Merry Christmas!

Crew really loved Christmas this year. He had so much fun opening his presents and showing everyone what he got.

Garrett and his stash. He only wanted two things this year..legos and video games. Well, Santa didn't disappoint. However, if I had known how much time I would spend deciphering lego directions I might have talked Santa out of them.

Tag got his I-touch and a ping-pong table.

Kade wanted everything New York Yankees, Santa truly does exist he says because he KNOWS his dad would never buy him anything having to do with the enemy team. Below, is Tag and Kade in their rival jerseys.

We spent a relaxing day at home eating and playing. Wish everyday could be like this.

Twas the day before Christmas...

On Christmas Eve, we went down to my moms for our annual Christmas Eve party. All I can say is "Let the eating begin!" All that hard work at the gym.....gone in about 1/2 an hour. It was so nice to get the cousins together to play. They were upstairs most of the time playing games and they were all getting along surprisingly well. I don't think I have seen my brother Chad in almost a year so it was nice to visit with him.

Of course, the kids were beginning to get antsy, so we headed home to get ready for Santa. We filled his tray up with cookies and milk. Then the boys opened their one present that they are allowed to open on Christmas Eve. Silly boys, they always hope and wish that maybe this will be the year that their present will be something other than....you guessed it P.J's. But, they were all good sports and put them on. We read The Night Before Christmas, and then the boys always beg for dad to read The Little Match Girl. Why, you ask do my boys love this story? Could it be their sensitive side showing through? Of course not, they only like to hear the story because they know that every time, without fail, it will bring their mother to tears. Well, off to bed with a threat of not waking us up before 8 or Santa will not come. To make sure this happens, we take big sheets of wrapping paper and block off the top of the stairs and they aren't allowed to break through it until we give the word. One year they will figure out a way around it, but until then it works pretty good.

On being 10....

Being 10 is a big deal at the Baxter house. It means you get to take five of your very best friends to Alvin and the Chipmunks and sit up high on the very top row away from your mother and be obnoxious. You also get to waste countless quarters trying to win worthless toys from "the claw" at the movie theater. You get a very special cake that three people spent hours making for you. And best of all, you get to stay up until after one playing games with your friends, fully planning to make good on your threat that the first one asleep will get whip cream on their face. Much to his moms surprise, when she comes up to send them all to bed.. Kade is the ONLY one asleep! This makes for a very tired mom and six very grouchy boys on Christmas Eve. We love you Kade. You always stick up for the underdog. Your little freckles are so endearing to me. You have a smile that can light up a room. You take after your mom when you hide under the covers and read at night. You never fail to tell me you love me and give me a hug. You have become quite the athlete and I am excited to see you play football next year. You have the height of a basketball player and the drive of a wrestler. You are the BEST popcorn maker ever. I hope you will always feel our love and show that love to others around you. Happy Birthday sweetie.

The Cake...

I happen to have some friends who have discovered the thrill of fondant and cake making. Kade really wanted a Yankee cake for his birthday and my friends were gracious enough to take on the challenge. The baseball started falling out right before I took the picture, but the boys still loved it and thought that it was just dirt that we had put on the cake for effect. They did an excellent job and even the Red Sox fans in the family broke down and helped eat it.

Happy Birthday Tag!

I know I am so far behind in my posts, but December was a crazy month. Tag had his 14th birthday this year. I can't believe that I have a son that old. He is so wise for his years and I am continuously amazed at his talents, his strength, his fearlessness and his kindness. I have enjoyed watching him,turn into a young man this year. He finally surpassed me in height and muscle mass! He loves to learn, be with his friends and play hard. He can switch from baseball to football to wrestling with an ease that only he can achieve. My wish for you son is that the following year will bring you much love, happiness, learning experiences, and faith. I pray that you will always search out opportunities to better yourself and to help others. May you always seek good friends and advice from your parents. And no matter how embarrassed you are by your mother, I hope you will always be able to look in the crowd and see me there and know that I am your biggest fan.

