Isaah Football

Isaah played flagfootball this year. Chad was the coach and their team name was the Silver Bullets. They did awesome! On defense he was the best free safety there was. He let very few get past him. On offense, the season started out with no one wanting to play QB, but in the last few games Isaah played it and did great. He passed it a few times for touchdowns and started realy getting a hang of weaving in and out of the opponents while running the ball. It was Chad's first time coaching a team of kids before but he was wonderful. He definetly had some strong personalities to deal with and his patience really was amazing. By the last few games the kids really new the plays and ran them well. This is Isaah's slide show he directed for your viewing enjoyment.

We Wish You

For all of those friends and family out there that are away from us this season we wanted to tell you Merry Christmas, we miss you and hope that you enjoy your Christmas season. The Kiddo's after opening presents wishing you a Merry Christmas! (Remember turn off the music and turn up your volume.

Once there was a snowman

Here is the the twins singing Once there was a Snowman at their Preschool. They now go around town singing Jingle Bells wherever we are. Hope you enjoy the Show!
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Twins Program

The twins put on a little christmas program at their preschool for us on Thursday. They sang us a vareity of songs. They did such a great job. One of their teachers informed me that Talli is one of the best singers (Maybe that just means the loudest). The girls did so good, Paige was a little bit shy in her singing but she still sang it all. It is fun to watch their different personalities start to come out. (Remember to pause the christmas music before pushing play.)

Christmas Crazy

I recently had a discussion with a friend about how blogs are the happy things in life. I thought I would post the normalness of life. The Christmas Crazy's have hit me. I do have 95% of my shopping done but it's everyday life that seems to be getting me. I feel a little scatterbrain. You know how it goes. I had two pictures almost the exact same downloaded on my computer for the christmas card, I choose the wrong one I wanted. Let see, forgot to pay the electric bill, left the grocery store with 1/2 of what I bought (luckily she ran the rest out to me). We attempted to make gumdrops yesterday, I had kids adding ingredients, needless to say after fixing my mistake we had to 4x the recipe (The kids followed my directions to a T), hopefully they will still turn out. I thought you might want to know if you are having a week like me, it's ok there's always next week. lol

On the positive side it snowed everywhere around the valley except in our valley. So after school yesterday I surprised the kids and took them up the hill (10 minutes away) to see it snow. They loved it! They stood next to the car catching snowflakes in their mouths and hands, laughing and giggling and loving it all. There is a chance of snow again tommorrow so hopefully some will fall at our house.

A Visit from Friends

Our great friends Steve, Jenni, Ashley and Nate came to visit us last week. We went 4wheeling and had lots of fun hanging out. For some reason I have odds n ends pictures from it. I guess I was enjoying it to much to pay attention. Nate loved riding the 4 wheeler with Chad and wearing Talli's backpack around the house. Madi and Ashley were quite the 4wheeler riders. They tore it up out by our house. The funnest was watching Ashley and the twins take their shoes off and hike up the sand at the trails. Chad and I were so glad that they could come visit. We loved having them here, its an open invite for any of our friends and family. Next time I will have to get some more pict.'s.

Chad, Steve and the girls getting ready to ride. Madi and Ashley tried the polar bear swim. Yes, they actually jumped in and enjoyed hot chocolate after wards.

These are some from the Logandale Trails. For some reason I don't have any of Jenni, she was kicking up some sand out there on the 4wheeler.

Recap

I had an exciting night at the rodeo last night. Shawn placed first in the last round, and Jody, Colby and I loved cheering him on. In the whole rodeo he ended up placing 4th, winning around $70,000 for this one rodeo. He is now ranked 7th in the world. He had a fun interview last night on a live tv show at the Gold Coast casino here is the link, it is the Dec. 13th night (interview). (remember to turn off my music) He had a great 10 days in Vegas, his shoulder and hand are slowly on the mend so he hopefully will be ready for his next round of rodeos in January. Keep up the good work!
A clip from the interview

Update

Shawn is half way through his first NFR rodeo. Round Seven starts tonight. We have enjoyed watching him on ESPN every night. The big news is he won 1st place last night in round 6. This won him a nice big gold buckle and a big chunk of money. He is sitting 3rd in the average. He has rode 3 out of 6 of his bulls, on round four he dislocated his shoulder but after having in put back in and taped up he says he is ready for more action. Here is an interview after his first place win click on video. Video Keep up the good work. You can also click on my sisters blog (my story) and you can read her view.

