It's over ?!?!?!

Well after all that work and preparation it's over. Christmas day was so nice but it sure seemed to go fast! I can't believe it's over already! I woke up to little footsteps in the hallway at around 7 so I just stayed put for a minute to see what would happen. I heard a lot of running around and whispering, then silence so we decided we had better get up and get moving. So after the coffee was on and the video camera was all set up I went in to tell the girls it was time to get up. They had already been out to see weather Santa had come yet because they werent sure if it was Christmas Day yet or not. I told them it was time to open presents and they took off! Chandler was still a little groggy but it didn't take her long to catch on and she joined right in. After we finished up and had breakfast we hurried to Salem for a few hours for a nice lunch and more presents with my family and then hurried back to Kamas for a nice dinner and even more presents with all the Averetts. What a great time of year. I love the chance to be with all of our family on the same day even though it seems like a whirlwind sometimes. I am a little bummed though. Now I won't have any excuses to have to go shopping. I bet I'll come up with something!

Merry Christmas!

Well we made our annual trek to the city to see santa. In the past we've gone to Ogden or Provo so we decided to go to Salt Lake and hit the Fashion Place Mall. The whole way down Hayden kept asking if we were at the North Pole Yet and Gracie was almost in tears because she was so nervous. If you know my husband at all you know that it's a huge effort for him to even go to Salt Lake or anywhere for that matter. He doesn't like to go to "the city" at all. Of course on the Saturday before Christmas everything was packed. It took us at least half an hour just to navigate the parking lot and then the one open space we found was out in the north forty. But still he remained calm. So we made our way through the mall to where Santa was and were surprised to see that the line wasn't really that bad. So we went to where we thought the end of the line was and asked if this was the line and a girl said you have to get a pager before you can wait in line She waved one of those little blinkie things they give you when you are waiting for a table at a restaurant. So we found an elf that told us you had to wait in line to get a pager first then when it goes off you can get in the Santa line. Crazy! When did Santa get so high tech? It actually wasn't that bad. We were able to walk around the mall a little and get something to eat rather than standing in a huge line all day. But of course once we got our food and sat down our pager went off. Here is the picture. ( I've got to get a scanner so I can stop taking pictures of pictures!) Of course Hayden wasn't looking at the camera and Chandler was screaming. I hope she wasn't too traumatized. Gracie and Hayden turned out okay and we have 3 or 4 identical pictures of each of them crying on Santa's lap. I've been trying to prepare her by showing her pictures of Santa and saying HO HO HO a lot but obviously it had no effect. Anyway the girls finally got to ask Santa for what they wanted and even threw in a couple surprises that mom and dad didn't know about. And the best part of the whole day is that we spent an entire day in Salt Lake shopping and Greg stayed cool, calm and collected the whole time. No meltdowns and no profanity! Hooray for daddy! I also had to throw in some pictures of Gracie and Hayden putting ornaments on the tree and Chandler taking them off. The tree has only been rearranged about 50 times since we put it up. So tomorrow is th big day and we're so excited! We want to wish everyone Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

What a Super Star!

Well nothing new has happened lately. We are just counting down the days till Christmas (It is coming awfully fast all of a sudden) and also counting down the days till Las Vegas. Next weekend Greg and I are going to the NFR with the people he works with and half the town apparently. But since there is nothing exciting to post yet, I couldn't resist putting up a couple pictures of our funny little Chandler. She is getting to be quite a ham and has a funny little personality. Not many people know that because she is a mamas girl bad! She is pretty shy around other people and doesn't like strangers at all! She can give some pretty dirty looks if she doesn't know you. Of course with a camera always flashing in her face she automatically says cheese when you point one in her direction. This first picture was after she had spaghetti for dinner. That explains the messy face and every time she would say cheese she crinkled up her face and closed her eyes for some strange reason. She has gotten to that independent stage so she insists on sitting at the table on a booster and not in her high chair and she must feed herself. So needless to say at mealtime she is a total mess and so is the kitchen. There's nothing like eating oatmeal or cold cereal with your bare hands. She also has the reading bug like her sisters. Of course she couldn't help it. If I had a nickel for every book I pick up off the floor everyday, I could buy a library that's for sure. I'm surprised at how often she will pick up a book and sit and look through it like she knows what it says. This one happens to be 'Oh the places you'll go' and is one of my faves. It also happens to be upside down. But It sure looks like she's enjoying it though. I do love my girls!

