If I have to be a Grandma...

I'm at least gonna be a cool one!!

Me and Kash in our Ed Hardy t-shirts

Remembering Scott

We miss you coming to our games.

We miss your latest and greatest electronics.

We miss your car being parked in the driveway and you sitting on the front

porch waiting for us to come home.

We miss you coming and watching the BYU - UTAH games.

We miss the sunflower seeds and beef jerky you always had.

We miss the treats you always brought over.

We miss your positive attitude even when things were the toughest.

We miss going to 'The Kelly Clarkson'.

We miss you staying with us and wondering if you

 would stay for a few days or if it would be a few months.

We miss having you and your boys over for dinner.

We miss the funny stories you would tell us.

We miss wrestling with you and accidentally cracking your rib.

We miss you taking us to movies.

We miss you taking us to Evanston to get fireworks and then

lighting them off in front of the house and the neighbors getting mad.

We miss you and love you Scott and think of you always.  

Christmas Lights

Nothing better that nice clear simple lights.

(This isn't the greatest picture either.)

Watch out Clark Griswold! 

(You have got to enlarge this picture to get the full effect.)

 

 There is some pretty tough competition out there!

Kalen's friend took us past this house the other night. 

It's too bad you can't see the Carousel and the Merry Go Round and 

the Teeter Totter with elves and Mr. and Mrs Clause riding on them.

  There was also Christmas music playing

not so softly in the background.

Did I mention the huge snowman on the side of 

the driveway and the lines of lights on the roof?

What do the neighbors say?

Do the neighbors like the bright flashy lights and loud

Christmas music?

Do they feel like they are in Las Vegas?

Do they like the extra traffic that has been driving

up and down their street for the last month?

Is it soothing to fall asleep to?

or

Do they want to unplug all the lights and tip over the

Merry Go Round when the neighbors are sleeping?

I guess I have quite a few hang ups about Christmas lights.

The worst are the icicle lights.  They are always tangled up and

never hang right.

The multi-colored have never been a favorite.

And all the lawn ornaments are soo not a favorite.

Lights that are stapled to the fence...not a good idea.

Plastic Santa in a sled on top of the roof...really not a good idea.

The only thing that could make any of these worse is to add 

blinking lights to any of them!  I HATE blinking lights!!!!

They give me a headache!

Lights should be clear and very simple.

 ( You could alternate clear with red or green.)

  Straight and not saggy.

And definitely not blinking!

It is pretty funny to see all the crazy lights and decorations

that go up at Christmas.  Some people go just a little bit

overboard.

17 Year Anniversary

After 17 years of being married we figured we deserved a night out.

We stayed downtown at the Peery Hotel.  A very old but quaint hotel.

It was very cute!

We ate dinner at Canellas Restuarant.  

We ate at this resturant on our first date over 17 years ago.

They even gave us a free dessert!

We went and saw the Body Worlds Exhibit which was very interesting,

we did a little shopping at the Gateway walked around.

This morning before we went home we went and walked around

temple square.  What an amazing place to walk around with the millions

 and millions of lights decorating the trees and shrubs and flowers and buildings.

I can't believe the amount of lights and the time and effort it takes to prepare for the holiday.

  The reflection pond looked really cool, there 

were floating lights in the water.  I wish we could have seen it when it 

was dark.  

It was a very nice get away.  Like usual not long enough.  But we had a great time just spending time with each other with out the distractions of home.

Love ya Erk!!!!!

Kash's 1st Birhday

The Presents...

The cake....

More cake...

Pretty much no fear in just digging right in and eating the whole thing.

I think he might be sick tonight!

The clean-up.

What a mess you are!

It's all good now...you are nice and clean!!

Happy Birthday Kash We Love you!!

***Look for many more pictures in the Family Photo section

at the top of the page!!***

This one's for you Diane

Aunt Diane requested a movie clip of Kash walking so here it is.

He is almost 1 and has been walking for about 2 weeks.

Watch out!!

