Random Christmas Fun

December is always a busy month and it is always Danny's busiest time of year at work so I tend to have to get to the girls end of year activities on my own. We did a school choir concert, a piano recital, Ashley's after school choir concert, 4 different parties for Alyss, and a Marie Osmond Concert for me. Not to mention Young Men's activities and a Relief Society activity. Most of it, I didn't get pictures of, but I did get a picture Ashley's choir concert(one of the things Danny actually got to attend).

After the girls were out of school, I took them to the mall to check out the Harry Potter event they had going on all month. It was crowded and more of a Harry Potter themed shopping area, but we did do some other fun things at the mall like ride the train.

On Christmas Eve, we went over to Gawbie and Grandpa's for a family party. We had a delicious ham and tamales dinner. Then we got to decorate the men like Christmas trees.

We had a nice program and then enjoyed some Christmas goodies and hot chocolate. Then we opened presents. It was a fun afternoon.
Back at home, we let the kids open their one gift, Christmas jammies. This year I made jammie bottoms with Labrador retrievers on them in honor of Casey.

 On Christmas, they were excited to see that Santa visited.

And it isn't Christmas, for me, without a picture of the kids on the stairs. Miner traditions are engraved into my heart.

We had a nice Christmas season and a happy new year. We were happy for the time that Danny took off around the holidays, especially after the busy season at work.

Alyssa turns 12

Alyssa had a great birthday. She wanted a rice crispy cake for her cake this year. She even requested to decorate it herself.

She got to have a friend birthday party, but we limited the number she could invite to her closest school and neighborhood friends. She wanted to do a baking theme, so after researching a little and talking with her about some of the things she wanted to do at the party, we decided to do a mini version of Cupcake Wars. They started with decorating aprons so that they wouldn't dirty their clothes.

Then we split them into two teams and let them choose from 5 different cupcake recipes(vanilla, coconut, gingerbread, funfetti, and lemon). We gave them 15 minutes to get their cupcakes into the oven. One team chose coconut and the other chose funfetti. I thought both team's cupcakes turned out delicious. 

 While the cupcakes were baking, we took a break for some games and then presents.

When the cupcakes were ready, we gave the teams 15 minutes to design 3 different cupcakes representing things that describe Alyssa. The first one was an artist theme, the second an author theme, and the third a Christmas theme. They had 15 minutes to design their cupcakes and get them on a plate for the judges. They were provided with about 6 colors of frosting, a huge selection of sprinkles, and fondant. I thought they created some fun cupcakes.

The judges chose their favorite from each category and the team that got 2 out of 3 took home the prize. I think the girls had fun. Our only snag was running out of time at the end because we got started late due to traffic delaying a few of the girls. The cupcakes also took a lot longer to bake than expected. But Alyssa thought it was fun and that is what was important.
On her birthday, we went out to the Japanese Steakhouse again this year. She has chosen that for her birthday dinner probably 4 out of the last 5 years.

Thanksgiving Break

The kids had the whole week of Thanksgiving off of school. We had really nice weather, so we spent some time outside. Danny worked Monday, Friday, and Saturday that week. On Monday, Alyssa finally got to have a much anticipated play date with her friend from school. They have been planning this play date all year. While she was at her friends house, I took the other kids swimming at the Provo Rec Center(where we have passes). The pools were really cold, though, so we didn't last very long compared to normal.
Danny was home on Tuesday and we took the kids to a daytime BYU Women's basketball game. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into until it was too late to turn back. There were about 50 schools on field trips attending the game that day. The Marriot Center was full of screaming kids. The noise level was incredible. Our kids were not happy, not only because the high pitched screaming, but also because they were hogging the jumbo tron(our kids are used to getting on the jumbo tron because of our usually seats being close to the camera man). They were excited about getting a white pom pom.

We lasted for 3 quarters and then took them out to lunch. Danny worked on finishing Alyssa's room remodel for the rest of the day. Mostly he installed this shelf.

We spent most of Wednesday cleaning and prepping for Thanksgiving. We hosted for most of Danny's family this year. We missed those who weren't able to join us. We didn't even take any pictures, but dinner was good, and the company even better.
On Friday, Ashley got to go play with a friend from school. While she was at her friends house, I went on a bike ride with the other kids. We stopped at a park for a little while and Alyssa found this tumbleweed.

They had fun playing with it. That evening, we joined the Wheeler's at the Thanksgiving Point Christmas light display. It was expensive, but pretty amazing.

Danny wasn't able to join us because he was working and he was missed.
On Saturday, the weather was nice again, so we tried out a new park. We read online that you could feed ducks there so we came armed with a bunch of different duck food options, including oats, corn, peas, birdseed, and lettuce. The ducks ate it all and the kids loved it.

That evening, we got to go watch Ashley sing in the Santa Parade with her choir. The weather, was fortunately, mild. We were unfortunate to have seats next to some pretty annoying kids, but we tried our best to ignore them. 

Parade selfie!! I love how nicely Camden smiled for the picture. He loves to see himself in selfie mode and always smiles so well for pictures that way. After the parade, we went over to the tree lighting ceremony and listened to Ashley and her choir sing one more time.

It is a small group, but they sounded good. We skipped the hot chocolate and cookie line since we didn't have Daddy with us and headed home for our own hot chocolate and cookies.
On Sunday, we put up our Christmas decorations. The kids were so helpful this year and we had it all done in less than 2 hours. Now the lights are on whenever we are home and the kids are constantly wearing their Santa hats.

We are looking forward to the Christmas season ahead of us.