Check out these elves!

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1120223811

Party! Party! Party!

Well all the birthday excitement has died down. How would it be to be 4 again and celebrate your birthday for 3 day straight! We had Thanksgiving a week early with my family in Salem so we had a little b-day celebration on Sunday with them. Then Monday was her actual birthday so we had all the Averetts/Crandalls/Butikofers over for cake and ice cream. Then Tuesday was a school day for her so she had to take cupcakes for everyone and had a little party there. Her birthday is so close to Thanksgiving that it's hard to find a good time to celebrate it when all her family can make it. She sure had a good time all three days though and she is so lucky to have such great family who will come to little ole Francis on a school night to help her celebrate so thank you to everyone who came! Here are some of her party pictures!

Happy Birthday Hayden!

Today is Hayden's 4th birthday so I'm stealing Olivia and Ricks birthday slideshow idea. I can't believe she is really 4 years old. She has promised me that she will stay 4 forever but she said the same thing last year when she was 3.

Who's ready for christmas???

I started my christmas shopping this last weekend and I am getting in the holiday mood! If I thought my husband wouldn't have a coronary I would get out my christmas decorations. I already hit him up about putting up the christmas lights while the weather is still good but I just got a dirty look. Can you say bah humbug anyone!!!! Come on there's not many shopping days left!!!! Let's get a little MERRY people!!

DECISION 2007

VICTORY! With a whopping 207 votes, Greg will keep his seat on the Town Council for 4 more years! He won by about 50 votes and the neighbor Tim won by nearly 100! We tried waiting up to hear the results but the town clerk called just before 11 to say she was last in line to get the votes in and it would be 1 or 2 before she would know the results. I guess Greg wasn't that worried because he said don't bother calling till morning then because I'm going to bed. So he got on line this morning when he got up and found out before anyone had the chance to call with the good news. Not a very exciting victory but a great result especially for his very first real election.

On the campaign trail!

Well on the long list of different hats that Greg wears is Francis Town Councilman. Last year when a spot opened up on the council he decided to run and was appointed to take the place of a member who was leaving. So this year he has to be elected and what an experience it has been so far. There are 3 spots open on the council , a 4 year and a 2 year, and 6 candidates including Greg running. Our friend and neighbor Tim Butikofer is also running. Greg is running for a 4 year spot and Tim a 2 year so they aren't running against each other which is good. There have been some very controversial issues that the town and the council have had to face lately mostly because of the new development that is coming to the area. Greg has come home from some of the monthly meetings and said that they have been quite heated. But I think he loves every minute of it! Part of what he taught at Morgan was government. So he is actually practicing what he preached for so long. The election is on Tuesday the 6th and we are very much anticipating the results. I think he has done a great job so far as council member and he definitely has my vote. If he has it his way, this term as council member is only a stepping stone till he can be elected Francis Town Mayor in the future. I can't wait to be 1st lady!

I told him as he was putting up his signs he

needed to get into it and wave to people as they drove by.

Give 'em a wink and a smile. Maybe kiss their baby.

Happy Halloween!

I love Halloween and I love getting my kids dressed up for Trick-or-treating. I was way excited when I convinced them to be something other than a princess this year and something a little more Halloween-ish. So we got a cat, a witch, and a bear. And it was a plentiful Halloween in Francis this year! Both the big girls had parties at school where they played fun games and got treats. So when it was finally time we loaded everyone up with all our candy and went to the stake center for trunk-or-treat or trick-or-trunk according to Gracie. The girls made a haul again this year and we weren't even there very long. Chandler fell asleep in the car on the way out so she missed the whole thing but Gracie and Hayden both got more candy than they will ever need. Then we hit Grandma Dixies and got fudge fairy candy, caramel corn, and cool pencils from Andrea and after making a few other stops at friends we got home all hopped up on candy just in time for bed! Surprisingly they went to bed without too much argument as long as we promised they could count all their candy the next day. Sorry we couldn't make it down to the Smith's and Beddoes' but we knew you would enjoy these pictures! Too bad nobody else will return the favor and get their blogs going to share with us! (hint hint)
Gracie was a Tiger Cat! Every time I turned around I caught her doing her little cat dance. Hayden was a cute witch. She wanted her nose painted like Gracie's but I told her witches didn't have black noses but they did have moles so she was okay with that. Chandler was the cutest bear ever and surprisingly wore the hat most of the night! I tried painting her nose but it must have tickled because she rubbed it off as fast as I could paint it on. We all had a really fun night and now hopefully we can control ourselves around all the left-over candy!