NFR Rodeo

We had a fun time at the rodeo on Friday night. Isaah enjoying keeping track of who was winning and what each person had to get to stay in first place. He really enjoyed a lazer show at the beginning of the rodeo and his tub of popcorn. We had good seats so we could easily enjoy it all. The stadium is definetly alot smaller than the Houston Rodeo that we have seen Shawn ride at. The first round Shawn tied for 2nd, the 2nd and 3rd he didn't make the 8 second buzzer, the 4th round he rode his bull and tied for 4th but after he was on the ground the bull helped him dislocate his shoulder. He is doing well but just sore and ready to ride again tonight. 6 more rounds to go. You can watch it on ESPN at night if you want to keep up. Keep up the good work Shawn!

Rodeo

The NFR officially started last night. Madi and my parents were there to cheer on Shawn. The rest of us were excitedly watching on ESPN. We were all on the edges of our seats as the ride started. (Sometimes I think it is actually longer than 8 seconds.) Well we all went wild including Shawn when they announced a score of 88.5. Yahoo! He ended up tieing for 2nd place for the 1st round. Only 9 more to go. I will have some pictures up this weekend. Chad, Isaah and I are going tonight so I can get some shots hopefully. Good Luck Shawn!

Thanksgiving

We had a a full house for Thanksgiving this year. Chad's sister Kelly was down with her girls, Jorden and Jazmyn and his mom Vickie and dad Dan came with them the week before Thanksgiving and spent the week in Vegas. I was a slacker and didn't take my camera the weekend before, we went to Circus Circus with Kelly, Vickie and the kids. We definitely got our money's worth. All the kids rode each ride at least 2x's some as many as 6x's. They had a blast and keep wanting to go back. Talli and Paige wanted to go on the adult coasters. They thought it looked like fun. They had no fear. Jorden, Jazmyn and Madi got to have a few sleep overs at our house during this time which they thought was so fun.
Then my parents and brother Shawn and Jody and her hubby Colby came to join in the fun on Thanksgiving day. We had a good day enjoying the food and visiting. We missed Chad's dad Bernie and his mom Terri and the boys... hopefully next year they can make it. Anyway the kids enjoyed playing outside and playing with cousins.
The day after turkey day instead of shopping we went 4 wheeling at a place called Logandale Trails. It is very pretty there. It had been raining two days before so the sand was packed down. We had a fun ride. The kids had alot of fun climbing on the rocks and playing in the sand during our breaks. The night I think we were all tired so we just played the Wii, and sneaks (like spoons but safer). The next day we went for another ride but on the other side of our valley. Madi and Isaah took their machines this time. Isaah's quite working (Chad had it running about 2 hours after we got back)so Isaah, Chad, Paige and I rode on Chad's machine. Luckily it's quite large. Madi got scared because she thought we were going up a big hill so Jody rode her machine. It was pretty funny. We all had a lot of fun.

Friends

I have a few friends who have started selling different products. The first is my friend Jenni, she is now selling Simply Fun Products. I am having a party on Wednesday, December 10th for these fun family games,many of them can be played in 20 minutes or less. I love that with young kids. I have about 5 of there games and there isn't one I don't like.
you can go to simplyfun.com/?cons=jenniferwilliams to view or place an order

My friend Cheryl is selling some cute hats and headbands. Those cute crocheted ones with the flowers on them. She is also selling bracelets. Here is her site www.averygirls.com

I will also be placing a Scentsy order on the 11th you can go to www.scentsy.com/brandif For a limited time you can purchase some cute Christmas snowflake warmers red, white or light blue, it's while supplies last. They are so cute. Just click on the What's New tab on my site.

