Three Time's A Charm!

Today was our third snow day in a row! I don't know if my kids will know what school is!

I have loved seeing the snow pile up ... and having the kids around.

Back to the old grind stone on Monday!

Gross Out Feast 2009 - menu

We did a Gross Out Feast/Barf-fet with John's sisters and their families earlier this month. I will post pictures and details later. I thought I'd post the menu (drawn by Jaley). We had some repeats on the menu from last year since it was a new crowd. Tomorrow we are doing another Gross Out Feast for the kids ... with different foods. It's going to be fun! Stay tuned!


The front of the menu was "2nd Annual M. Gross Out Feast and Barf-fet". The back of the tri-fold menu had credits going to Jaley for the artwork and to contact idon'tcare.com for complaints. Eat at your own risk and Barf Bags Available Upon Request were also on the back.



Here is menu:



Translations:
Appetizers –
Monster Boogers: Guacamole and black/purple tortilla chips

Monster Barf: Salsa w/cream cheese and black/purple tortilla chips

Monster Toes: Mini sausages in Grape jelly and bbq sauce recipe

Ursula’s Jumbo Lipstick: Shrimp and cocktail sauce

Main Dishes – (sides: Salad, tater tots or French fries)
Maggot Burgers – mini hamburgers rolled in dehydrated onions. We might just put chopped onion on top. Catsup, mayo, lettuce, mustard and pickles

Pirate Fingers – Hot Dogs w/catsup, mustard and relish served on a bun.

Barf in a Bag – Pot Pie served in a brown bag - support the bottom of the inside of the bag with wax paper so the bag doesn't break!

Dessert –
Diaper Surprise – Mixture of Pudding, cake, brownies, candy bars, etc served in a diaper. Bottom portion of candy corn to represent “corn”.

Frozen Bovine Fluid – Ice Cream with nuts, caramel, strawberry and chocolate toppings. Whipped Topping.

Witch Fingers – Brownies

Drinks-
Vampire Blood – red punch (red soda) with thin red strawberry jello strips floating in it! Really cool!
Urine – Apple juice. Lemonade with Cream Soda … mixtures like this. I did Ginger ale. I served it in urine collection cups you see at the Dr and Hospitals. It was funny!

Gotta love the weather!

I love Colorado! You never stay too cold for too long! Note the weather forecast from weather.gov for CO ... more snow tomorrow (and maybe another snow day ... the kids are hoping!) ... and then 60 degrees by Monday!

Tonight: Snow and areas of blowing snow. Low around 22. North wind between 8 and 14 mph, with gusts as high as 20 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. Total nighttime snow accumulation of 4 to 8 inches possible.

Thursday: Snow likely and areas of blowing snow. Cloudy, with a high near 31. Blustery, with a north northwest wind between 10 and 20 mph, with gusts as high as 28 mph. Chance of precipitation is 70%. New snow accumulation of 3 to 7 inches possible.

Thursday Night: A 30 percent chance of snow before midnight. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 20. Calm wind becoming southwest between 6 and 9 mph. New snow accumulation of less than a half inch possible.

Friday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 42. West southwest wind between 3 and 11 mph.

Friday Night: Partly cloudy, with a low around 27. Southwest wind between 3 and 8 mph.

Saturday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 51.

Saturday Night: Partly cloudy, with a low around 29.

Sunday: Partly sunny, with a high near 55.

Sunday Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 30.

Monday: Sunny, with a high near 60.

Monday Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 31.

Tuesday: Sunny, with a high near 62.

Tuesday Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 29.

Wednesday: Sunny, with a high near 63.

Snow Day

We woke up to a SNOW DAY!

It has been fun hearing Kerst and Kendall giggling and squealing as they go sliding down the stairs in their kid sleeping bags. Now to find their snow stuff so they can do that in our backyard!

Now to go make some hot chocolate ...

Jaley has an even better idea. Let's set up Christmas! No one will see our gavestones burried in snow. Good point.

25 Billion

"No way there's 25 billion cubes in there," Kerst informed us.

John started to laugh. John was busy cooking crepes for breakfast. I had my back to them as I was getting the soup in the crock pot for dinner after church. I turned around to see what was so funny.

School has done a great job at teaching him estimating. He's right. There's no way 25 billion cubes could fit in that container.

25 bullion cubes.

I'm glad we have kids that make us laugh. This kind of reminds me of Kerst's cannibals story.

("Mom, please don't post that. It will make me embarrassed.")

That's my job (o:

Cookies!

Jaley has been making cookies every night for the past 3 days. Yum!

Kendall has been her assistant chef. It is so cute to see them work together!
And enjoying their masterpieces!

(photos by Jaley)

Finished proclamation

Here is my finished project as promised!

For those who want to attempt this, here is the template I used for making this. This template is for a 16x20 frame that has the 11x17 Proclamation on the Family. The photo editing program I use is Microsoft Digital Image Suite. You should be able to do this project in any photo editing program. The white line shows where the frame will cover the edge (some of my photos didn't go all of the way to the outer edge). I made sure that most of the photos went into the middle just in case I cut the matting and the middle showed. It didn't happen, but I wanted to be on the safe side!

