Thanksgiving

turkey sausage stuffing  Christensen FaMiLy thanks talent show at the church  pool table  ping pong  PIE  Jenga  tons of potatoes 

A Birthday Week

Brandon celebrated birthday 40-something. He liked getting some new shirts and treats, but his favorite was the no fog shaving mirror for the shower. Life-changer.  No one was more excited about gift-giving than Cannon. He colored a very nice U.S. flag and collected a few random trinkets throughout the house to re-gift to Dad. 

We decorated for Christmas! We have strictly waited until after Thanksgiving to decorate in year's past but then came the snow and the Christmas music and all of a sudden all the decor was placed and the tree trimmed. 

Adrie counted 15 Nativities. I really love Nativity sets and could almost go as far as saying I collect them. 

Adrie took some creative license with the leftover decorations and made a display in her room. Santa's going to have a warm lap with this line-up.

Brynn and Kate played basketball games. Kate's was especially exciting. She played very well!!

Our house became an international hub over the weekend with our exchange student potluck party. Making their debut were pretzels from Germany, pound cake from Belgium, Danish apple cake (aeble kage), Colombian cookies and that's right, Butterfingers from Spain! The Americans brought the root beer. Only the Colombian gave root beer the thumbs up. The Europeans think it reminds them of the dentist.  Who needs games? With all these students having the experience of their lives they were excited to talk, talk, talk!!

First Snow

Hooray for the first snow of the season! It fell like glitter from heaven in the morning light. Cannon and Adrie woke up and at the sight of it, quickly donned their snow gear and joined the rest of the neighborhood kids playing outside..

After stake conference it was mostly melted but still so cold. It was a perfect day for warm crumbly pumpkin pie cake and hot chocolate. 

Sofie's first American snow. She loved how it brought out the details in the mountains.

This week we had the pleasure of hosting another exchange student, Océane from Belgium, while her host parents were away. It was double the International fun for us. I assigned them dinner one night. They decided to make Belgian Waffles. Belgian waffles made by a Belgian! How cool is that!

Sofie and OC were nicknamed Fifi and Ofi at our house. We had the family laughing around the dinner table when we took turns singing the alphabet in different languages. Sofie in Danish, OC in French, and me in Spanish. Kate thought Danish was hysterically funny.

Both girls had their first girls choice dance, TWIRP. They bought matching shirts for their dates, went bowling, had dinner at our house, and went to the dance.

Adrie, her friend Emjay, and Cannon took orders and served up dinner for all the cute couples.

Brynn competed in an inner squad meet, which means it was local  and we didn't have to travel. Brynn was in the top three aka Platinum level gymnasts. She got a 9.5 on vault which Coach Carrie said was the best she'd seen.

Brynn scored well in every event and got 1st all around.

Coach Carrie gave Brynn a tear filled hug at the end. This is Brynn's last competition. We had to scale back to 1 day/week and no competitions for financial reasons. Brynn is just fine with that however. She now has time to try other sports. Brynn and Kate both started their basketball seasons this week.

A family favorite, Brynn and her friends celebrated a great week with frozen yogurt.

Chasing Summer

We weren't ready for summer to go away just yet. We found it again in St. George!
75 degrees and sunny...

We hiked around Pioneer park above the city. Found some very narrow slot canyons that only Adrie and Brynn could fit through.

We did a lot of shopping! Went out to eat at Texas Roadhouse with our prize money from the aspect photo contest. We even had enough leftover to go to Cafe Rio the following day.

Brandon and I went to the temple.

We all played a lot of volleyball and goofed around at the park. As always we had a great time in our favorite getaway.

November Chills

First snow flurries came Monday. It was a good day for hot chocolate and Cannon ' s favorite, "soop and bred bools."

Sofie asked a boy to TWIRP and he answered with a YES and some German  phrases that didn't make sense even to Sofie.

Trick or Treating

Get With the Program

1st Grade Halloween Program was full of silly jokes and songs. Cannon ' s very favorite is "Why was 6 afraid of 7? Because 7, 8, 9 "  So funny when kids discover something for the first time.

This crisp fall morning started with a parade around the school. We saw princesses, superheroes, and a variety of ninjas like Cannon.

School was out earlier this week for Cannon and Adrie parent teacher conferences. Luckily their teachers had very good things to say about them so I let them choose a book from the fair and a treat at the gas station.