Madi Program

Madi had her Kindergarten program on Tuesday. The girls were pilgrims and the boys were Indians. The program was really well done. With lots of singing and dancing both on the stage and off. There were only about 50 kids doing the program (just afternoon kindergarten) so it was a big change from what we were used to. I loved it. Here is a clip of her. She actually sang, smiled, and danced. Madi looked very cute as a pilgrim and did a great job! (Scroll down and pause the music on the right hand of your screen to hear her sing)

Leaf Fort

When we were up at my parents a few weeks ago the kids had fun raking leaves. Isaah, the great engineer designed this fort and had the girls be his leaf haulers. Talli would fill up two sand buckets with leaves from one side of the house and haul them to the big pile. I watched her do about 10-12 trips. Isaah would do the same but with just large armfulls of leaves. They tried to convince grandpa to let them leave it up for when it snowed so they could have a snow fort. But grandpa wouldn't go for that.

We are counting down the days to the big rodeo in Vegas, 10 days to go. We are all excited to get to go and see Shawn in action. Isaah thinks it is just amazing and can't wait. Here is a link to a article that was wrote about him in my hometown. By the way you can watch him on ESPN starting the 5th I believe.

Article

Colby and Shawn enjoying the rodeo life:)

Playdough

The twins received play dough for their birthday and love it. We haven't had it for awhile because it had all dried out. So their marvelous Aunt Jody got them some. Chad was so excited.:) They love it and are finally old enough to leave alone while playing with it. Here are some pictures from when we were at Aunt Jody's house a few months ago. She brought out her play dough to entertain the kids. Who knew it was such dangerous work?

NFR Here We Come!

I imagine my brother's smile is about twice as big as this right now!

Tonight we found out some very exciting news. After winning 1st in the Wilderness Circuit Finals in Ogden, UT Shawn traveled to Dallas to the Dodge ProRodeo Circuit finals. He went into the finals 22nd in the ratings and needing about $9000 to make it to the finals in Las Vegas. This was his last big chance to make it to the finals, the big one, the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas. The first two days he made about $10,000, tieing for 1st one day. Then in the semi-finals he placed 1st $$$. Which after this we knew he was going to Vegas. In the finals he made a good effort but only made it to 7.86 seconds, just 0.24 shy. So he is bringing home about $17,500. (I'm hoping for a really good Christmas present this year!). He will be going into the finals as number #11 in the ratings. We are so excited and proud of him. He has worked hard to make it here and has loved doing it. Way to live out your dream!!! If you go to this site you can see a great picture of him and see an article about him. Article
This Shawn with his saddle and buckles that he won in Ogden.
here is a video that Jody and Colby took of him in Ogden href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQcl7H7a_KQ">

Madi

I had this cute picture of Madi from the twin's birthday party. She is dressed up like a cat and is holding Blackie the kitten that came for the party too! Madi is my helper that does all of her chores happily (usually). She loves homework, this morning she did 8 pages of it,(This is homework I give her to keep her where she was at in Texas). She is a super fast bike rider now and can even keep up with Chad. What she lives for though is friends. Before school, after school, during school she wants to play with friends. She makes them so easily and loves them all dearly. Her favorite color is now purple so I have two rooms in my house that are covered in pink and purple. Total girl colors, you should see my shopping cart when shopping for cloths. She loves the movie Princess Bride, I don't know how many times she has watched it in the last week.
The most exciting this is she has lost 3 teeth in the past month and one more is almost out. Pretty soon she's not going to be able to eat.

Isaah

At the school yesterday one of Isaah's classmates stopped me and said Isaah had won an award for reading the most passages on a reading website. Well come to find out Ticket to Read sent his class a poster and Isaah an award letter and some tattoo's for reaching 1000 points. He is the only one in the class who had done this. For a kid who doesn't like reading that's awesome! Chad and I were pretty proud of him. While on the subject of Isaah he has found a new love...kickball. They play it at recess here. He is enjoying school here and I think he is enjoying it here. He still loves lego's and building things. He is very close to finishing his wolf badge in scouts. Probably about another month and he should be done. He has been doing much better with his siblings and though he has his days (what kid doesn't) we are doing well. This halloween we took him and a friend to a haunted corn maze. They loved it. It was just scarey enough for them but not to much. He loves the thrill of being scared just alittle. We finish soccer a few weeks ago and we will start flag football in a few weeks. Isaah did really well and Chad and I enjoyed watching him play.

