Friday, December 30, 2022

Gingerbread Date Night 2022

 

Taking ugly Christmas sweaters to the next level!!!!! My dear friend, Candice found this little beauty for me and knew I must have it for the gingerbread competition date night we had planned.

This group understood the ugly sweater assignment!
The grand winner-- a haunted house created by the Ryans and the Lees.  The theme was "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" and they zoomed in on the line-- "they'll be scary ghost stories".  It was a controversial win, but the judges were firm in their decision.
And what gracious winners they were!
Abe, Keith, Alyson, and Greta-- theirs was really good.
The Hansen and the Robinsons.  Theirs was also very good, but they went with a school theme--- a bad choice considering the judges were all minors.
The Camerons and I went for a "Christmases long, long ago" focus.  We did not win, but we probably didn't deserve to:)
Honestly, this team - the Snows and Kitchens--really should have won!  Theirs was so beautiful!
The whole evening was great fun! 

December Begins

The boys' neighborhood sock drive was once again a great success!  The Chase family does such a great job organizing it and the boys look forward to it each year.

Grover.
Then Peter got a turn to go with Abe and some of the Snow family to a BYU basketball game.  He was thrilled to get a picture with Cosmo.
Going on a date with Abe to see A Christmas Carol at Hale Center Theater was a highlight of the season for me.  It was especially fun to see Abe's former co-worker star as Ebeneezer Scrooge.  He is incredible.

Well now, isn't that just a cute picture?
A little Christmas angel.
This was another of my favorite moments of the season-- as a family, we had just voted the winner of a double-elimination tournament to determine the best popular Christmas song.  It was none other than "All I Want For Christmas Is You" by Mariah Carey.  These two performed a dramatic lip-sync beginning and when the beat picked up, they were spot on with their kick line!  Ha, ha ha!!!! So funny! Here is a link.  

November Happenings

Dad and Greta went on a date to Black Bear Diner.
Elinor and I had a lovely time at Time Out for Women.  It was wonderful to spend so many hours with her and it felt miraculous to me to be there with her.  She also introduced me to CupBop and it was delicious!
Faith joined some swim friends from Skyridge High School for the football state championship game at the University of Utah.
Abe and Cannon enjoyed joining the Butterfields for some football on Thanksgiving morning.  Ryan grew up in a great ward in Sandy (with some of my Clark cousins) and they still gather each year.  Pretty cool.
We enjoyed a very lovely and very low-key Thanksgiving at Andrea and James's place downtown.  We ate and we played games and it was chill.  This picture is Elinor's shocked face when she won Liar's Dice.  We have a few other pictures from the day, but for whatever reason they are all quite blurry.  


A few days later we had our Italian Thanksgiving at Plumfield.  I suppose another name for this traditional gathering would be Friendsgiving--- but we also have it with Italian food.  I had to explain to one of the kids that Italian Thanksgiving isn't an actual holiday that everyone celebrates, rather it is just a tradition we do:)
I had been getting after our kiddos this evening about not being on phones and just talking and playing games.  My requests were not very well-received.  Devices were confiscated--- they weren't happy, I wasn't happy--nothing terribly interesting there.
So the next evening, when phones had not yet been released from their captivity, the kids were teasing me that I just wanted them to become Amish.  
Somehow, I don't think Faith thought it was that funny.
The next morning, lo and behold! Our Elf  (who had made an early appearance because we were all too excited for Christmas festivities to begin) was dressed in his Puritan attire.  So what if he got the Puritans and the Amish mixed up?

A little fun family football in the backyard.
Grover loved running around with the kids.
Abe and I went with my dad and Bev to a Messiah sing-a-long in Draper.  It was very enjoyable but much shorter than in years past, so I didn't quite get my fill.
SICKNESS.  Blah.  We (and everyone else we know) has had so much sickness already this season.  I suppose all of our immune systems are shot to pieces after the isolation of covid.  Anyway, it's been through all of us multiple times.  
Grover is such a nice snuggly companion for sickies.
Abe and George went to a BYU basketball game at Vivint Arena, thanks to some friends who gave them tickets.
Abe and Cannon joined the Schramms at their place for a big University of Utah football game.
Faith and her besties, Anya and Alyssa, at the Silver Rush swim meet.

Central Utah Ballet Nutcracker 2022


It's been a little while since this show towards the beginning of November, but it was stunningly beautiful!  I'm not going to make a ton of commentary because I have A LOT of blogging to catch up on before regular life begins after the New Year.  But also because the pictures will say it best.

George is so good on stage.





Opening night


Closing night.
We're so proud of our ballet boys.
Cannon and I had a little inside joke about craving a Sunkist soda.  So I surprised him the second night of the show.
The traditional stop at Arctic Circle after the show closes.  Clark and I with the traditional Pumpkin Pie shake.

Murder at Plumfield

 

Note: I started this post on November 13th and got as far as one picture.  Then I got busy with the holidays and now it is December 30th.  But I suppose I'll just pick up where I left off:)

Abe and I had a lot of fun recently at a Murder Mystery party our friend Andrea hosted at her Plumfield House in Salt Lake City.  It was a fifties theme, so we recreated our Halloween costumes of 2018.  

To our delighted surprise, Clark was there as well, playing the part of one of the murder suspects-- a yodling Swiss chef.  Honest to goodness, he was hysterical!  I had no idea he could yodel so well or put on such a terrible, yet entertaining Swiss accent!
We enjoyed a tasty dinner because we began to try to crack the case.
After dinner, we went around from room to room listening to and questioning the eight suspects.
The whole evening was SO MUCH FUN and I seriously hope this becomes an annual event!