Winter Wonderland

Garrett and Crew sure love the snow. It will take me a good 20 minutes to get Crew bundled up and then he goes outside for 10 and wants to go back in. So, we go through the whole process of taking all the winter clothes off and hanging them up. Making hot chocolate and dry clothes on and he wants to go outside again! Every year Jared has to resurrect "The Beast". We inherited this snow blower from my mom. It was left with the house when they bought it over 10 years ago. We aren't sure exactly how old it is, but it does a great job. It is very touchy however, and I think Jared is the only one who can get it to work. I am always praying that we don't have a big storm when Jared is in Arizona!

Salt Lake Slam

This weekend was the Salt Lake Slam which is a National wrestling competition. There were boys here from as far away as Pennsylvania. This event is usually held in Salt Lake but lucky for us, they held it here in good 'ole Wasatch County at the Pony Palace. After starving themselves all day to make sure they made weight Friday night, we went to Dairy Keen and then home to bed, being extremely grateful that we weren't in a hotel like most of the other wrestlers. On Saturday, Jared left at 7 to go up to Logan for a baptism with GG and Crew. I headed off to the Pony Palace with the boys. Now, I admit, that I am for the most part, a very nervous sports mom. But, with wrestling, I am a complete wreck! Those three 1:30 periods are agonizingly slow. Tag has even admitted that it is worse than pitching or playing QB.

Tag, did really well and ended up placing 2nd. This was his first national competition. The poor kid had to wrestle his best friend for his first match. They promised each other that no matter what happened they would stay friends. Well, Tag ended up pinning him. Ian went on to take third place so we all felt a little better. Tag lost only one match and it was to the same boy that he has lost to all season. Every one of their matches ends up going into overtime. A couple have even gone into double overtime. Tag always loses by just a point or two. He is SO frustrated because it is the only kid he hasn't been able to beat. I think it is all mental at this point and he will eventually get the best of this boy. Until then, the trophies were pretty rockin' and he had a good time.

Kade

I was so proud of Kade. This was also his first National competition. They rank the age divisions a little differently than the state ones and because Kade was born 8 days to early, he was bumped up into the Novice division. This year that put him as the youngest. When we went online to see all the boys in his weight division, every one of them was in 6th grade. Two years older and wiser than my poor little Kader. In his first match, he got pinned so quick I didn't even have time to get my camera ready. He was ready to quit, but after a prayer and a pep talk from his mom he went back out and beat the second kid 11-10. He got pinned again on his third match and that put him in a bracket to wrestle off for 5th and 6th place. I told him that he wouldn't get a medal for 6th place and so he had to wrestle his heart out. When he got out there my heart was aching for him. He was losing 4-2 and I could tell he was getting tired out. Then he pulled some strength out of nowhere and pinned the boy! He was so happy. So, 5th out of 8 boys all older than him...not to bad. Seeing his beaming smile.....priceless.

Deck the Halls

We finally got the tree in the house this weekend. This tree, that looked so small out on the moutain, was still to big to fit in the house and we had to cut more off of the bottom!

If there is ever a ladder in the house, you can guarantee that Crew will be up on it. It took me four days to get my house decorated and I bet I could have cut it down to three if I didn't have such a great helper!

We figured out that we have about 1400 lights on this tree. A fire hazard for sure. It looks beautiful and everyone that drives by the back of our house comments on our tree. I love our big picture window and now we just need some snow.

This is where you will find GG and Crew every night when the tree comes on. They both love to sit on the edge of the big chair and talk about how pretty the tree is. We put all our Christmas story books under the tree and we get blankets and pillows and read the stories at night. Thank goodness for Tai Pan and their plastic ornaments! Crew still loves to take them off and bounce them on the floor.

This is my new Pottery Barn chandelier that Jared bought for me. I love it! It is such fun to decorate.

Girls Weekend Getaway!

We had our annual St. George girls getaway this weekend. The last two years we've planned it on the same weekend that Twilight and New Moon came out. We have two full days of non stop shopping, eating, and movie watching. We hit almost every store in St. George. When we came home on Sunday, we had a car, a Tahoe and a little U-haul trailor full of packages. We always have such a fun time. It's the one thing I look forward to each year. Thanks friends!

