Happy Valentines!

I saw these cards last year and so this year I got around to making them. They turned out so cute!

I love Valentines. I try to make it feel like a special time for the kids. So when Kim told us about what they do for Valentines, we got so excited and planned it ourselves. We hosted a Valentines Eve Dinner for some older couples in our ward. We turned our home into a restaurant. The kids dressed up in dresses and aprons, we made menus, decorated the table, and made a lot of food. It was a success! I think it really helped the kids see how fun it is to serve other people. Graci and Shelby were in charge of seating everyone, while Rian and Kenni had their pens and notepads taking orders. They all helped serve the food and clear away dishes. They loved it.

Our invitations:

(I just noticed the snake behind the sign. No need to fear, it is one of our rubber snakes that scares birds away)

The Menu:

Side note here. We love Olive Garden salad and make it at home. A lot. We buy the dressing at the restaurant and throw together mixed green packaged salad, tomatoes, olives, peperoncini, croutons, and red onion. We heard rumor that they may be going out of business???????? Not sure about that. If that is the case, you might want to stock up on the dressing. They usually sell out rather quickly, so maybe call and ask them when they get their shipment in.

The "nothing fancy but fun" table:

 And, that's it. As soon as our 8 guests started arriving I didn't have time to take any pictures since I was the head chef. I wanted one of everyone there but it never happened.
I think we have started a new tradition. I believe our guests really really enjoyed their time visiting and being "waited" on. What a great way to spend Valentines!

George Strait!

We were able to go see George Strait again this year with our friends, Thane and Suzanne. It was a lot of fun and George, of course, NEVER disappoints! Now that he is a grandpa, there might not be many more concerts on the horizon so it was really fun to see him again. Martina McBride opened for him this year and she was great as well.
We got to St. George Friday, went out to dinner with Kim and Carl that night. Brian and Carl went for a run Saturday morning while I went shopping at DI. (Found some great stuff btw). We got about to Mesquite when I remembered I had left my camera back in St. George! I was so mad! I had all my bokehs ready to practice on all the lights at night. I was really bummed. Luckily we had our phones so we could still take some pictures at least. We met Thane and Suzanne for dinner. We did the buffet at Monte Carlo and it was really good. Then we headed to the concert!

This next one is our scary picture for the night. I can't remember if this shot was taken before the drunk cowboy sat by us or after. I couldn't contain tears of laughter over how ridiculous he was. 

This time without the flash. 

There. That one is better. 

Our seats were great! We were in the lower bowl and it was just a great weekend all the way around. 

A project!

Check out this project I started Friday and finished Saturday morning!
http://www.girlinthecountry.com/

My kind of winter

I know we need snow and moisture and all that, but this winter is the best! I can easily do without snow. If it keeps up like this in years to come, I might not have to become a snowbird. We spend so much more time outside. Even though it still gets really cold, to me it doesn't feel as bad without all the snow and wet to walk through. Since we don't have a yard yet, our mud really has been kept to a minimum this year as well. Another plus. Horses get ridden more than normal winters, and I  don't have to worry quite as much about all the animals staying warm.  The dogs LOVE our daily trek through the orchard. We see a lot of deer tracks, and every single day we scare up at least one jack rabbit. I am just tickled pink to live where we do. I couldn't ask for anything better.
The girls love the orchard as well. They get sticks and knock down the old mushy apples that a few trees still have on them.

The kids made cupcakes so of course, we took a picture!

Fun with photos

I will post more pictures about this but I wanted to put up just a couple. I had such a fun night last weekend when me and 2 friends from here in town went on a photography field trip. We went after dark and while we were loading up all our gear in the car, I told them it was so exciting to me and felt like we were going on a secret mission! Like Mission Impossible or something. Anyway, we found an overpass to set up our stuff on. Our goal was to practice with shutter speed. This is a sample of what we did:

(I have a lot more that I will post later) Another really fun thing that I have always wanted to try, was bokeh with different shapes. We made a few before we left. I made a star:

Those are all headlights on cars! Except for the 2 green and those are the stop lights. 

Isn't that so fun? I have always wanted to do it with the Christmas tree, but never did. I just might have to put it back up again to try out my heart and paw print.

