Merry Christmas!

Yeah! It's Christmas time! Just wanted to drop a note and wish you all a very Merry Christmas! I hope you all are having a great holiday and are enjoying time with your families.



Me in front of the Christmas tree.


Audra and her family in front of the tree Christmas Eve.

The gingerbread house the kids made on Christmas Eve.

The renactment of the nativity the kids did Christmas Eve at a friends house. If you look closely you can see Sweetie in the middle stealing baby Jesus out of the "manger". :)

Enjoy your Christmas!

Weekend

Road Trip! So Friday morning we left from Phoenix and drove up to Malad, Idaho. Hit a bit of snow on the way, but not so bad of a trip.

Either Northern Arizona or Southern Utah.

Arimo, Idaho mountains.

Mom and me in front of our motel in Malad. It was snowing out, Mom crazy to not have a coat on. :)

Here are the kids that came playing in the parking lot snow. This was the first chance we really let them 'play' in the snow. All the trip long they kept asking if they could get out and play. But us being the 'oagers' that we are we wouldn't let them play in the snow as we were trying to make it to Malad in time.

Audra, Luke, Mom, Matt and me at the restaurant behind our motel at breakfast on Saturday morning. This was more our 'hanging' out time as a family. We haven't had all us four kids together since my college graduation back in 2003.

After breakfast we headed off to Arimo for the funeral. Cried of course. I'm happy Grandma's at peace, but it's always hard for me to say goodbye. Here's a couple of picks from the grave site.


Afterwards there was the luncheon at the church building where all the family was there. Each of the siblings families took group shots. Our family pretty much were the last ones to leave, and the main ones to stay and help clean up.

Top row: Luke, Leslie, Debbie, Matt, Travis
Middle row: RHM, me, Mom, Audra
Front: Oldest and Princess

Pretty much after that all the family dispersed. The boys and their spouses drove on back to Missouri together and the rest of us headed back to Arizona. Took a little detour off at my cousin's house which he's building himself in Arkansas, Idaho. It's a great looking house and I'm totally amazed...but those roads to get there were crazy and I wouldn't really want to drive them on a regular basis. :)

Here's some pics from inside the car on the way back on Sunday:


Travis not wanting a full on frontal shot. :)


Audra whipping her head around as I had bad trigger finger timing. :)

Mom, not really wanting me to take her pic either.

Oldest and Princess listening to the movie on the portable DVD player.


RHM pouting...he was poking Princess and just told to stop.

Me, figured I had better be captioned as well. :)

So, that was my fun first vacation weekend. I'll update you more later. Hope you all are looking forward to the holidays and have a fun time!

Trip Beginning...

So, we flew down to Phoenix on last Thursday morning...flight arrived an hour late due to 150 mph head winds. Oh, my bum hurt after those 4 hours in a plane I wasn't preped for. :) We then headed back to Audra's house, picked up Sweetie and headed home. Audra put Sweetie down for her nap and her and I headed off to the public library to get some books on CD for the road trip up to ID the next day.


Here's me outside the library...on this trip I always have to be prepared and have my camera at the ready. Audra is a bit of a picture fiend. :)

Anyways, we then headed back and waited for the rest of the kids to get home from school. That night they had a school music production they had to preform in...otherwise they would have had to write a report over the holiday break. No one wants to do reports, so we got ready to go.
Mom, me, Oldest and Princess waiting to head out to the program.

My old roomie Liz then came over so we could hang out. She is very kind and agreed to go to the kids concert with me as Princess at least really wanted me to go.

Here's a pic of Liz doing Sweetie's hair as she'd just pulled it out. :)

Here's Liz, me and mom waiting for the production to start. :)

This is a video of one of the songs Oldest's grade sang. He's in the middle in the green shirt...this is the end of the song, but was pretty cool so I thought I'd share.



Both Oldest and Princess did great! Liz and I then snuck out and headed to Oregano's for dinner...cool Italian place...pretty good pizza. :) Liz was saying it wasn't the best she's had there, but I still liked it. We even ate outside...yeah that's Arizona for you...but there were heaters above each of the tables for us to sit at. We exchanged gifts then headed back to Audra's to talk for a bit before Liz left and headed home.

I had to go to bed at a reasonable time...we were leaving for Idaho the next morning at 6:30 a.m. All ready tired thinking of it. :)

So, that was the first day of my Christmas trip. Stay tuned for future installations. :)

Grandma Christensen

My Grandma Christensen passed away this Sunday morning. As my mom says, "I am so happy for her." Grandma passed away in her sleep, and there was no dragged out sickness or pain for her. She got to live to the ripe age of 96.



I love my Grandma and will miss her dearly. Going to visit her while traveling through the area with friends, staying over to spend time with her for family reunions. Watching her tend her garden and hang the wash out to dry. Sitting on her front porch shelling peas from her garden with my siblings coming and going, talking about our lives and the weird weather. :) Sitting at her kitchen table and watching her cook, wondering how in the world she could find anything.

Now she gets to be with Grandpa...and their bodies won't be a hinderance any longer.




Here's a pic of one of the last times I got to see Grandma at a family reunion in 2004. (Thanks Audra for letting me steal the pics you posted, didn't plan to copy cat...just didn't want to search for pics when yours were so handy.)