Oh, Christmas Tree..

It is time, once again, for the annual Christmas tree cutting adventure. It begins the first Friday of November at 5:30 A.M. with mom, venturing out on her own, to Soldier Hollow. There she stands in line in the freezing cold until 8:00 when she will then have the opportunity to purchase a tree tag. They only give out 1,000 on Friday and 1,000 on Saturday. They sell out EVERY year. This year they did something different and started handing out wristbands at 6:00. With this wristband, you could return at any time between 8 and 12 and purchase your tree tag. What an amazing concept! I could actually go back home and crawl into bed for a couple of hours. Which is exactly what I did!

After much debate, measuring and driving back and forth between the two winners, we decided on this one. Once again, by the time we got it on the truck, we realized it was a LITTLE to big and would have to be cut down a bit before coming into the house.

I am so grateful that I have Tag around to do all the dirty work. I can just stand around and take pictures of everyone. Oh, that and chase the dog around who kept taking Crew's hat and gloves.

There's something special about that "first snow" that children can't resist. They threw snowballs and broke branches, made snow angels and ate dirty snow. What more do you need to be happy? I can't wait to decorate! Tai Pan here I come!!

We Are the CHAMPIONS!!

Well, the Wasatch Heavy Weights finished the season undefeated! They played tonight at Timpview High School. Tag threw in three touchdown passes and they ended up winning the game 20-6. I was a nervous wreck. Tag threw some long passes and we were all so focused on whether or not the receiver would catch the ball, that we didn't see Tag take a few hard hits. Somehow, I ended up out of the bleachers and on the sidelines. Everyone, was teasing me that I will never make it through high school football. The boys were so excited. What a great bunch of boys.

Brendan, Jaxson, Zach, Casey and Tag. Football and baseball buddies.


The coaches......Jared, Carl and Ken. They have known each other long enough that they do a pretty dang good job of offsetting each others..let's just say intensity.















The moms made a poster for each of their boys on the team. The poster's all had black and yellow balloons attatched to them. When the boy's scored their first touchdown, we let all the balloons go.

But, the best part of the night took place after we all arrived home to our little town of Heber. It was about ten o'clock and the boys arrived at the old high school to see two firetrucks. They piled the boys on and took them all the way down mainstreet and back. They had a police escort and lights and sirens going the whole way. The parents all followed in their cars and were honking their horns and being just as crazy as their sons. What a PERFECT ending to a perfect season.

Things that go bump in the night

Halloween use to be my least favorite holiday. I HaTeD trying to find costumes for my kids. Everything I liked, they would hate. I would spend hours on their make-up, only to find them in the bathroom minutes later,washing it all off. Not to mention walking up and down the street in the freezing cold with a little one stuttering tttrick-or-tttttreat. As you try to bribe them with anything to get them to go back home and they are begging for one more house. But the last few years I have either mellowed out or changed my thought process. I have let my kids pick out their own costumes and if they want to be Batman for three years in a row, I smile and say GrEaT! I have learned that pirates and monsters and ghosts don't necessarily need their faces done up to be cute. Pumpkins don't have to be Martha Stewart and every dinner doesn't have to have a Halloween theme. Someday, I will miss the endless candy wrappers that I find everywhere for at least two weeks after Halloween. There won't be anyone around to tell me that everything is "SpOoKy" and there will be nobody left to say "bye-bye SpIdErS as we leave our house. Yes, this year I remembered....to just breathe.

Crew had so much fun running to every house. He really liked the "spooky" houses and at some houses, he actually would walk right into their homes. The only problem was that he wanted to open and eat the candy from every house as soon as he got it.

Garrett and his best bud Skylar. Garrett got really sick at our friends house as we were eating dinner. I didn't think he would even make it out this year and was going to have Jared take him home. But, then he snapped out of it and there was no stopping him. We all ended up at Jen's house after and we could hear all the kids downstairs trading their candy with each other.

This is what happens when you tell a thirteen year old that he can NOT go trick or treating without a costume. Yes, they all went into Walgreens and came up with this. Baseball bandits or something to that effect.