12 on the 12th--December Edition

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1. I watched part of The Tonight Show (recorded from the night before) while eating breakfast before work.
2. Family selfie before I left the house (there were various levels of cooperation for this).
3. It's nice we have a Christmas tree in the office at work, this is the view from my desk.
4. This is what I gave my Secret Pal.
5. I read while eating lunch in my car.
6. I'm a bit spastic when I park my car, no matter how hard I try I can't seem to angle correctly in a slanted space.
7. Whitney and I went to Michael's after school.
8. She shocked me by saying she wants this poster for Christmas (what the?!).
9. We got a couple more Christmas cards in the mail (I'm frustrated we don't have a usable family photo for ours this year).
10. This was the beautiful set up for our Book Club dinner at Collette's house.
11. The fabulous pile of gifts I got from our book and gift exchange!
12. Late-night selfie of the 6 of us.

12 on the 12th--November Edition

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1. Randy packs our lunches every morning.
2. Family selfie before I left for work (it was a cloud of morning breath).
3. Ordering my daily Coke and this time I got a hashbrown too.
4. Reading during my 1/2 hour car lunch, I always park by this pretty tree.
5. The weather was cold and Novemberish.
6. Whitney in her theater make-up for Seussical rehearsal.
7. Whitney's hand...oh junior high.
8. I've got Seussical vinyl on the back of my car.
9. I was ravenous after work and used this Chick-Fil-A coupon.
10. I got a Jury Duty summons and some Washi tape in the mail.
11. I decorated Christmas gift tags with the new Washi tape.
12. I always read myself to sleep, tonight it was The Graveyard Book.

Halloween 2014--Work Style

My co-worker Tiffany (the one in the Pinterest shirt) had the brilliant idea to turn the office into an iPhone and to have all of us be apps. It was simply a matter of printing logos onto iron-on paper and putting them on a t-shirt...easiest costume ever!

Sadie's 2014

 About 3 days after Homecoming was over Landon got invited to Sadie's.

These items were left on our porch and he had to get the letters she had written on the packaging to figure out who was asking him to the dance.

He replied a couple days later with these goodies (he's getting a lot of help from me and Randy).

The dance was last Saturday and this is one of the only pictures I have of them. They ended up going with one other couple and went bowling, then to dinner and then the dance. (She got the shirt for him to wear.)

Miss Sassy Pants Turns 14

This year Whitney's birthday fell on the Saturday of Fall Break, so she had Thursday and Friday off of school leading up to it.

On Thursday my mom picked her up and took her to lunch and then birthday shopping with some money from us and then some from my parents. They also had plans to pick Bella and Tess up from the train to join them for the end of their shopping outing and then for a sleepover at my parents' house.

Whitney saying goodbye to Junie.

Whitney and Bella came back to our house Friday afternoon (Tess went home) and entertained themselves so much I hardly saw them.

On Saturday, we joined my entire family at Wheeler Farms for family pictures. Usually we set up my tripod and a self-timer and hope for the best but this year Robyn's boyfriend (who is a professional photographer) offered to do a photo shoot with us. It's so weird that the kids are all getting so big! Ashley is the youngest cousins and she's now 8 1/2...crazy. It felt like they were tiny for so long and now it feels like they're all teenagers.

After a couple hours of of photo taking, me, Lori, Whitney and Bella went to lunch at Apollo Burger. I took this shot of Whitney modeling her birthday shopping finds (i.e., new shoes, new jeans and new sweater) which she is thrilled about.

She loves, loves, loves these Sassy shoes!

Lori wore her sunglasses during lunch because she was next to a bright window. She could have closed the blinds but she and Bella said the sun felt nice. It was funny to sit across from her wearing glasses though.

Next we went to Color Me Mine (just like last year).

Lori took this fabulous photo of the girls.

Lori and I both painted mugs.

I painted this mug (which will end up being a bright turquoise after it's fired), Bella painted the bulldog, Lori did an ombre affect on her mug, and Whitney did a really cute little sugar bowl, lid and small spoon which she'll probably eat cereal out of.

Later that evening we got together at Lori's house to finally celebrate her birthday (which was September 8th), Landon's birthday (which was August 10th), Andrew's birthday (which was September 29th), Randy's birthday (which was October 12th) and Whitney's birthday...apparently we've had a really hard time getting everyone together. Robyn and Lyman (boyfriend) ended up having a couple Halloween party to be at and Landon ended up going to the BYU-Nevada game, but other than that we were all there.

The spread of gifts. Lori wanted work done for her gifts so Adam and Randy hung a couple heavy duty items, mounted her flat screen tv to the wall and fixed a toilet.

We had cheesecake AND the Oreo Ice Cream dessert.

All lined up so we could sing to them.

We relit candles and put them on Andrew's piece of dessert so he could blow them out and spray as needed.

