SERVICE AT THE STAKE CENTER!

With them finishing up building our stake center they were asking for volunteers to come and help set it up for an hour so I signed us up. Emma was gone, but the boys were not looking forward to it and quite honestly when it came time to go, neither were Jared and I. But we signed up so we all went. The boys ended up having the BEST time there! They actually thanked me for taking them and Tyson even said, "this is cool, now when people ask who set this place up, I can say, I did!" We took wrappings off of pictures, door handles, put trash cans in classrooms, put sacrament trays together and Jared and Tyler put the TV stand together. After wards we took all the boys to Sodalicious for drinks and then they took for to play at the Cardons! It was a great day for service!

CHRISTMAS EVE WITH THE RODGERS SIDE!

For the first time in my 41 years of life we celebrated Christmas Eve with the Rodgers NOT on Christmas Eve. Caryn and Cade couldn't be here Christmas Eve so we did it on Sunday instead. We still got together and did fondue and gifts, but it just was a different day. The cousins had fun running around together and playing! Emma got things she needed for college - curling iron and steamer and Eli got his most desired plain white vans with laces, Tyler got a lego set and Tyson got a gift certificate to go buy a fish and all the needed accessories later that week! It was a very good Christmas Eve in deed!

MOUND MAGIC BASEBALL TOURNAMENT!

I am sure I have said this before, but one of the best things about being on MMB is having the ASU sports photographer's kid on our team. He seriously takes the most amazing pictures! Jared and I are obsessed every time he emails us! Eli is loving his team. He is getting out of his hitting slump for sure and getting his confidence back on the plate! He rotates between Right field, Left field a little first base and a little pitcher! His last game though he had the best pitching stats! He also had bases loaded, 2 outs and we were down by 1 and Eli was up to bat (good thing we were at this game cause I would have been sick to my stomach) he his a line drive into a hole in the outfield and brought in a run to tie the game and keep it going! His coach was jumping up and down. Eli had done his part and did it well.

FAMILY DAY!

With everyone having such busy schedules and such conflicting schedules I decided in the beginning of December that we were all going to be together on December 19th and it was going to be mandatory family day! It was the last day of school so it seemed like the perfect day since no one would have homework, Emma didn't have cheer or work and so I took work off, Jared made sure to be home on time and we skipped sports for the boys. First we headed to the Giving Machine. We all loved it last year so we wanted to do it again! Each kid picked out something they wanted to buy and we did it. And no lines! Then we walked over to Joe's BBQ and had dinner, hung out and the boys played twister for a bit. After that we headed over to Christmas on Comstock to drive and look at the lights. Next stop! Macy's for letters to Santa! After that we headed home for treats and then Christmas movie time! Eventually during the movie everyone had fallen asleep except for me and Tyson. Julie Brooks even stopped by and surprised Tyson with the biggest Hershey Kisses ever because they thought the smaller ones were so cool outside her house that she hooked them up with even bigger ones! ha ha!  It was a long night but a very good one filled with special memories. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole night with just our family spending time together. It is sad we had to schedule this time, but it sure far exceeded any of my hopes and expectations! Can't wait to do it again next year!!

JINGLE JOG!

It was my last Jingle Jog - tear. Every year at Haley or should I say the last 7 years, I have gone (and sometimes Jared too if he can with work) to the school and helped stand on the course some where and make sure the kids are running their Jingle Jog in the right direction. Eventually I even got smart and started bringing a speaker and playing Christmas music for them while they run past me. I am seriously going to miss things like this. No one needs or wants help in junior high or high school. My days of being apart of my kids lives in school is coming to an end. These boys run their little hearts out trying to be the fastest ones in their classes. Love them!

CHRISTMAS LIGHT SCAVENGER HUNT!

Christmas light scavenger hunt with the Szymanskis! It's tradition! It's a must! This year we met at our house first and did pizza oven pizzas and then had pazookies. Sadly, we had to leave Eli's baseball tournament early to get home on time to start the fire and get everything ready. We didn't want to cancel cause there was no other time to do it and with baseball, you never know what time the games will be and he originally wasn't even supposed to have a tournament, but because Thanksgiving got rained out, they did it this weekend instead. Eli was understanding that we left and the Kimballs kept him for us. We were making pizzas and having and a good time and then watching the game on game changer. When we finally left to do the scavenger hunt, the game still wasn't quite over so we left without him. They ended up winning the whole tournament (of course because we weren't there) and so part way through our drive we drove home and picked up Eli to join us for the end. We headed back to our meeting spot at Bosas and then Jared ran across the street to Cane's and bought Eli some dinner. It was such a fun night and we love doing this every year!

YMCA BASKETBALL!

Tyson sure has a love for basketball so we were able to get his football team to sign up with him during the winter season to do YMCA basketball.  A couple of the boys were doing other sports so we found a couple of more friends and had a complete team, with a new boy who's dad was wanting to coach  - woo hoo! Now Jared only has to send out reminder texts about practices and game times and then only has to assist! Tyson and Tyler are quite the good little ball players! Tyson takes this game way to seriously - we love it - ha ha!