I mounted the 16x20 print (from Costco) on mat board with spray adhesive. If you print at Costco, you need to trim the white border off of the sides, NOT the top.

I have a mat cutter I used to cut this. It can be done if you have a straight edge and the beveled edge mat cutter. The top and bottom measurements are 2 1/2 inches. The side measurements are 3 1/4 inches. Make sure you have a NEW blade when cutting the beveled edge of the mat and to place a piece of scrap mat board underneath the print/mat you are cutting.

All State Auditions

It is a busy schedule ... for Julia. She is auditioning today for All State Choir - Classical. We are excited she has had so many opportunities to excel in music. Go Jewlz ... sing your heart out - and touch theirs!

Enchords Debut

Julia's A Cappella group - Enchords - she started had its debut at the Tri-M Music Honor Society Induction. One of the girls in the group was ill, so Julia's choir director stepped in.

They sounded amazing!

Enchords will be performing this piece at the Fall Concert. She is considering adding a couple of more girls to the group as well. She will be starting a couple of Christmas numbers with them in the next week or two!

Enjoy!

Something else for your 72 hour kit

I just discovered this walter filtration water bottle on our church distribution website. It is a new product. You should consider including this in your 72 hour kit. Not bad for $16.50 ... water filter pumps run around $70.

And one more makes

TWO DOZEN GRANDCHILDREN FOR MY PARENTS!
My new nephew was born Sunday evening to my brother, Sean, and his wife, Jennifer.

The doctors were telling her that the baby would be around 7 lbs. He's a whopping 9 lbs 14 oz! Born naturally without medication. Jen, you are my hero! Congrats Sean and Jen!

Welcome baby Sean Jr!

Homecoming

The Homecoming Dance was this past Saturday.

Julia had some friends over to our home for Homecoming Dinner. It was fun having them around.

Julia was beautiful. Kyle was handsome. I had to add 4 inches to the hemline to make the dress long enough and then added sleeves as well. It was a really fun and cute dress! Sometimes it is a pain to "modest"-fy, but so worth it in the end! It is easier to find something already modest, but is almost impossible out here!

Julia and Kyle came over to the house when they were finished at the dance and we hung out and played some games. They are really fun to be around!

...and the home of the brave

Julia (soprano) and Madeline (alto) sang the National Anthem last night at the Football Homecoming Game. WOW!

Here is Julia and Madeline warming up with their choir director, Mrs. D.

Julia also sang at the pep assembly. She split off and sang a high B-flat (an octave above what you hear here) on the word "free". Wish I was there to tape that!

Proclamation

I am updating our proclamation that is hanging in our home. I made this one 3 years ago and told myself I would update it yearly with our current family memories. Didn't happen! Here is what I did 3 years ago (with a preemie Kendall, John's triathlon, Julia's musical, Kerst putting his own tie on, etc...) I created this in my photo editing program as one large print and mounted it on mat board. This one I created was done all in Sepia.

For the new mat, I created two different versions (difference being a sepia or black/white overlay to tone down the colors - I wanted a hint of color this time). I am printing them both. I LOVE Costco! They are printed in their store! I thought I would have to have it mailed to me since I am doing it as a 16x20!

I will be doing a spray adhesive to mount it onto some mat board and then will use my mat cutter to cut it out and then frame our "Proclamation on the Family". I will have to see which one works better with our wall colors (plus I have my eye on a frame that is on sale at Hobby Lobby)

Photos in this picture (for 2009). Starting top left and going clockwise ...

Jaley at the renaissance fair trying on hats, Kendall getting a kiss (Devil's Head hike on Labor day), Julia driving the 4 wheeler with me as passenger .... ahhhh, Julia and Jenna trying on hats at the renaissance festival. Kendall and Jaley sleeping. Jaley Julia Jenna at the County Fair (where Julia won her awards for the photos), Kerst crashing the girl's photo shoot, Kendall crying when the kids get out of the car to go to school for the first day, Kendall in Joseph UT at M reunion at an Indian State Park, Jenna pulling the handcart up the hill (can't remember the name right off hand), Kerst and John on his baptism day, Kerst and the woodland fairy at the renaissance festival, Our kids on the horse statue in CO Springs, Kendall sleeping on top of John's shoulders at the Stake Pioneer Day at our Stake President's barn, Julia and Jenna after getting back from their 3 day Pioneer Trek in Wyoming, Julia in front of her dream truck we saw while at the M Reunion in Joseph UT, Jaley Julia and Kerst during a sibling photo shoot, John and Corin at P Family Reunion in Orem UT, Corin and Jenna at Jason's Family dinner after his funeral, Our family at Devil's Head along the train where John's family would take their traditional photos - I believe they were individual photos.

I will post my finished project!

Spookified - again

For FHE we set up our Halloween decorations. Not much different from last year. Kendall took a little bit to warm up to the skeletons.

Now to prepare for our "Gross-out Feast" ... we are doing it a little more casual this year and doing it "Barf-fet" style. We have a pretty gross menu planned ... beware!