Christmas Day!!

I warn that there are quite a few pictures in this and the following post. If you have some kind of lame problem with this, then go stalk someone else's blog! Ok, moving on....WE HAD A GREAT CHRISTMAS! Anna woke up at 6:45 whispering to herself. She came and laid in bed with me (Mike was downstairs with a sick baby) and then Ty got up at about 7. I yelled down to Mike (which consequently scared the crap out of him) and once his heart went back to a normal rhythm he joined us upstairs. Mike armed himself with the camera as each kid went down to the sparkling lights of the tree and the world of presents. Drum roll please...... This is a big turtle that the kids can climb through and explore. Sophie thought we bought it for her and kept attacking the kids throughout the day.
Don't ya just want to squeeze those cheeks!

Of course Anna goes straight for Brayden's toys.

This came to us yesterday by way of our Bishop. He brought this huge gift to our door and just said "here ya go". I was a little perplexed and asked why he was giving us a gift, and of course, I was expecting an answer that praised our intelligence, good looks, and charm, but no, he had a different story. An acquaintance of his had just been on the Ellen DeGeneres Show and had received prizes. They didn't need this and wanted the Bishop to give it to someone who could, so he thought of us. Thanks Bishop, Ellen guest, and of course Ellen herself :)

(Those are my toes in the back ground in case you were wondering)

Jen and Aaron gave this to Anna and she wore it all morning. She not obsessed at all!

I'm sure he'll hate this photo later in life, but how cute is this baby. At least it's not as bad and the "pink bunny" costume from "A Christmas Story".

We had a few visitors...Papa Winslow and then Matt and Grandma Winslow. Then we were stupid and thought we'd eat out. Yeah, the only thing we could find open was a nasty Mexican place. It was pretty gross. Then we ended the night by seeing "Bedtime Stories". Very good! It was funny and clean. Our kids laughed all the way through it and so did we. What a good day. I sure hope you all had an equally if not more rewarding Christmas. Thank you all for the gifts and cards. We have enjoyed them a lot. MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Christmas Eve

I know you have all been checking this every five minutes for the latest updates. We had a great couple of days. It's just one big party. That's what happens when Mike's around all the time. Nothing but fun. Anywho, below are some pictures of the cutest and most moody kids on the planet (yes they are VERY tired tonight). Christmas Eve is always so fun and it gets SO hard to wait for Santa, but we found things to do to fill our time.... The kids made a gingerbread house for Santa instead of cookies. Mike and I thought it was a great idea. It meant no remaining house parts for days to come. Santa ate it all (or should I say the lovely white trash can:)
Here's Tyson's note to Santa. He's telling Santa that he wants a purple light saber and that the gingerbread house is for him.

Ahhh....cute Mike!

Ahhh....cute Brayden!

Ahhh...oh wait....it's just Hayley.

Oh, and there's the little munchkins having the traditional hot chocolate before bed time.

Spreading out the Reindeer food (it's oats, sprinkles, and glitter). The glitter sparkles in the moonlight to attract the deer. They fly down and eat the food while Santa delivers the gifts.

This is after "Santa" put together a rather large gift for the older two. We're not so sure Santa put it together the right way....

Tyson is 6!!

So, Ty turned 6 this morning at 2:19 am. Over the past 1 1/2 years, he has changed into such a different little boy. I have really enjoyed watching him learn and grow. We had planned on having one of his best friends (Chase) over today, but we have pink eye and decided to just keep this birthday a family event. Well, we did go out to eat, but we were in a corner away from everyone else so hopefully that helped. SO, here are some pictures of today! This is Ty's favorite restaurant. PIRATE ISLAND! It's very fun!
A picture of him with his 14 gifts. We only got him 4 of them, the rest were from family. Way to spoil our boy people. You know he doesn't need THIS much but he did love it!

He also got money from Grandma and Grandpa Bradshaw, Grandpa Winslow, and Great Grandma Winslow, so we went and picked out some toys. This voice changing helmet was among them.

Ok, so I wish I could take credit for this cake, but I can't. We had a giving tree at church where we donated service to others. One woman put "decorate a cake" and I picked that one with Ty's birthday in mind. She did this by hand today for him. Turned out so good (and tasty too)!

He was pretty scared of the flames and blew one out prematurely, but Mike fixed that and he did great.

WE LOVE YOU TY!! HAPPY #6!! You will always be my little guy and I'm sure we will just grow closer as we have over the past years! I hope this year brings lots of fun adventures!!

