For Shawnee

we come to you when our bones are creaky
or when our joints and our knees get squeaky
you fix us up and give great advice
and you are always so sweet and nice
but we want you to know that to us you are more
than a doctor to fix us and help when we're sore
you're our sister, our auntie, and best, you're our friend
who is funny and sweet, and true to the end
on this birthday we hope that you've been super happy
and that you got something to wear that is snappy
we hope baby Barrett was wiggling like crazy
and that Brady just let you sit down and be lazy
we hope all your wishes and dreams will come true
and we hope you know, Shawnee, just how much we love you!

Happy Birthday Shawnee!!

Javier's

We had so much fun last night at dinner and I wanted to post our picture from Javier's. We got as many as our siblings together last night as we could for dinner and we went to Javier's. The food was super yummy and the company was even better.

Christmas Pictures (in no particular order)

So I have tons of pictures from this past week with Christmas and all and I thought I would just share them with you all. The first couple are from today but the rest are pretty much from Christmas Day. Enjoy!Benson drumming away. I took this one for Danny (aka Elder Haws).

This is Nick today. Brady gave Nick this suit and I thought it looked fancy on him. He was shoveling the driveway when we got home. Thanks for the suit Brade!

Our "official" 2008 Christmas photo.

Mom's gifts to open Christmas morning. She also got a dishwasher a couple days prior to Christmas. (Santa is very self-less.)

Andy and Cory's piles.

Dad's chair surrounded in gifts.

Nick and Tami's piles. Nick really spoiled me this year, like always.

This is what it looked like after Santa left. Looks nice and clean!

So those of you who live in the area know that we got tons of snow on Christmas night. It was so bad that McKenzie's parents told her not to even try to drive home, and Nat and Casey didn't want to deal with driving in the snow and stuff, so we all had a "sleepover" at Mom and Dad's. Nick and I drove down the street and got our air mattress and then we pulled out some mattresses for Nat & Casey and also for McKenzie. Andy just slept on the couch. It was actually really fun. We watched "Head Over Heels" and then fell asleep!

What would the sleepover be without balloon animals made by Casey? Nick is sporting his super cool crown or hat that Casey made him.

Shanna was talking to Danny. (She doesn't look happy does she?)

Dad sporting his new basketball shoes that Nat & I (and our spouses) got for him.

Shawnee & Brady

Ronola

Shanna and Cory

Nick and Tami

Casey, Nat, & Cory

McKenzie and Andy

Mom went crazy with making quilts for everyone. These are the ones she made for Andy & Cory. Nick says this was a "Quilted Christmas."

Dad with his hot air balloon quilt that Mom made him. (I used this one at our sleepover and it was FABULOUS!!!)

Emily, Nat, and I secretly surprised Mom with making a quilt with some fabric that she used to sew things when we were little. I'm pretty sure she liked it. She started crying when we asked her what the fabric was from. Big hit I think.

Okay this is my favorite picture and this is why I saved it for last. I am posting this mostly for Danny but I thought I would let you all see how much weight Dad has lost. He fits into Danny's leather jacket that Danny wore right before he went on his mission. Dad, that's amazing. We're all proud of you for losing that much weight!

Anyway, we really had a fun Christmas and it was fun to be able to talk to each of you (my family members) on Christmas. I am really grateful for each of you and for all that you've done for Nick and I. We love you all so much!

New Blog

I'm pretty sure most of you have seen my email, but in case not, we've joined the blogging world with a blog of our own. It's shawneeandbrady.blogspot.com. Feel free to add a link to your own blogs! :)

Happy Anniversary

I meant to do this yesterday, but it was a crazy day, so sorry it's late, but I wanted to tell Brady and Shawnee happy anniversary and I hope you're loving Mexico!