Annual Christmas Open House

A few years ago, about 7 to be exact.  My neighbor and I were saying how tired we were of neighbor gifts.  You have to either make or buy way to many and who do you give them to and who don't you.  You end up spending way to much time, money and effort and what do people do with these crazy Christmas trinkets?  They end up in the garbage or you save them and never display them again.  Now I know many people like to bake their favorites treats and pass them to all the neighbors too.  Again what happens to them?  If it's not some weird fruit cake then it ends up sitting on the counter until little by little I have ended up eating the entire plate of treats.   Not good!  So with all those thoughts we decided to start a neighborhood open house where we would make donations of some sort to a worthy cause and invite the whole neighborhood (yes the whole neighborhood, obviously not everyone comes) to come together and eat treats and visit with one another.  Tonight was the 6th (we skipped a year when my neighbor moved) annual open house held at our home.  Many people have commented on how glad the are that we ( I have two very good friends who have helped make this so successful) organize this every year and it is so good to do something for others.  After all it is the season to give.  This year each family was encouraged to donate to what ever specific organization they choose.  Such as Toys For Tots, Utah Food Bank, Shop With A Cop,  Salvation Army or Make a Wish.  In years past some of the things we have done are, collecting toys for Toys For Tots, Donations for Make a wish Foundation, and donations for a child who was terminally ill.   The ornaments on this tree had the names of the various organizations that families had donated to. We had many families in our neighborhood come to our home and enjoy the company of others while donating to a worthy cause. This has become a fun tradition in our neighborhood over the years and probably for many more years to come. 

A Thanksgiving To Remember

I will warn you ahead of time that this a quite a lengthy entry.  If you will continue reading this I promise you will be completely entertained. 

Several years ago it became a tradition to go to St. George over Thanksgiving for baseball tournaments.  It started with Kalen playing and eventually Braden.  This particular year was quite interesting.  We completely skipped dinner with my family and headed south. Of course we had to get gas and treats.  We spent more money on treats and hot dogs than we did on gas.  Apparently gas wasn't $4.00 a gallon back then. Arriving in St. George we were expecting something to be open for dinner.  Other than a gas station we found K-Mart was the only option.  The grocery selection is pretty grim.  So my two friends and I  used our imagination and gathered up what we could find to make the best nachos you could imagine.  Yes nachos for Thanksgiving Dinner!  On Friday we had 4 games to watch since Kalen and Braden were both playing.  As we were watching the last game Mason came running to us saying that he had 'snapped his bone'.  He said he and his friend Kobe were playing football with a pine cone and Kobe tackled him. He said his arm hurt but we couldn't see that anything looked wrong and couldn't really pinpoint where it hurt.  So he climbed up on Eric's lap and fell asleep for a little bit and he kept wiggling and moaning while he was asleep  so we could tell something was wrong.  We ended up taking him to the Emergency room and sure enough he had 'snapped his bone'.  His collar bone to be exact.  Mason was only 5 at the time and he was quite a trooper for the whole weekend hardly complaining at all. The broken bone and the great dinner was just the start of the issues to come.  The games were all played and Kalen's team made it to the championship game which were to be played on Sunday in St. George until it rained so hard that the streets were rivers and the games were moved to Mesquite.  Saturday night Kalen and Eric didn't feel so good but Kalen was ok in the morning.  So we drive 45 min. to Mesquite with a sick husband and a broken collar bone.  They lost the game so we headed home.  We knew a storm was coming in but we had no idea how bad it would be.  Around 4:00 we left St. George and headed home expecting the typical 4 hour drive.  It was smooth sailing till we hit Cedar City and it started snowing a little.  By the time we were about  10 miles outside of Beaver we came over a hill and the traffic was at a complete stop. The snow was coming down hard.  People were sliding off the road and stuck.  All you could see were brake lights for miles.  There was no place to even turn around.  We were stuck!  It was awful!!  It took 2 hours to drive those 10 miles!!  When we exited the freeway along with everyone else, the gas station parking lots were full, the streets were packed and there were no hotel rooms any where.  We had finally gotten hold of my mom and dad (there had been no cell phone service) and they told us if we could get to Filmore there was an Army Reserve Building that had been opened up as a shelter. So now I'm driving, Eric is sick in the passenger seat.  Thank goodness for the DVD player to entertain the kids.  Again it takes hours to get to Filmore.  At one point Eric had fallen asleep and when he woke up he asked where we were and you could still see the lights from Beaver behind us.  It took us 8 hours to get to Filmore!  It should have only taken 2.  We arrived in Filmore at the luxurious Army Reserve building.  We checked in and were given a sleeping bag and mat that who knows who has slept on and were told to find a place on the floor.  Imaging being in a very large school type gym with hundreds of random people snoring and coughing and sneezing and cots creaking and crackling.  Not exactly the set up for a good night sleep.  I ended up taking Mason to the van to sleep so he would be more comfortable.  It was freezing!!  He was warm and cozy in all the blankets but I was cold.  I would randomly drive around to get the heat going.  Eric sat on a bench in the restroom the whole night since he was still sick.  I think Kalen and Braden slept ok.  About 6 am after a wonderful night sleep we checked out and went home! After 4 years we can now laugh about this awful experience.  Hope you all get a good laugh and remember this story as you take your next road trip!!  Happy Thanksgiving!!