12 on the 12th--October Edition

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1. I was up early to get the balloons out of my car and to hang decorations for Randy's birthday.
2. Randy's "corner presents".
3. He requested Raspberry Muffins and chocolate milk for his birthday breakfast.
4. He's easy to please.
5. Whitney giving Junie some loves.
6. It was rainy and dark when we went to church at 8:45am.
7. I got released as Primary Secretary (and am now serving as 2nd Counselor in the Stake Primary).
8. Landon checking game footage.
9. I got a couple hours to read and nap before having to go visit another ward's primary.
10. The day ended up being beautiful and sunny.
11. Birthday kisses for Randy.
12. Lori joined us for dinner and dessert.

Andrew's 27th

 Andrew turned 27 on September 29th!

Andrew got to come home last weekend (he does every other weekend) and was so excited because his work helper made him this sweet Toy Story card (she drew it herself).

On Saturday a bunch of us gathered at JCW's for lunch (my dad always takes Andrew there when he's home for the weekend).

Lori went with Andrew and my parents to the Disney store and Instagrammed this super cute photo of them. It was rather momentous because Andrew got to choose a new Woody and Jessie doll (that's all he ever wants). This photo is significant because they're all sincerely smiling (no easy feat for the men in this picture).

I can't believe he's 27! I was 16 years old when my mom had him (she was 39). 

Homecoming 2014!

Since Landon turned 16 back in August (which I still haven't blogged about) he was able to go to Homecoming. I began asking him questions about this as soon as school started, (i.e., who are you going to ask?, how are you going to ask her?, who do you think will be in your group? etc.).

Finally on September 1 when we were together at Pizza Factory for dinner (and him cornered) we got him to say who he wanted to ask to Homecoming. This felt like a big deal and meant that we could move on to the next phase which was coming up with a clever way to ask her. We discussed several ideas and then brainstormed about things they had in common or that she likes, and he mentioned that she's way into the BBC show Sherlock. Randy and I rewatched an episode that night (we like that show too) to freshen our memories and came up with a fun idea.

Fast forward 3 days later when it suddenly became urgent to actually follow through and make this invite happen (he texted me from football and asked me and Whitney to put the tiny papers in the pills so he could drop it off when he got home around 9:45). Five of the pills had blank papers in them and one had his name on it, he came up with the "Holmes-coming" which I thought was pretty cute.

This is how it looked when he left it on her porch. The tag on the box says "The Game is On" which is a Sherlockism.

Her response was some stuff tweaked from Sherlock as well so it was pretty cool.

The ticket.

The $20 corsage.

Landon wasn't super keen when I initially offered to take pictures of their group, but I reminded him that every body seems to do a full on photo shoot for dances...I said I'd be on standby in case he didn't get a better offer.

It was fun seeing them all in action, they're so cute.

Landon's cute date Ashley is from our ward.

This is one of their silly shots.

The boys.

I don't even know how this strange shot came about.

How adorable are those yellow boots?! 

I don't think he started the date expecting to do this.

Isn't the beaded bracelet corsage cute?

Landon and Parker have been friends since they were little (maybe age 7).

I love their friendship.

One last shot.

12 on the 12th--September Edition

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1. The morning school mess.
2. Landon catching his ride and Whitney leaving for the bus.
3. The morning's dishes.
4. Our spider extermination device, we've been over run by spiders lately.
5. Loading photos from yesterday's football game.
6. Part of a funny text exchange with my sister Lori.
7. The leaves on the mountain are turning orange.
8. I spent some time reading in the cozy.
9. Picked up Whitney from school and took her to Lori's for some cake making.
10. Lori at her house.
11. I had to make cupcakes on Whitney's behalf for the country fair.
12. A funny card from Rebekah 3 years after she wrote it.

First Day of School Again

School started on August 19th this year, which seemed way too early for all of us.

Landon is in 11th grade this year and has a Football class 1st period on A days (hence his lovely shirt). Whitney is in 8th grade this year and is determined to figure out how to manage her hair.

Can you feel the love?

Of course Junie had to be included.

I had already been working for a couple weeks so school starting was actually kind of a relief. This is my 4th year in the front office and my 5th year working at the junior high. Good times.

Miscellany

I'm so far behind, even on my miscellaneous posts...dang it.

I love my 30 minutes of car-lunch reading time but hate how fast the time goes.

My sister-in-law Daniela and two of her kids (Peter and Isabella) were in town from Illinois looking at Colleges (BYU, UVU, UofU, AND USU) but squeezed us into their tight schedule.

Landon washes a load of sweaty football clothes every night.

Landon did the ALS ice bucket challenge in his Sunday clothes. 

I love it when Landon does his homework in his room at his desk rather than in front of the computer.

I thought this looked like a lovely still life.

Football stud Landon.