Gingerbread Houses and Snowshoeing

It's been a while since we've posted, so I thought I'd share some of our recent activities with all of you. For family night a few weeks ago, we made a gingerbread house. I was skeptical at first when Brady brought it home (he did buy it in October, so maybe that's why), but we actually had a lot of fun. Here are some pics:




Brady has decided to take on another sport...snowshoeing. This is a good thing because snow is soft to fall on and I can't think of anything he'd cut himself on, so I think we're pretty safe (as long as we stay away from avalanches!). :) Actually, we've been saying we need a "winter sport" because I don't ski and so winter is cold and long and snowshoeing seems to be pretty fun so far. It was a beautiful (still cold) day on Saturday and we had planned to go "full-moon-shoeing" (where you hike at night under the light of a full moon) but plans changed and we went during the day instead. I was glad for that because it was cold in the day and I can only imagine what it was like at night. It was awesome because we were just walking around in the snow like we were the only people on earth. There was about 2-3 feet of freshly fallen snow which made it nice, not to mention the aerobic workout. We went with our friend Spencer (and his dog, Katie) and Brady's boss, Greg. The one bad thing was seeing how bad the valley air really is when you're up above it...we all really need to take care of our environment! (That's a soapbox for another day!) Here are more pics:




Oh, and just for fun, here's our Christmas tree!
Merry Christmas everyone!

Happy Birthday Shawnee!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SHAWNEE!!

Dear Shawnee,

I just wanted to take a quick second and wish you a happy birthday. I am so glad to have you as a sister. I used to tease Brady about the girl he'd marry and I am so happy that he found you. You're such a great influence on him and I am so proud of both of you.

I remember back in the old days when you two started dating. It was funny to listen to Brady talk about you. He would come into my room late at night and just sit on my bed. I'd know something was up when he wouldn't leave. He'd just sit there and kind of bounce with a silly grin (you know the one I'm talking about!) He'd ask me questions about things he could/should do and he'd tell me about all his little tricks (like losing games) to get to spend time with you.

Speaking of games... if I had time I'd go hunt up those old Sorry tournament pictures and post them here! ha ha ha! That seems like a million years ago that we did that. I'm glad that I got to know you and spend time with you before I moved off to the other side of the country!

I always feel kind of protective of my younger (I started to type little but decided to change my wording!!) brothers and sisters. I always want them to be happy. I know that you make Brady so happy and I am so grateful for that!

I'm also so proud of you for the things you've accomplished. I'm sure that it gets annoying that we always call you asking about whatever hurts us. You've been a huge help to Johnny while his back has been hurt the last few months. We both really appreciate it a bunch!

You're also so incredibly creative. I am jealous of your digital scrapbooks and am going to copy you as soon as I get a chance to figure it out! Everything you do and make (ie: your cute bag that we sewed) turns out great!!

Shawnee, I hope you have a great birthday. I wish I could send you something fabulous, but know that today (and lots of other days too) I'm thinking about you. I love you. Thanks for being a great sister to me!

Love, Em
(and the rest)

Buried Treasure

So, in an attempt to be a blogger, I thought I'd share what we've been up to. We have been working on preparing our little courtyard for planting some stuff. (I'm going to give "green-thumbing" a try.) Two weeks ago, we cleaned out all the wood chips and landscaping fabric and a bunch of construction garbage...plywood, shingles, rusty nails, glass, pop cans, candy bar wrappers, etc. It was nasty! We then used my dad's rototiller to mix in some mulch. But, as Brady was using shovel to see how hard-packed one area was, he hit something. We soon decided it was a chunk of cement or something. Needless to say, we gave up that day. We had worked so hard, only to have our hard work be flustered by lazy construction workers. Well, after talking to one of my clients (Liz, who is my gardening mentor), I got up the energy and a little motivation to try to dig up this thing. So, this morning I went out to work in our garden and after some help from Brady, this is what we pulled out: PS. GO UTES! We were at the game today...we beat #11 UCLA 44-6!

Timpanogos Cave

So, I guess I better jump on this "blogging-bandwagon!" Our exciting weekend took us to Timpanogos Cave with our friends from "the village." I had never been there...or at least I don't remember if I ever have been, but it was really cool and I recommend it to anyone who hasn't been there. We got there just as the rain was ending, so it was a nice cool hike for us. The only thing that was bad was that they charge $7 per person to get into the cave, plus $3 per vehicle to drive into the canyon. But, I guess those park rangers have to make money somehow. :) Enjoy the pics!