Halloween pumpkins

They loved their pumpkins!

Halloween

Halloween night finally arrived after Isaah woke up all the kids at 6am because it was Halloween. You'd think it was Christmas. We started off the evening having a potluck dinner at our friends Stacey and Sams and then moved on to a trunk or treat at the church and then a few streets in our neighborhood. The kids won 9 little fish at the trunk or treat and were very excited. They had about 8 different fun games for them plus 2 cake walks and way to much candy. They had alot of fun there. The best was Chad finally dressed up, I don't think in the 11 yrs I have known him that he has ever dressed up. Chad was a vampire, I was a kitty, Isaah was the headless horseman from Ichabod Crane, Madi was a witch (this was the costume I made, that she loved), Talli ended up being a princess, (she had been a dinosaur, supertalli, and a ballerina at all other halloween festives we attended) and Paige at last minute decided to be a bunny, where that one came from I don't know she had been Barbie Fairytopia all other times. We definetly got more candy than we needed but we all had alot of fun.

Twins 4th Birthday

Talli and Paige's birthday finally arrived. They had been counting down the days. Packages were coming in the mail for them and they were having such a hard time waiting to open them. They had two friends over, Danny and Emma plus Danny's older sisters Patty and Kelsy. Isaah planned a few games for them and I planned a treasure hunt for the younger kids and a different one for the older kids. They loved it. Then we celebrated with pink barbie cake and opening presents. They loved everything they recieved. Each package was so exciting to them and they had to show everyone. I can't believe my babies are so big now.

Carving Pumpkins

Wednesday night we took the evening and carved pumpkins with the kids. They were so excited and had been wanting to do it for two weeks now. They each had their own idea of what they wanted it to look like of course. We sat out on our driveway enjoy the 75 degree weather with no mosquito to bite us and cleaned and carved all night long.

Here are the end Results. Can you guess who's pumpkin is who's??? I will post the answers in a day or so. Let's hear those guesses! 1. Scary Guy 2. Pirate 3. Kitty Cat 4. Happy One

comments

I have been having a little trouble with my blog and I am not sure why. People haven't been able to leave comments. I think i might have it fixed so you can try again.

Thanks Lori

My cute cous Lori just tag me. So here it goes... I had to think on a few of these.
Rules; 1 Link the person who tagged you. 2 Mention the rules on your blog. 3 Tell about 6 unspectacular quirks of yours. 4 Tag 6 other bloggers by linking them

1. I hate listening to people eat cereal. I wait till everyone else is done then eat.
2. I hate it when people don't clean the lint traps on dryers.
3. I also don't like unorganized pantry's... call me crazy I just like all the tomato soups to be grouped together.
4. I really dislike drinking pop from a can, the taste is just off
5. I dislike the smell of coffee. Don't know why, I grew up with the smell of it in the morning and still do when visiting family. It's one of those things you either love it or you hate it.

Boy this kinda sounds like my dislike list doesn't it. Well now it's my turn to tag (hahaha) Juli, Jenni, Darci (this means you have to blog), Sima, Kim, Lisa, Dawn, Lindsay, and Cheryl

Weekend

Our local grocery store had a Halloween Party this weekend and the kids all wanted to go. So after Isaah's last soccer game we ran home and had a snack then told the kids to figure out what they wanted to wear. Madi decided awhile ago to be a witch, Isaah was going back and forth, and Paige and Talli could not make up their minds, everyday it was something different. In the end Talli ended up being "Super Talli", (she wears this quite often), Paige was Barbie Fairytopia, and Isaah was suppose to be the headless horseman from Ichabod Crane. They had fun and Talli won a cake in the cake walk. She was so excited, she wouldn't let anyone hold it. She finally decided to share some cake with dad and then we all enjoyed a piece. (Notice the shoes on the twins, we couldn't help but laugh)
Super Talli and her cake
We also went 4wheeling with the kids this weekend and Chad even let the kids swim in the pool, which was a little chilly since he hasn't heated it all week. The kids played outside all weekend with neighbors riding bikes, scooter and having wagon rides. It was a really good weekend. Chad and I had a babysitter for all 4 kids one night (the kids adore their new sitter) and went spot lighting for coyotes or foxes and visited some friends. We even watched a movie.