Here is one more. Notice the stop light turned orange? 

Hair Stylists

Kenni's friend was over the other day.
I walked past their bathroom and saw this:

They will spend hours doing hair and makeup.  Its nice too because they are getting really good at it. Rian or Kenni are the ones who do Shelby's hair most of the time now days. 

I love to have them do my hair. In fact, Kenni is playing with it right now. 

A couple funny things these kids have said lately:

Back in December Rian came home and was talking how some kids at school were saying there was no such thing as Santa. He asked her what she thought. She said she told her friends "Santa is real because my parents would NEVER buy me all that stuff. They are too cheap!"

A few weeks ago we sold Brians weight bench/set that he hasn't used for about 2 years. When Kenni found out she started crying and was very upset. I asked her why she didn't want us to sell it. "Now I won't have a strong dad anymore!"

She wanted to play apples to apples the other night. She kept choosing the funniest words. my favorite was socks. "But socks are very honorable!"

Rivalry Relay

Last August Brian and I, Brians brother, his wife and son ran a relay together. You can read all about it Here.

Christmas Eve

We had a great Christmas Break. Brian worked from home the few days before Christmas, then was off work all of last week until today. It was so nice to have him home and hard getting back to the normal routine today. We got a few projects done that we have been wanting to. He finally finished the shelf in Rian's room, and then we did my backsplash in my kitchen that we meant to do before we even moved in. He taught me how to use the tile saw so now I am no longer afraid of it. We have one room to finish in this house and that is the basement bathroom. Now that I know how to do it myself, I will tile it all and surprise Brian one day!  Mom and Dad came up the Friday before Christmas, and that night we had the Ewell family party at the Church. Graci wasn't feeling well so mom and dad stayed home with her that night. Saturday was a fun day as Candice and Gary and boys came down to spend the day and early evening with us. I was so excited when Candice said she would go on a horse ride with me. We took our turn, then let the kids take over while Mom and us started dinner. We had a really good time with them here. I got a couple photos of everyone eating, and meant to get some more of all of us together but it never happened.

Im writing this right now while Brian is at young men's. I was just getting ready for bed and Shelby was in my bed talking to me. She kept saying she was texting people and naming her friends, family, cousins, etc. I thought she was just playing. Well, I looked at her and sure enough, she had my phone and I realized she really was texting someone! Luckily, it was her Aunt Kim. She sent 5 of them. It was really funny. Kim got a kick out of it too. I didn't know she knew what it was! She does know how to find her way around on my phone though to play the games she wants or find her movies. Kenni was on her ipod once in the car looking for a movie. She said she couldn't find it and we heard Shelby say " I will get it for you Kenni". After a second she said " here you go". So Kenni watched her movie. 

Last week Brian went downstairs and found Shelby had lined up all her babies on the couch and was playing house. She told him and Rian to sit by them so I could take a picture. Here it is:

We have some new faces here on the farm. 

Meet Daisy and Penelope:

Baaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!

Birthdays!

Graci turned 6 yesterday. Shelby turns 3 on the 22nd. We decided to just celebrate them both together this year.

Happenings

I found some pictures on Brian's phone that I thought would be fun to post. Everyone got to go to a BYU football game this season. First one Brian took Rian, second one he took Kenni and Graci

The night of the very last home game we went bowling (Shelby's first time. And she beat me! I ended up dead last)

Then we went to the game. It didn't start until 8 that night and as you can see, was VERY  VERY cold.

Brian's Dad came to sit with us too.

This was Thanksgiving when we all went for a walk after dinner to make room for pie.

Shelby and Kenzlee are very best friends.

DC

Okay, so these pictures are 8 months old. Just getting around to posting about the second half of our trip back east last May. Washington D.C.!

Our hotel room

I LOVED Mt. Vernon. I could totally see myself living there back in the day. 

Geoge Washington really enjoyed the finer things and was very particular with his grounds and home. 

The Slaves quarters

The Potomac River

(Washingtons backyard)

His Tomb

The Kennedy's

Tomb of the unknown soldiers

There were a lot of veterans there that day. 

Nations Capitol

Ford's Theatre

White House. No presidential sitings however even though it looked very busy

and guards everywhere

Washington Monument