Baptism Pics

 We took Katelyn out on one of the last nice days of fall 2014 for some pictures in her baptism dress.  Apparently we weren't the only people taking advantage of the nice weather.  Everywhere we went there were hoards of photographers doing senior pictures and wedding pictures.  We had a hard time finding a place to take pictures, but they turned out cute.  These were some of my favorites.

Festival of Trees Wreaths

I helped both of the girls' classes create wreaths this year.  Kyleigh's class had a "mining in Idaho" theme and Katelyn's class did a Renaissance theme.  I had the kids in Kyleigh's class paint pick and ax sets that I had cut out of wood with silver paint.  I also had them cut small foam blocks into gem like shapes (gems are all shapes so they could pretty much do whatever they wanted).  Then we used hot glue to put colored rock salt on the foam gems.  I made a sign for the middle of the wreath that said, "Idaho gems by Idaho's gems."  We got an honorable mention at the festival of trees for that wreath.  With Katelyn's class I cut rectangles out of leather and burned the edges of the leather so it would look aged.  We cut out small pieces of paper and put holes through the paper and leather.  The kids bound the paper and leather together to make tiny little books.  Their teacher had them write stories in their tiny little Renaissance books for the wreath.  I also cut out swords from wood and had each of the kids spray paint a sword.  Their teacher also printed out whole page shrinky dinks and had the kids color them.  She then shrunk them down to ornament size for the wreath and added a bunch of other little things.  Both of the wreaths turned out so well and were purchased by the parents of class members, which is really cool.  

Thanksgiving 2014

 Thanksgiving this year was a big family event.  We scheduled Katelyn's baptism for the weekend after Thanksgiving so the Cook family could fit two events in one trip.  While they were here we fit in a few things other than the really delicious dinner on Thanksgiving Day.

I had two candy balls prepared for a candy ball game.  I learned this game from some of the Young Women.  You wrap a small circular item with the thick saran wrap type stuff that you buy in the packaging section at Walmart.  You tear off the pieces off the wrap and add pieces of candy as you go.  The ball gets bigger and bigger.  During the game you have to find the end of each individual piece of wrap and pull it from the ball.  You hope to pull out some candy as you unwrap that piece.  You are working against the person next to you who is rolling dice and trying to get doubles to take the candy ball away from you for their turn.  I wish I had my camera ready for this game.  Josh and Jenny were having an intense battle that included chasing and tackling.

Another thing we did was decorate our own plates for Thanksgiving dinner.  I am not a huge fan of going around the table while the hot food gets cold while we say what we are thankful for.  So instead we all used sharpies and wrote what we were thankful for on our plates and baked the marker into the plate.  Seemed like a good idea at the time.  Not such a great idea when we put hot food on them and the food turned the colors of the markers.  Oops.

We had plenty of pies for Thanksgiving.  I have long held that it isn't a Cook family Thanksgiving without more pies than people.  This year I made 7 pies, Holly made 7 pies,  Jenny bought 3 more, then Linda Garner sent over 2 for me and Russ, and 2 for Mike and Holly.  21 pies, 16 people.  Mission Accomplished.

We made the amazing Our Best Bites turkey for dinner.  Jenny and Don made perfectly creamy potatoes with evaporated milk.  Nancy went to the grocery store with us and bought the cutest turkey shaped butter ever.  I used my new turkey shaped gravy dish that I got at the thrift store on my birthday scavenger hunt with Holly.  Along with all that, fresh hot rolls, sweet potato casserole, and all the other goodness that comes with Thanksgiving dinner.  My mouth is watering thinking about it.

We had the crazy shopping group leave that night for all the early black Friday deals.  Kyleigh joined them for the madness.  She may be hooked for life.  At the first store they went to they each got a $10 gift card, which she used to buy a zip up sweatshirt that she wears all the time.  She came home pretty pumped.  I did venture to Walmart that night to buy a new trampoline.  The one we currently have is about to go the way of the world.

We also went to the festival of trees one day.  I had helped Kyleigh and Katelyn's class with some wreaths that were at the festival and I wanted to see them.  I will post about that later.

We had a Christmas gift night.  We wanted to open the gifts with Jenny's family that we had gotten for them and vice versa.  We also opened a few to and from Merrill and Nancy.  That was super fun.  Who doesn't like opening Christmas gifts before Thanksgiving weekend is over?

Katelyn's baptism was on Saturday night so my whole family, except Nate, came into town Saturday morning.  We met at Pojos for some fun in the early afternoon.  I am not sure if my kids will ever want to go to Pojos with me and Russ again.  We always give them $10 worth of tokens to share and that is it. This time they got tokens from Darci and Rissie and GG and Gpa.  They ask me for tokens and I hand them two.  They ask Gpa and he hands them 15.  They also did a couple of rounds on the bumper cars and got way more tickets than they usually get.  Makes sense, because they had more tokens to use.  They were pretty excited.  Afterwards, we went to the hotel they were staying at after that for the cousins to do their present exchange which was also fun.

In the evening we had a quick sandwich dinner at our house and then headed to the church for Katelyn's baptism which will also have to be a separate post.

It was a great Thanksgiving.  I am so glad everyone could make it to support Katelyn and have a great Holiday together.

Snow Fort

First big snow+really good friends just down the street= snow fort fight with the Russell's.

First Snow Day

First skiff of snow.  How fun that Ridge and Aliya can meet in the back yard and play in the first snow of the season.

Katelyn's Turns 8!

 Katelyn had a big decision to make for her eighth birthday.  Rusty and Mike wanted to go help their parents with a construction project, but the only time they had to go was during her birthday.  She made a very generous decision and told Russ they should go to help Nama and Papa.  We still made her actual birthday a special day.  We made cupcakes for her class, and pancake men for breakfast.  We also had dorito casserole and crab legs for dinner.  Yes, crab legs.  That is what she wanted.  We also had banana splits with a candle for the birthday girl.  Russ and Mike came home a few days later.  Merrill and Nancy were with them and we had a party for Katelyn the day they got home.  That party included a chocolate fountain and lots of fun presents.  We had a hard time trying to think of what to buy Katelyn for her birthday.  She is too young for older girl gifts and we have everything else we can think of that she might like.  We racked our brains trying to figure out what she might like.  We discussed things she loves and doesn't have at home.  The answer was so simple, MONKEY BARS!  Katelyn loves monkey bars.  She comes home from school with huge blisters on her hands.  They are like a badge of honor at Pierce Park Elementary.  She and Naiya are always comparing monkey bar blisters.  She was so excited when she got them.  We hung them up in her room and she couldn't be happier.  Lots of celebration for a very big birthday.  Happy 8 Katelyn!

 Nama brought scarves that were left in the Kiva.