Thanksgiving Turkeys

Gobble Gobble!!

Fun festive Thanksgiving Turkeys that you can make yourself.

With just a few items these are a snap.

All you need are Oreos, Candy Corn, Whoppers,

Royal Frosting (which you make) and regular

cake frosting.

Very easy to assemble.  Just follow the picture!

Use them as place settings for your dinner.

You can even eat them!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

The Other 4

Kalen's first broken bone-shoulder.

  Snowboarding. 

February 18, 2004

Braden's first broken bone-wrist.

Fell from the 2nd story of an old house.

Required surgery and 3 pins!

April 8, 2002

Braden's second broken bone-elbow.

He was hanging on the rim of the basketball hoop and fell.

April 7, 2003.

Yes it was almost exactly one year to the day later!

Not so cool when it ruins 2 baseball seasons in a row.

Mason broke his collarbone when we were in St. George.

November 24, 2004

He was playing football with his friend and came crying to us saying that his bone snapped!  Sure enough it did.  No Picture of him.  He's the last kid, you know how that goes!

I think we are good on broken bones for a while.

I guess we were about since it has been four years

since the last one! 

That Makes 5

A second trip to the doctor confirmed that 

Kalen has a buckle fracture on his wrist.

With a sweet (GO UTES!) cast for 2 1/2 weeks it

 will make snowboarding a little hard but Im sure not impossible.

Not that there is even enough snow now.  

This is Kalen's 2nd broken bone and the 5th broken

bone amongst the three boys.

We had only been home about 10 minutes and Kalen was already

 complaining that he couldn't move his fingers and could we

 just cut the top of the cast off a little?

  I finally gave in and helped him.

  I figured if I helped him I could prevent having to take him back for stitches.

  Using a sharp knife, scissors and a few

 other kitchen utensils  we cut the top off.

  Now he can do his homework!

.

It's official!

Does he look a little excited?

Braden was officially invited to play on the Tuff Country Predators (Preds) today.

A great beanie with the Preds logo was accompanied by an official letter from the 2 coaches inviting him to play on their team in the spring.  

This is going to be a great opportunity for Braden and he is

way excited to be a part of this team.

We look forward to an awesome season!!

Tag---Smile

I had a few minutes to kill while I waited for my appointment

to get here so I decided to play along with the tag.

Im sure Kalen wishes I would have found something else

to do with my extra time.  Especially since my last

entry was also at his expense. 

 

This was my fourth, fourth, 4th file, 4th picture.

Open wide so we can get these things off.

This is the end result of almost two years of torture.

Doesn't he have a nice smile?

Dr. Skanchey did a great job!!

I now get to be the tagger and I tag Keri and Jess.

Have fun!!

tag again

This tag is all about Eric 

What's your husbands Name - Eric Charles Olsen.

How long have you been married?  Almost 17 years on December 6. 

How long did you date?  7 months.

How old is he?  39.

Who eats more sweets? Probably me but he eats his share.

Who's the better singer?   Oh Eric is.  He is always told he should be in the choir, he says no. 

