Josh, Jenn, Ashton, Emmy and Ethan…

We drove to California for Thanksgiving this year.  This is what Emmy looked like MOST of the time.

We finally figured out how to keep her happy (playing games on Josh’s iPhone) and the last two hours weren’t so bad.

We were missing Rob and Angie’s families, but the rest of us were together.  It was lots of fun and VERY delicious!   We had to get the kids out of the house for a while Thanksgiving morning, so we played at the park.

We decided to go back home and help a little bit .  I was the table-setter, I’m definitely not a huge help when it comes to cooking serious Thanksgiving dinner.

Eddie, Lindsey, Josh and I decided to go to Snowbird for Star Gazers…I don’t even know what it is, really.  You go to a little class where they teach you about stars and then you ride the gondola to the top of the mountain and look at stars, and probably make out like crazy.  So we got to Snowbird and found out that Star Gazers had been canceled due to bad weather.  We also found out that we are completely UNPREPARED for WINTER!!!!  It was FREEZING UP THERE!!!!!

Since we had a real babysitter (no offense Cari and Kris) we couldn’t just go home!  We drove around up in the hills checking out incredible homes and went shopping at the new Nordstrom Rack in Draper.  Everything was closing and we still didn’t want to go home.  Our only option (besides going to Walmart, splitting up and finding the BEST thing for ONE DOLLAR) was to go to Trafalga.  We were all a little hesitant, even though Josh and I had been to their batting cages a couple weeks ago.   But it ended up being tons of fun!

We did the batting cages again.  Josh took one swing and realized what caused his tendonitis to flare up approximately two weeks ago (batting cages) and couldn’t participate.  Eddie and Lindsey rocked.  I found out that I’m a switch hitter!  After having quite the horrible RBI right-handed (yes, I throw and hit right-handed), Lindsey told me to try lefty.  It was WAAAAY better.  Weird.

We raced bumper cars.

And we played some arcade games.  This one was pretty fun/funny…JUMPING JACKPOT!!!

Here’s Josh’s first try, on one foot because of his tendonitis in his right ankle:

Here’s Eddie’s first try:

Lindsey’s first try:

And my first try:

Ashton and Josh went fishing the other day at a pond in…Salem..Payson…I don’t even know where they went, but it looks like a pretty place. They had lots of fun with Ashton’s cousins, Jayda and Druw (they are so cute and they all play together so well). Ashton learned to cast pretty well and he even caught a little fish.

We aren’t really outdoors people, we love it but we never go camping voluntarily and we will never own a dog. So before Ashton could go fishing we had to first get some supplies.  That meant Ashton had to face one of his greatest childhood demons…The Cal Ranch Store.  We went in there once when he was tiny to see the worlds biggest horse and it was a real sensory overload. He was mostly upset by the dead animals, particularly the dead reindeer that was hanging on the wall.  The whole way into the store he was affirming himself “I’m not scared anymore because now I am big”

Josh is in putting Ashton to bed for the fourth time tonight.  He left the door open and I’m listening to Josh sing Ashton songs and I’m LAUGHING MY BUM OFF!!!  Here’s how the first one went:

“I hope they call me on a mission, when I have grown a foot or two. (I am thinking,”Oh, that is so cute that he’s singing that song!”) I hope by then I will be ready to teach and preach and work as missionaries do.

I hope that I can share the gospel with those who want to know the truth. I want to be a missionary………long pause…..to teach and preach and work as missionaries do…”

Oh man, I had to stifle my laughter by shoving my face into the bean bag.  Then on to the next song…

“Called to serve Him Heavenly King of Glory………chosen heir to….witness…..for the King….(long pause and me laughing into the bean bag)…”

He gave up on that one and went on to “I am a Child of God” which he also couldn’t remember!  Oh man, I am laughing/crying as I’m typing this, I can’t see anything!  It’s 1 AM, maybe I’m just tired.

He just came out and asked why I was laughing.  He told me that after those songs failed, he sang two whole verses of a Beastie Boys song he used to sing all the time.  We just sat there cracking up on the bean bag.   Josh’s next calling should be Primary Chorister.  Can you just see him up there, making excited faces at the kids trying to get them to sing, doing the good ol’ ladder leading?  You know what I’m talking about, the up and down scale leading?

Friday night, Josh and I gathered up a bunch of our peeps and went cross-country skiing at Aspen Grove.

Cari, Deven, Shelley, Eddie, Lindsey, Jess, Jed, Gary, Josh, Jenn

I think the only people who had ever done it before were Josh, Jed and Gary who tried it once in scouts or something many, many, MANY years ago.  I don’t know if it was because we were all beginners, there were 6 inches of fresh powder, the ski’s hadn’t been waxed for ten years or ALL OF THE ABOVE, but we truly experienced hardly any SKIING.  It was mostly falling and walking with ski’s stuck to our toes.  It all made for one of the most hilarious nights EVER.

If any of us knew what we were doing it might have been different, but for some reason all of our ski’s just kept sticking to the snow.  I believe they are supposed to stick a little to prevent you from sliding backwards.  But even when we were experiencing forward motion, the ski would be sliding somewhat nicely, then suddenly STICK, no more movement.  It was wild.  After walking up the first biggish hill, Deven and I decided we definitely needed some skiing action and we tried to ski down the hill we just came up.  That’s when I really started sweating!  It was ridiculously difficult just to slide!  We were laughing our butts off, though.  After all the work of TRYING to cross-country ski, the only muscles that were sore the next day were my stomach muscles from laughing so hard.

Here is my favorite picture.  Sure, it’s just Deven kneeling in the snow.  But right before I took this picture, Deven decided he was going to ski down a hill.  He stood there, ski’s parallel pointing straight down the hill, he bent his knees, dug his poles into the snow and pushed off with great force, completely committed to flying down this hill.  However, his ski’s did not agree with the idea and DID NOT BUDGE.  Deven fell forward like a tree, the whole length of his body was FLAT on the hill.  Oh man, we were all dying!!!  Everyone (except Josh who never fell at all) wiped out trying to go down this hill, as you’ll see in my slide show.