So my vacation this season has taken a bit of a turn. Mom and I were going to drive up from Audra's house to go and visit Grandma after Christmas...you know, before she passed away...she was getting slower as time went on. Guess our timing didn't quite make it. Now we will be driving up from Audra's to go to the funeral in Idaho this weekend. I'll still get to see her...just one last time. Love you Grandma!

Pics from D's Birthday

See...I told you i'd do it eventually. :) Here are some pics from her b-day celebration.

Dominique didn't want to get out of bed. Gotta hurry to get to the movies!

Got her the Twilight Series books.

Dinner at Outback. :)

More pics...but they just filler. This gives you the gist of our party time. :)

Christmas Season

So...life has been pretty busy lately...which is why so few blogs. My bad.

Everyday I have a list of things that I have to do in my head...and I don't really ever fully finish off those lists...so they continue on till the next day, then the day after that...until they get done.

Since I'm heading out of town for Christmas...tons to do and too little time to do it in. What in the past I have had 3-4 weeks at least to get done...I really have a week and a half to two weeks tops. Oh busy times.

So in order to compensate for that...this last Monday I took a "sick" day and finished off all my Christmas shopping...or so I thought.

I was all prepared...had made lists and double and triple checked everything to make sure I wasn't forgetting anything. Well...more stuff popped up. I've then been out shopping a bit on Tuesday and Wednesday night. Then last night I was trying to pile things all together and was talking with my sister and thought of a couple of other things I'd like to get before I leave town.

Shoot me now.

In between all this shopping I've had other things to do, favors for people, visits to people, cleaning and searching within my home. Mom and I have tried to keep up with things, but just getting ready to leave has left our house in a bit of a mess. I think next week I'm going to be packing, doing laundry, and cleaning the house crammed into as much time as I possibly can. I will so be ready for that vaca! :)

Oh Santa...I know how you feel. :P

Now this weekend will also be full of stuff to do...mostly holiday parties to attend and people to say goodbye to...or just pass on their presents. :) Usually I try to deliver gifts as close to Christmas day...if not ON Christmas day as I can. Weird habit of mine I started and like...don't know why. :)

Okay, here's my fun schedule:

Friday night I have the Branch Christmas party. White elephant gifts and request to wear an ugly sweater for the Ugliest Sweater Contest. I can do the gift thing...can't really stand to wear 'ugly' things...so I don't think i'll be doing the sweater. I'm a party pooper that way...too bad. :)

Saturday morning I'll be going to a movie with D and hanging out to also exchange our gifts with each other. We didn't really want to wait for after I'm back. Then that night I'm helping out with Mom's ward Christmas party...so that'll take up a part of my night.

Sunday I've got church and VTing to do. oh man. Have those gifts ready all ready though. :)

So...written down that doesn't sound too busy, but I'll not be home too much...which really makes it feel like a busy weekend.

Well, I hope you all are getting ready for the holidays...and not totally procrastinating. And if you are procrastinating...man I wish I could be you. :)

Who?

Who's afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?

Slowly, step by step, Eva makes her way through the skeleton trees. Careful to not make any loud noises she tries to hide herself behind the trunks, knowing the effort is fruitless as there is nowhere to hide.


"SNAP!" goes a branch off to her right. Not able to contain her gasp of surprise Eva feels all the eyes of the forest turn on her...making her even more frightened than she was before. All other noises stop and a hush falls over the forest. Unmindful of the noise she makes now Eva sprints to her left, hoping against hope that whatever was chasing her really had been to her right.


Up ahead is a light. As Eva slows down she tries to control her breathing. Even though she may be slowing down, the noise behind her is getting louder and louder, not ceasing in it's speed. Darting her gaze all around her she sees a well up in the distance...near the light. Should she go? Shouldn't she? Could the well prove safety for her, or just lead her onto a more perilous path farther into her fear?


Heavy breathing is coming up on her, making sweat pour off of her face. Decisions, decisions. Finally, feeling that she has put off action long enough Eva makes a run for the well. She can feel the pounding footsteps coming up upon her.


Closer, closer...only a few feet more. Finally! Three feet from the well Eva leaps from the ground, and dives for the well. Praying that there is a bucket to help stop her momentum down...or at least water in the bottom of the well.


She makes it! As she begins her decent down into the well, she whips her head around to see her attacker. All that Eva sees is a claw swiping out trying to get her one last time before she is finally out of range. Thankfully whatever/whomever that was does not succeed.


As the blackness surrounds Eva nothing is stoping her fall. No bucket, no water, no....nothing. Yet she is not gaining speed as she descends. Reaching for anything to grasp onto Eva blindly flails about trying to find something to hold onto. Farther and farther she goes, nothing but smooth stone and air. Finally... some roots! Scraping her hands, doing all she can to find a hold to stop her fall Eva finally comes to a halt.


No way up, and no one she could yell to for help, Eva slowly works her way down to try and find some ground to stand upon. What seemed like hours later, but was probably more like 15 minutes Eva reaches solid ground. Sighing, Eva tries to find out the dementions of her new "home".


Suddenly, two hands slam onto her shoulders. "AAAAAAHHHHHH" shrieks Eva. She whips around and finds....



Okay, your turn. If you enjoyed the beginning of this story, tell me where you'd like it to go next. Who is it she finds at the bottom of this odd well? Is it the wolf that seemed to be attacking her in the forest? Is it a friend? Is it a stranger? You get to tell me the who of this story, we'll then see where it goes from there. :)