Fun with Gracie at the apple farm!

I got to go with Gracie on her 1st grade field trip to an apple farm in Santaquin and what a great day we had. It was kind of a long way to go for 1st graders. I heard "are we there yet?" a lot and we werent even out of Heber yet. But once we got there they showed us all about how they grow and harvest apples and cherries and took us on a tour of their farm and they even had a pumpkin patch where all of the kids got to choose a pumpkin to take home. Most of them went for the biggest they could find and had to be reminded that once we got back to the school they had to get the pumpkin home some how. It's fun to finally see all the kids in her class and put faces to the names she's been talking about since school started. It was good to spend some 1 on 1 time with Gracie. With 3 small children it doesn't happen often enough and I can't believe how fast she's growing.

Just look at these cute girls!!

Not much has happened around here lately but we sure have some cute girls! Don't mind chandlers crazy hair, she will not leave anything in her hair for long. This day it was pig-tails gone bad. We got Gracies school pictures back and I am so happy with them. We blew it last year and totally forgot about picture day till we were sitting at the bus stop so needless to say last years pictures weren't the best. So this year we had to make up for it and we got up early and curled her hair. I can't believe how big she's getting. She is reading all the time and I am amazed with how well she does already! Books have always been one of her favorite things and it's clear that it has really paid off! It is also rubbing off on her sisters because they both love reading time and both act like they know how to read also! Anyway mom here is a picture of Gracies school picture. I can't get my scanner hooked up so that's the only way I could think of to show it to you.

Greg and I got to go to Salt Lake on Friday night and see Larry the Cable Guy with Tony and Julena. It was a lot of fun and super funny! We don't see them very often and rarely venture into the big city so it was a treat for us! Thank goodness for grandma Dixie who is our go to for babysitting. We always seem to call her at last minute and she rarely turns us down. After some birthday shopping in Park City with my mom and sisters the rest of the weekend was devoted to yardwork (will it ever end?) and of course cows (I know that will never end). We got a lot of help from the girls in the yard who got totally muddy. For some reason Chandler is always drawn to the dirtiest spot she can find in the yard.

Chandler has recently started playing with baby dolls. I love this picture. She will give them a big squeeze and predend to give them a bottle. This was taken after her nap so that explains the crazy bed head. Too bad we can't catch up with Aunt Jamie long enough to get a hair-do! (Hint Hint)

P.S. It snowed today. Is it really October??!!??!!

It's winter AGAIN!

Well since the first snowflake flew this year the girls have been itching to get out and play in it and they were definitely able to this weekend. Saturday started out with sunshine but then the snow came and there was definitely enough for them to make a new snow friend with a celery nose (we didn't have a carrot). I am so not looking forward to winter! Where did the summer go? But then the snow melted and on Sunday Greg was able to start winterizing. He cleaned out the garage which was badly needed. Hopefully now that we have grass the garage won't be such a mud magnet but that's probably just wishful thinking. Oh well! And that about covers the life of the Averetts this week. Boring and barely blog-worthy which is why I've been so hesitant to start this thing but now that I see that Addie and Kristie are doing it too I'll have to put more effort into it. Thanks for telling us about it guys! (That's a bit of sarcasm) Maybe this blog thing will motivate us to do something fun so I can write about it. Maybe not. We'll see.

So I guess I'm going try this blog thing. Chances are I will be the only one to read it but what else is a stay at home mom going to do with her time? Clean!!! Don't be ridiculous! Well it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas around these parts! I expected to see some snow on the hills this morning but not on my new grass! Needless to say the furnace got turned on for the first time and the heat mizer better not say a word! Even he was surprised when he got up and saw the winter wonderland outside. He had been complaining all weekend about the weak storm that hit and he thought it was suppose to really rain and hopefully water the lawn. It will teach him to complain huh! Especially when I keep singing christmas carols because I can't get them out of my head! I'm sure that he's thinking now he can be done working on the yard but I've got news for him. Hopefully if we're done being sick and it warms up like they say it will, we can actually come a little closer to finishing what we started.