The highlight of the kids weekend I think was when we babysat our friends kitten that is 6 weeks old. It is so cute and small. I think it's the smallest kitten I have seen he easily fits curled up in the palm of Chad's hand. We all adore it, even Rusty. That's the problem though, Rusty licks it to death and then he wants to play with it. He doesn't exactly play gently and I think he was getting a little jealous of the attention it was receiving. Otherwise we probably would have a new addition to our house.

I ran to Walmart with just Talli also. Chad thankfully bribed the other kids to stay home but Talli was very adimit about going with me. We had so much fun. I think I haven't enjoyed a trip to the store with one of my kids that much. She was trying on scarey halloween masks scaring me, and she asked me to go down the toy isle, I told her I wasn't buying anything and she said "Okay, I'm just going to look". That's exactly what she did, she would pick things up and say "oh, mom Paige would love this", I would remind her we weren't buying anything and she'd say "I know". We just had the best time, I am glad we went.

Chad and I were talking that it's kinda nice, we don't feel like we have to go anywhere, we can just hang out at the house alot and playing with the kids and enjoying life, especially in the beautiful weather we have been having. Hopefully we can continue these wonderful weekends.
Who or What is this?

Pumpkin Patch

On Friday Madi's class walked to a pumpkin patch. It was a long dusty walk, about a mile to and a mile back to a local farmers field. The kids were troopers and made it with just a little complaining. Isaah's class went the week earlier to the high schools farm and picked pumpkins, I wasn't able to go with him. He came home looking like he had to wrestle his pumpkin to get it off the vine. The kids thought it was great to be able to do that, I don't think we have ever been to a real pumpkin patch before.

Preston

In July the good ol pilots wife's group had a reunion. Since we are all split up (it's so sad) we decieded we needed a reunion. I guess you can call it a six month reunion. We met up at Jared's family campground in Preston. It was pretty fun, the kids loved it and then we headed to the parade and rodeo where we watched Shawn ride. We had alot of fun and we are planning on making it an annual event, all 29 of us plus maybe a few extra's. Thanks Juli and Jared! (You can double click on the pictures in inlarge it)The gang at the Preston Parade
Paige pushing 'Baby Chris' on the swing, it was so cute and he loved it. (Chris just turned 2)
Kids on the Teeter Totter
Kids enjoying the Parade, they got tons of candy and saw soooo many 'princesses'

New House

So this is what you have all been waiting for. Sorry I don't have a picture of all the rooms, they aren't all organzied and cleaned. This house was a foreclosure that we ended up putting 4 different offers on over a 6 month period. We have a lot of yard work to do to get things coming back. So far so good though, alot of the plants are coming back and we even having little grasslings starting back up. The house was in great condition and everything was working well. The pool and the house are working well so we are very lucky since it was sitting empty for so long.
kitchen view
a view from my back patio
another view of the back yard
Chad and Madi Sycronize Diving in the Pool
Master bath, with a jetted tub, it's nice!

view of livingroom from kitchen
another view of kitchen
front house

Twilighters

So I have finally broke down and watched the trailers for the movie Twilight. I have to say I am finally very, very excited to see it. At first I was so so about the movie because I know the books are always so much better. I have to say though I am now excited about it. It looks like they have done a great job, (at least the trailers have me excited!) So if you haven't read it yet, go get it and enjoy! You'll have it finished in time, you still have a month.

Dress Up

While doing some organizing the kids were preparing for Halloween early. Isaah is Darth Mol, Paige is the Dinosaur, Talli is Super Talli, and Madi is the Lion. These are not the costumes they are wearing on Halloween, well, Isaah said he is going to be it, (thank goodness because I didn't want to make a chupacabra costume).

Soccer

Isaah started playing soccer here the past few weeks. They play coed with 8 players including a goalie. He has been enjoying it and doing extremely well. He excells at playing the forward position. It has been alot of fun to watch him, though he told us sometimes his chest hurts when he runs. Chad and I had to laugh, Isaah isn't use to playing soccer in the high altitude out here. 3 more games of the season to go, so far they have only lost 1 game (though they don't keep score).