2024 Recap

• Our heater died so we had a staycation at the bnb and attended our first hockey game and loved it. Once the heater was replaced and we came home, we found water damage along the interior garage wall that needed more repair work. 
• Saw Nate Bargatze live
• Lance went to Thailand with Benton for 10 days to visit Kempton and Bonnie
• Savannah came to visit for a week
• Charity got her mission call to Missouri and moved out
• Grandma Watson turned 94
• I went home for a weekend to attend Savannah's patriarchal blessing; it was also the same weekend as Charity's mission farewell
• Had major water damage in the laundry room bathroom and had to renovate it
• Cora and I saw Disney Princess Favorites on Broadway
• Mom and Christine came to visit for a week during spring break
• Donna and John came to visit
• Kimball got two parakeets - Diamon and Lemonade
• Purchased a warehouse to offer more services through Inland Mortuary Services
• Saw the Northern Lights!!!
• Went with girlfriends to see Kristina Kuzmic
• Lance and Kimball went to Las Vegas to visit Jeff and Penny as Penny was suddenly in liver failure
• Christine and Scott came to visit for a week before I hosted the Pettingill reunion
• Lance and I kayaked the Little Spokane River
• Cora and I saw Frozen on Broadway
• Family vacation to Ocean Shores, WA coast where the kids experienced the ocean for the first time
• Lance and I saw Pentatonix
• Skipped school for a week and went home as I escorted Savannah for her endowment, and a Cox reunion at the cabin since Kempton's post in Russia is over
• Lance gave a TedX Talk! Donna, John, Kempton, Isom were there, and TJ flew in to support Lance whom we've not seen in about 15 years
• Went to President Doxey's mission reunion in SLC
• I got to go to UT craft day for a whole week!
• Penny passed away and Lance flew down to LV to speak at the funeral and help Jeff
• Kimball's birds suddenly passed away
• Lance and I went to the Glenn Miller Orchestra Christmas concert

Christmas Break 2024

 We have had very little snow this year but once we finally got an inch, Ezra made an itty bitty snowman ad Kimball made sow cubes. 

For our family activity we went to the Jedi Alliance Arcade for some nostalgic fun. My favorite was the drums, I even gave myself a blood blister on my palm because I was so into it, haha.

They had some incredible movie and gaming memorabilia! Boy did it take me right back to my childhood!

Christmas was so relaxing and magical this year, if I do say so myself! We were spoiled by our family, ate too many goodies from friends, and really enjoyed each other's company without any responsibilities. And I mean, I really went lenient--I didn't care what the kids did or ate, it was every man for himself for two weeks.

For the last three years we have been saving money to take the kids to Disneyland. We gifted it to them for Christmas with new luggage, and in each luggage had a clue as to where we were going. We'll be spending 3 days at Disney and 2.5 days at the beach. To say the kids were excited is an understatement, especially Cora. I know in the picture Ezra doesn't look thrilled but that's because he was up all night Christmas Eve throwing up and still wasn't feeling well. Poor kid, what a horrible time to be sick.

Ezra can be our stowaway, haha.

The ornament we made this year were clay Christmas bulbs, I forgot to get a picture of the finished project. They have googley eyes and a face on them as well, they turned out cute.

Everybody was busy Christmas day working on a project. Cora's doing a dreamcatcher, Kimball a wood burning kit, and Ezra was busy painting some Minecraft figures.

Random Happenings

Last month Lance bought this old antique horse drawn funeral carriage. It is currently being stored at the warehouse and when Lance has pockets of time, he works on restoring it. I estimate it to be finished in 10 years.

I got so tired of Lance always complaining that the house is cold, especially when the boys are hot from playing and I'm hot from cooking dinner. So I gave him part of his Christmas early. These are sherpa lined socks and a sherpa lined ankle length robe. When Lance put both on he said, "I feel like I climbed into the gut of a camel!" I laughed pretty hard at that one, how does his brain think of things like that?

We attended the Glenn Miller Orchestra Christmas concert downtown, it was fantastic!

Sadly, both of Kimball's parakeets died within a week of each other. Diamond passed away suddenly in the middle of the night and when Kimball got up one morning, he was just lying on the floor not moving. We were all quite surprised. Parakeets are companion animals so we suspected that Lemonade wouldn't last without Diamond. Sure enough, about 5 days later as Kimball was getting ready for church he could tell something was off. So he held Lemonade in his hands until he passed. That was a hard day for Kimball, he literally watched as life slowly drained from his beloved pets.

Cora earned student of the month for the character trait of caring. Way to go, sis!

While Lance is away, we will play!

 

UT Craft Day

 

Every year for my birthday I always ask to go to the UT craft day at Christine's house. It doesn't always happen because of scheduling conflicts with Lance but this year it did happen!

We learned different pie crust techniques (which I used for my Thanksgiving pies this year), made gift tags, a door floral arrangement, played a bunch of games, stayed up visiting, ate delicious food, lots of shopping, got to see Scott and Sydney on their return from Hawaii, played with the kids, and helped Christine with some home decor stuff.  It was such a blast as always, Christine and Nancy always plan the best activities. The best part is just catching up with what everyone is up to and how each of the kids are doing. This year, Savannah, Halle, and Aubrey came along which was super fun. I love my family so much!

Copying Savannah's pose, lol

Helping Christine hang up pictures at midnight

One of the days was Grandparents day at the school. Mom and I were lucky enough to have lunch with the kids at school and I bought each of them a book from the book fair.

Grayson was such a good sport shopping with the Moms for hours on end.

Giving Mom a kiss under the mistletoe.

These girls made a haul!

When we all arrived at Nanyc's that morning, we realized we all made a complete rainbow.