Dad - put your dancing shoes on....

I have the best father in the world and wouldn't you know...today is his birthday. New Year's Eve! He likes to say that the whole world celebrates his big day.

My dad has his own blog - check it out here!

Happy Birthday Gene Gene the Dancing Machine!!

Love,
Yikket

P.S. - Hey dad - before we come over to party at your house tonight, I just have to know... did you take down your Christmas tree yet? I just don't dare run the risk of witnessing another 'incident' where you accidentally knock it over. If you recall, mom shook with laughter for days and the memory of the tree lying on its side has haunted me for years.

P.P.S - Oh - and just so that I can prepare myself - are you going to tell the infamous Scotty Pippen (aka Potty Skippin') joke again this year? How about your elephant imitation? Are you going to pepper us with snipits of the Herman the Worm story? Will you wax philosophical about the good ole Alma days with Turkey Jim?

P.P.P.S - Can we finally put to rest the debate that Springville, UT is the drug capital of the world?

P.P.P.P.S - If we end up playing Scattergories, don't be mad if we don't let you count "Foghorn Frieda, the famous floozie from Flauttisville, Florida" as 7 points, k? That was really quite a stretch.

P.P.P.P.P.S - Oh yeah- and would you mind if your daughter thinks you are the funnest, craziest, kindest, bestest, and most giving dad in the world?

Giveaway

I'm having a giveaway! To learn the details - go check out my new blog!

Psst

I've been busy working on a project.

Come back Monday to see what I'm doing....

Merry Christmas!!

Can you believe it's Christmas Eve? What will your family do tonight?

Merry Christmas everyone. Be festive. Be safe.

Holiday fun and household UN-fun

We've been busy people in our home lately! I'm short on time so this post will be short, sweet, and to the point! =)

Thursday we went to Connor's swim meet. He is really good!! Unfortunately they lost the meet because they were going against the best swim team in the state.















Friday my work had our Christmas party and I made some delicious tacos!! Thanks everyone for your awesome recipes. I couldn't have done it without you!

Yesterday our family went Christmas-ing down town. It is not very often that all of the kids are home together on the same weekend - so we took advantage of this rare opportunity!

We went to Clark Planetarium and saw "Santa and the Snowman 3D".

BTW - if you have little kids and want to see a darling Christmas movie - this is the one!!














Even though it's kind of a 'little kid' movie - my teenagers loved it. They actually admitted it!















Then we boarded TRAX.















And met Todd for dinner. YUMMY!!















We saved the best for last!

About three weeks ago, I opened the mail to find that I received tickets to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas concert. I was so excited that I actually screeched!! I enter the lottery every year - and this is the first time I received tickets.

Along the way, we braved the crowds and saw the beautiful lights on Temple Square.















And made it to the concert. To my delight - our seats were excellent (it's hard to tell in this picture). There are just times in life when the stars align and things just work out. Yesterday was that day. The concert was amazing!! The choir, the orchestra, the reading - all incredible! I love this choir and the feeling I get when I hear their angelic voices. There was an AMAZING organ solo of the song "Go Tell it on the Mountain" that literally brought the house down!

It was a super weekend that ended with my mom's birthday celebration tonight!! Love you mom - hope you had fun.

And now for the bad news.

I'm stealing Elora's computer right now because mine is broken. Why? Not a clue. The 'Geek Squad' thinks it might need a new mother board. Yeah. That's fun.

I haven't mentioned that my oven died a few weeks ago and my washing machine is on the brink.

Alas - life is good. I will take appliance issues over the more serious challenges that other people are facing during this Christmas season.

But - this means I won't be blogging much during the next few weeks. {Please hold your applause}. I'll still be around - and I'll lurk and comment when I can.

I sure hope everyone is having a wonderful Christmas season!

Happy Birthday Maud the Broad!

Today is my mother's birthday - December 12. She would be mad if I said her age - so I'll just say she looks barely old enough to be my mom! And that's the truth!

**My mom reads my blog so please leave her a comment and tell her Happy Birthday**

So - about the name Maud the Broad. First of all - my mom's name is Maudeen. I was kind of a crazy teenager and I'm so glad she made it through those years in one piece! I also had crazy friends - and they loved my mom! People just love to make her chuckle because she has a funny, hilarious, contagious kind of laugh. But getting back to the point - one of my friends - I actually think it was Cindy (aka Binders, Cynthia) - actually called my mother "Maud the Broad" once while she was at my house. My very fun mom laughed and laughed at that name and it stuck. Instead of being stuffy and hating that name - she thought it was hilarious.




Here is my lovely mama!