Who is smarter?   Eric is much smarter.  He helps the kids with their homework.

Who does the laundry?  That would be me.  Im not sure if he even knows how to work the washer.

Who pays the bills?  That's also me. 

Who sleeps on the right side of the bed?  That would also be me. But  Im thinking Im changing because my side of the electric blanket doesn't work so well. 

Who mows the lawn? Thats a toss up between the boys and Eric.  Eric definately  has the straightest lines in the grass when he mows.

Who cooks dinner? Mostly me but he can figure something out if I haven't planned a dinner. 

Who drives?  Well we both drive. But Eric drives when we are all in the car.  

Who is the first to say they are wrong? That would be me.

Who kissed who first?  He kissed me first standing at my front door.

Who asked who out first? Eric asked me out first.

Funny tag---Love ya Erk

Thanks for the tag ASH!!

I tag Jessica and Annemarie

First Day Snowboarding

It really stinks when you go snowboarding for the

first time of the season and you take a couple

of hard falls and hurt your right wrist.

Then you continue to snowboard for the whole day.

Then you go to the doctor the next day because

you had better things to do on a Saturday night

than go have it looked at.

Then they tell you it just looks like it is sprained

and bruised and to just take ibuprofen and ice it

for a couple of days.

Then you get this sweet splint to wear for a couple

of days.

Then the nurse calls when you get home

and tells you that the radiologist says it looks 

like there could be a small fracture and to

have it checked out at the end of the week

to make sure.

Then you can't cut your dinner up because you are

right handed and your mom has to do it for you.

Then you can't button your pants and probably won't

be able to do your homework either.

But you can still play X-Box!!!!

 This isn't the first time Kalen has gotten hurt the 

first day of the snowboarding season.  He broke his arm

a few years ago on the 2nd run of the day.  Funny thing he was with the

same friend both times!  The last time was worse.  One friend stayed with

him while the other went and got the ski patrol

 and they took him down the hill on a sled.  

Eric had to go get him and he threw up in the car 

because the pain meds made him sick.

He still loves to snowboard!

Man's Best Friend

Bath time!

A best friend shares his Bath time!

A best friend lets you cozy up on the couch.

  

A best friend shares all their good treats!

Peso is our best friend.

A best friend always waits for the good stuff!

These dogs have quickly realized that if they stay close to Kash they will be the happy recipients of crackers, pretzels, puffs, cheese sandwiches and whatever else he is eating because half of it ends up on the floor!

One Man's Junk....

After being in the garage for over a year, the oven is finally gone!!

'One man's junk is another man's treasure'

  How true that is.  Our neighborhood clean-up is tomorrow

 which means that for the last week people have been

 putting all the stuff that has been cluttering up their

 houses, garages and yards that they can't fit in the garbage cans and

 is not  worthy to take to the D.I. to the curb

 for Sandy City to come pick up. 

 This is done in the spring and the fall each year.

  This also brings  a variety of people driving around

 scouting for the best 'treasures' in the piles

 that they throw in the back of their trucks and take with them.

Who are these people and what do they do

with all the stuff the find? Do they have piles of useless stuff

all over their yards?  Do they have to park their

cars in the driveway because the stuff is packed

in their garage?

 I guess it doesn't matter.

  Our cars can fit in the garage 

and the stuff is now gone from our house.  

So it is no longer my problem.  

  You would be amazed at the stuff people take.

  Before I had a chance to take these pictures there was

 also a big quarter pipe skateboard ramp,

  about 6 small skateboard ramps, a bike and a basketball hoop.

  All of which were completely broken, cracked, chipped or warped.

 There is a reason we are throwing all this stuff away... 

it's broken!!!

   As we were eating breakfast Sunday morning we sat

 and laughed as we watched these 3 men 

 rummaging through our pile deciding what they would take.

There are still a few things left in the pile, but there is sill one

day till the big dump trucks come and take the rest away. 

Happy scouting my friends.

  I hope you find what you are looking for.

  If not come back in the spring and try again!!!

Did I also mention that this is against the law?  

But we won't tell!