped talking about it all day! We had such a fun time!

They were so excited to see Smoky!  I was laughing so hard though because they kept asking,

"Are you really a bear?"  "If you're a bear...what do you eat then?" 

(We had just been reading about bears and what they eat...)

 I bet Smoky didn't think he was going to get an interrogation! :)

They were so excited to see a rainbow! They were showing the kids how far the water can go from the truck! Aren't those cute little Jr. Fire Chiefs!

The kids were beaming on that truck! I stayed behind with one of the girls who was really scared!

My cute kids! No matter how tired I am when I get home, those little smiles will always melt my heart!

We had a visitor...

First of all let me just say that this little thing looks cute in this picture but not so much when it's running around your house!  Yesterday morning I was sitting in my living room and saw something out of the corner of my eye run across the floor.  I thought maybe it was a big bug and then I saw it again and realized it was one of these beauties.  Of couse it led to me screaming for Raymond to come help...but it had already ran under my oven and we couldn't get it out.  So we went to Walmart and bought a bunch of traps and set them up around the house.  I was so bummed this morning when I woke up and we didn't catch it.  But tonight when we got home it ran into our living room behind our TV.  Raymond being the manly man he is got some gloves on thinking he was going to catch it with his hands (I don't think he realizes how fast they are but I wasn't going to tell him because I was having fun watching him try!)  He was trying to get behind the couch and was all over the place...but me being the ingenious person I am put a barricade in front of the hall going to our kitchen with a little place to run through that had a sticky trap and just like that he was caught! I was pretty proud of myself and I can finally go to sleep tonight without worrying about our little mouse! Hopefully it was the last...but we left the other traps up still just in case....our neighbors have had 3 in the last few weeks! Just thought we'd share our fun experience! Hope you all are great! :)

The Birthday Month!

September is a BUSY birthday month in our family! My sister Kelsey, two sister in laws...Aimee and Mary Kate, my Dad, our niece Emmie, our nephews Trenton & George, my birthday...not to mention I have a lot of friends whose birthdaya are in September, and two of my best friends just had baby girls!  CONGRATS to Leigh and Jillyn!
SO instead of making a bunch of Birthday posts I decided to do it all at once!  HAPPY BIRTHDAY! We love you guys!  My baby sis Kelsey turned 16 this year so it was a big one for her!   All my siblings and I went down to Cedar to surprise her! It was so much fun! Minus the fact that Raymond couldn't be there...
When we got there she was upstairs and my dad was telling her to come and help him with something...of couse she wasn't too excited to come help but when she came down and saw us she ran over to Brit and gave her a huge hug...then she saw Ryan and I and started crying saying "What are you doing here? How did you get here?"  It was so worth it to go see her for the weekend...I think she's a little lonely being the only one at home now. :) But she had a big Sweet 16 party that night with one of her friends who had just turned 16 too...there were 70 kids in our backyard so it was a crazy night but so much fun! We didn't take too many pictures on my camera but here are a few! Love you sister!!!

Ryan, Aimee, and my mom...we weren't allowed to stay long at the party! :)

WE LOVE YOU GUYS!!!