Isn't she pretty? She has stunningly beautiful eyes!









Here are some things I know about my mother!

• She has a great laugh!
• She loves makeup
• She is beautiful
• She is lucky
• She drives a Mini Cooper (Jealous!)
• She loves to play dice games - especially bunco
• She is faithful and loyal
• She is funny
• She loves the color red
• She loves the Gospel
• She is competitive and loves winning radio contests!
• She would do anything for her children and family
• She has a favorite cup and a favorite chair
• She loves Bryce Canyon and she gave me my love for Bryce Canyon
• She makes the best potato salad in the world!
• She has 4 children - 2 girls and 2 boys
• She laughs at my dad's jokes
• She is frugal
• She loves licorice and jelly beans
• She is spunky
• She is very kind to everyone
• She loves very deeply

Mom - I'm feeling bad that I'm not going to see you until Sunday. Have a super great wonderful jolly birthday. You are loved so very much!

Click HERE for a little something from your four kids....

Happy Birthday Maud the Broad!!

Help! Need a great taco recipe!

I'm making tacos for 15 people and need a good recipe....chicken, beef, armadillo meat - doesn't matter. Just needs to be tasty. Do you have a yummy recipe to share?

Lucky!!

I came home from work tonight to two great surprises! They made my night!


First - I won a giveway from author Annette Lyons!! She is giving her three winners a choice of any of her published books. Let me just tell you how hard it was to decide!!


But this was not a typical giveaway - this was a "Pay it Forward" giveaway. She included a challenge. In an effort to promote book sales - the winners are required to post their own "Pay it Forward" giveaway!! So - come back to my blog soon. This is such a clever idea. I love it!! Thank you Annette!! I can't wait to read your book.


Then .... I received a package in the mail from Shauna at Trying to Stay Calm.Why? Just because that's the way she is. Her blog is like a ray of sunshine!! Thank you so much, Shauna. That was so sweet of you. You are awesome. The chocolate? Sooooo gone!




And I can totally imagine what the rest of you are thinking about me right now...





You may even be thinking that I'm making this all up and I didn't really get these awesome gifts. To this I say..



Eat your hearts out!

Speaking of eating - it's time to go serve dinner...

Vote for the best Christmas Pic!

The plan was to get our Christmas pictures taken this weekend. I had grand intentions. The lighting would be perfect. Clothes and hair would be perfect. Children and mama would be happy. The heavens would sing. Our family's Christmas card would be stunning!!

Yeah, that was the plan. It didn't turn out that way.

The lighting was bad. The photography was horrid. We were moody. It wasn't very fun.

Here are a few gems from the first batch...

I suggested going back to the park to take more pictures. "NO MOM!!! They look fine!"

I'm a mean mom - we went back.

The final results are not much better. The following 4 photos are the best of the nearly 60 that we took. I can't decide which one to use so I need your help!! Which of the following are the least frightening of the bunch?

Photo 1

(Do I look totally annoyed in this picture? Because I sooooo was....)

Photo 2.

Photo 3

Photo 4 .

So, what say you? 1, 2, 3, or 4?

How cute is Elora's new hairstyle?!!

Before....

After!

I LOVE IT!!

Darren's films

Before his mission, Darren loved to make videos. He created film after film - about anything and everything. It's what he loves. It was very hard for him to leave technology behind and journey to a foreign land. But he did it. I'm proud of him and I'm missing him.

As a side note - we learned yesterday in his weekly email that he was robbed last week. Darren was out with his companion and had two wallets on him - one was a fake wallet with only a few bucks in it. They got that wallet - but not without a scuffle. He's okay and he wasn't hurt! But it's hard for us here at home - we feel so helpless. Do any of you missionary moms have advice?

So for some reason, I'm remembering his videos these days and thought I would post my favorites. They mean more to me because I first started to love him when he was 10 years old (when I married his dad) - when he was precocious, creative, curious and had boundless energy. Through the years he channelled those traits into his filmmaking and became pretty darned talented! It was fun to watch.

So here are my faves....

(Sorry - I just deleted the first video. Too embarrassing for me)

The next video was for Larissa's school project a few years ago. Meltaways are my kids FaVoRiTe chocolatey treat...



This next video was a film-making competition that he signed up for. They had 24 hours to shoot a video and had several components that were required: they had to use the phrase "Dude, where's my car?"; have a shot of the sunrise; the city; a landmark etc. So - Darren had 24 hours to come up with a plot, film the video, and edit it. He was up all night! Btw - the lady in this movie is my mother-in-law!



The last one I'll post is of Heroes. HE LOVES THIS SHOW! It's a little gorey but I thought he did a great job with it...