Sing Praise

Last night was great! Lieto!, a choir here in town that is SO wonderful, had a concert and the director let me perform one of my original compositions and one of my arrangements. I was able to hear "A Christmas Vision" for the first time with real instruments (not just the fake Finale ones). I wrote the music to this piece two years ago as a gift for my dad for Christmas. My Great-great Grandpa, Edgar Howard, lost an 11 year old daughter before Christmas one year. He was heartbroken. He was a Christian so he had belief of life after death and of a heaven. He wrote a poem about how, although Christmas was the same as usual, it was so different without the presence of his little girl. One night he had a vision in which she came to him in a dream and told him not to worry. Though they would never see each other again on Earth, they would surely see each other again in paradise. It's a very touching poem and it was so cool to finally hear it with the live piano and English horn. The other piece was an arrangement of "Silent Night" for piano and French horn. It turned out really nice. The choir was AMAZING! They do so well and I love listening to them. I am so grateful to Norm Lister for letting me do these pieces. I can't ever thank him and the choir enough. It's also SO fun to have Mike perform with me on piano. I love it!

We also had our Church Christmas Program today. Mike was in charge of the program (as he is the ward choir director). I can't tell you how well it went. It was a low pressure performance, but the most important one of the season. The choir sounded better then ever. There were small miracles that made things work so well. The spirit was certainly there as we sang those carols and hymns. People were moved to tears and I was so proud of my husband for all the work he has put into it. Again, I love this season!

SNOW!!

Look it snowed! As my Dad would put it, it has snowed in hell. It's been so fun having winter in St. George. The kids have loved playing in it. They are not so used to the freezing temperatures, so they don't last long outside, but we've been armed with a camera every time to capture the few moments of winter bliss. In front of our house on Wed night after Mike's concert.

This is our neighbors house. Ours has lights, but nothing compared to this.

This is Joe the Snowman. Mike helped the kids build it!

You can see the wind. It was bitter cold.

And of course, this had to be posted. Bray wasn't asleep until he had a handful of Sophie.

I love this time of year!

We went to Tyson's "Santa Social" last night. A very "real" Santa came. He told the kids about the North Pole and secrets of his gift delivery then they all got to sit on his lap. Here are some pictures from that. My sister Mandi came last night with two of her boys. Look how little Darek still is!

Tyson was too busy with his friends to sit with Santa, but Brayden and Anna were happy to do it. Notice Brayden's interest in Santa's glasses.
Anna in front of one of the decorations. She is so cute.

Tyson with his best friends: Olivia and Chase. They also went to pre-school with him.

I got the boys to stop running for half a second to take this picture.

This is taken at Anna's Christmas Program. Her line was "I like to go to Grandma and Grandpa's house." It was the perfect line because Grandma and Grandpa Titus just happened to be in town and they came to see her program! Don't you love the dress!!

I had to put this one on. Sophie is very interested in Brayden and his toys. Likewise, Brayden is very interested in Sophie and her tail, fur, ears, face, etc. Sophie is so good with him. She doesn't bite or yell, she just lets him pull at her. When I couldn't find her yesterday, I went to check on Brayden as he slept upstairs. Low and behold the kitty was sleeping in his bed next to him.

In other news, I get to perform one of my arrangements for horn and piano and a vocal piece I wrote at a concert on Dec. 20th. I'm excited and a little nervous. It's one thing to just perform, but another thing to perform something that you wrote. If it sucks, you can normally say something like "Oh, the arrangement isn't that great." BUT when you write the piece, it's all you. We'll see how it goes....

Another Job

So, I may have another teaching job starting in January. The school that Ty goes to doesn't have a band and they've wanted one since they opened. Mike taught the Principal's kid band and she has asked me numerous times to think about teaching at her school. We did a survey to see how many kids would be interested and there are quite a few. I get to pick my salary because it's an after school program that the families have to pay for and I set the fee. The only thing is that they have NO money for equipment, so I have to set the fee at a price where I can factor in equipment and my own liability insurance. ANYWHO, it's been interesting. I would teach 2 days a week after school. The reason I'm considering it is because I can still be home with my kids and I don't have to pay daycare because I wouldn't start teaching until Mike is out of school. It does add an added stress to our life, BUT it might take away some of our financial stress as it's been very hard living on one income since I quit teaching (I haven't been paid a dime for the job I'm doing with the Festival- we'll see if I ever get paid for all that work). Anyway, I guess this is a pretty boring post. Sorry people. I'll try to be a little more sarcastic next time :)