Tyler's First Cavities

We were so sad to hear that Tyler had to get cavities filled when the kids went to the dentist in October. He had to get 7 fillings!!! He has always been pretty good at the dentist, but with the number of fillings that he had to get, the dentist wanted to put him under for the fillings. We had done this 2 different times for Alyssa, so it was nothing new for us, but we were not excited about the extra cost.
Here he is sleeping still after the procedure. He took forever to wake up. The anesthesiologist finally came in and gave him a few good shakes to get him to wake up.

He did really well with the whole procedure and is now diligent with his brushing and flossing so he doesn't have to "get the shot again at the dentist." Camden is equally as diligent with brushing and flossing because he wants to do everything that he sees Tyler do.

Fall Leaves

 We don't get that many fall leaves because our trees are all still fairly young, but we got enough to make a decent pile two different times. On of the times, we took some pictures.

They were even willing to help pick up the leaves after playing in them.

Halloween

 It was hard to be excited for Halloween this year when we were all so sad, but the kids still dressed up and went trick or treating. I took the boys to a Halloween themed story time that morning. Tyler had insisted on being Spider-man again this year even though I had bought he and Camden Woody and Buzz costumes. When Camden put on the Buzz costume before story time, Tyler decided that he wanted to be Buzz. There was quite the temper tantrum, but I finally convinced him to be Woody for story time and then he could be Buzz for trick or treating that night. I thought they looked pretty cute in their costumes.

Alyssa was a farm girl and Ashley was Toad from Super Mario Bros.

The girls went trick or treating with friends this year and I took the boys out while Danny watched the World Series game and handed out candy. Their cousin, Kennedi, joined up with them after the first street. We also put on some coats after the first street because it was a pretty cold night out.

Carving Pumpkins

 Our pumpkin carving this year had a definite theme. Seeing as we carved/painted the pumpkins 2 days after we lost Casey, most of them were done in memory of him. We ended up with having enough pumpkins for each of the kids to have 2 this year because we all got free pumpkins after we had already bought one for each of the kids. As a result, each of the kids carved one and painted one. Ashley spent a long time on her painted one.

 And I think it turned out amazing.

Tyler painted his yellow for Casey and pink because that is his favorite color.

 I loved seeing Camden stick his whole arm inside of his pumpkin to scoop out the seeds and guts.

 Here are Camden and Tyler's carved masterpieces(done with Daddy's help)

 Here is Camden's painted pumpkin.

 Alyssa painted hers to look like Casey's face. I thought it turned out super cute.

 And Alyssa and Ashley both carved Casey. Alyssa's is on the left and Ashley's is on the right.

We had to throw away the carved pumpkins when they started to mold a few days after Halloween, but the two painted Casey pumpkins are still on our porch. I guess we will have to bring them in when we decorate for Christmas.

The Day We Have Been Dreading For Many Years

We had one of the worst weeks ever after we got back from the Grand Canyon. It started with this awful sickness that cycled through everyone in the family except me. The boys had it while we were at the Grand Canyon. Ashley had it for the trip home and the few days following. Then Danny caught it and was out of work for 3 days because of it. And Alyssa was the last one to unfortunately get it. We had hoped that she would stay healthy since she had her Fiddler on the Roof play that weekend. No such luck. She had to perform, headache, fever, and all. Then, on Friday, Casey got sick. It started in the middle of the night. Camden woke me up around 3:30 in the morning and refused to go back to his bed. So we headed downstairs in order to let everyone else continue sleeping. As I got to the bottom of the stairs, I heard a strange sound coming from the kitchen. It sounded like there was an animal growling. As I walked closer to investigate, I found Casey on the kitchen floor having a seizure. I ran to him and pet him and called his name, but he was unresponsive. So I woke up Danny. By the time we got back downstairs, he was done with the seizure, but was still panting and not able to get up. When he finally did get up, he was obviously disoriented and not doing well. Danny found an animal hospital that was open all night and we called them to see what we should do. After talking to them, we felt better about waiting it out until morning to take him to our normal vet. That is, until he started having another seizure. Danny held him until he was done and then carried him out to his truck and took him to the overnight animal hospital. After being examined by the vet, we learned that he had a brain tumor that was causing the seizures. They couldn't get him to take medication, so they put an IV in with the hopes of getting the seizures under control so that we could take him home. They held him there all day on the IV, but he continued to have the seizures pretty regularly. Around 4:30 that afternoon Danny called and told me to bring the kids to the vet so that we could say goodbye. That was probably the hardest thing we have ever had to do in our lives. It was hard enough to say goodbye to our sweet dog, but the time between when I found out that Casey was dying and when we would actually get to the vet and tell the kids broke my heart. I didn't want to shatter their world.

We spent 1-2 hours in a private room at the vet saying goodbye. We cried, we hugged him, we talked to him, and shared our favorite stories about him. When it was getting late and we felt like we were just delaying the inevitable, I took the kids to get dinner and ice cream while Danny stayed with Casey. He died about 30 minutes after we left.
We have had a hard time adjusting to life with out Casey, but we continue to go on. I don't know how long we will continue to look at the back door for him or think of him every time we have leftover food or when food falls on the floor, but I imagine it will be a long time before any of those thoughts go away. We lost him a couple of years earlier than we expected and because it happened so suddenly, I think it has hit us harder than expected. Danny and I had started to dread this day a few years ago when we saw how attached the kids were to Casey, especially Ashley. We had pictured in our minds watching him grow old and seeing his health gradually get worse. I don't think any of the scenarios we pictured resembled this day. We will always miss him. Here are some of our favorite pictures from his life.

 

 

That last one was taken during our family photo shoot a few weeks before we died. We are so glad we decided to bring him to the photo shoot because now we have some great pictures to remember him by. We will always miss Casey. He was the best dog we could have ever asked for.