Christmas Holidays 2011

Getting ready for Christmas this last year was crazy. I think this year I will have to start in July if I want to get everything done. on top of working to finish decorating the boys rooms we did the following.

I was Santa's elf this year and made a fold up airport.

sorry the picture quality is bad I used my phone.

made my mom a bulletin board with old patterns, sewing stuff, and button push pins.

made my Nephew a science kit. with lab coat and science experiments in the book.

 I never took a picture of the gift i made my dad this year. it was wooden blocks painted black, with B&W pictures of each of the grand-kids and a letter on each block that spelled out "We love Grandpa"

went through ALL of the boys toys before Christmas this year. Was starting to wonder if I should give them any more for Christmas!?

Hosted Christmas Eve dinner with Rob's family.

 We also went to a rest home and sang carols one night with Rob's family.

made a ginger bread manger scene at our annual Ginger bread making with my family.

this was Dean's creation.

went out to eat and Temple square with my family, just like old times. This is all of my family except my Brother Matt who is serving a mission right now.

All the Grand-kids on my side of the family. first time they were all together!

Hosted New years party. second annual Steiner cousin party. what a bunch of crazies!

Thanksgiving 2011

 We started a tradition a few years ago of doing a 5K every thanksgiving. We moved farther away and so this year we went to a new one in Orem. It was only two miles, but we still had fun and kept the tradition going.

we really need to stop taking pictures from this angle! arg!

 This year I started a new tradition i want to keep going. I started a thankful book. each page will be a different year and have a photo of everyone we have Thanksgiving with that year. around the photo everyone will sign with one thing they were thankful for that year. I think it will be fun in a few years to look back at what we have written.

love my family!

kids thought it was a nice day to go canoeing.

This is my Gramps!

Halloween fun!

 We have had a fun Halloween season.

Dean had a field trip to a pumpkin farm and picked out a strange looking pumpkin.

The boys and I made hand and footprint ghosts.

We went to a pumpkin patch in Springville (same as last year) we saw the biggest pig we ever saw and had fun in the corn and in the hey maze.

We skipped buying a pumpkin there, they were pretty picked through and what was left was rotten. We went down the street and bought some healthy large ones at Walmart for only $1.88 each!

 We had fun carving pumpkins this year!

Dean wanted his to look surprised!

We made Brig's look like him when he does his evil laugh.

Dean dressed up like a ghost this year (the only costume I made this year). He is holding his mouth open in all his pictures to look like a ghost mouth.

Brig and Rob went as pirates that we wore 3 years ago when Dean was that age.

I went as Fiona from Shrek a costume I made our first year married (7 years ago) 

I made trick-or-treat bags for the boys this year. (a ghost and a bat)

Andrea

Warning: this is not a happy post.

Life is so hard and for some of us it is too hard. We don't know why things happen the way they do. Only God knows that!

Andi and her son

 Within minutes of posting my post yesterday my sister called and gave me the horrible news that my dear, sweet cousin, Andrea, took her life. She is 28 years old, a mother of two (5 and 4), a wife of an amazing man, who just buried his father on Saturday. My heart goes out to them during this tragic time.

Andi and I

Andi and I

My earliest memory of Andi was on the front porch of our grandmother's house. I was trying to get in to use the bathroom, I think, and she was guarding the door, ready to bite me if I came any closer. Though most of my earliest memories were similar to that one, we apparently had fun together as well, sometimes getting into trouble.

In the photo we are jumping off the bed onto the mattress thing on the floor, doing it again and again, I think we were suppose to be sleeping. I've also been told of a time we were caught in my grandparents bathroom with the entire floor covered in toilet-paper.

Salt, Pepper, and Brown Sugar

My favorite memories were the Steiner reunions, when Salt (me), Pepper (Cherese) and Brown Sugar (Andi) would share a tent (later the younger girl cousin joined us) and stay up late talking about anything and everything. Of course this would normally lead to the subject of boys at some point. I remember how freaked out she was about the thought of sex. She thought it was gross. It was gross that her parents did that and she would say she was never going to do "that" with her husband.

Cherese, Bryan, Andi, and I

A few other random memories are that she didn't like mayo or mustard. Everyone who knows her knows she loved bears. They decorated her room growing up and her house when she was older.

She seemed to have it all put together, such an easy going person. So caring, She always wanted a job where she would be able to help people. I am sure there are many people who are better due to her help. I've always admired her drive and desire to do this.

I miss you and Love you Andi! This world is not as sweet as it use to be, without our Brown Sugar!

#31, #67, #87, and #94

I've got four more things past off my list. This is actually happening easier then I thought. I re-read through the list today and realized I was passing things off and didn't even realize it. 

#31 Organize Garage -(no picture for this) we did this a few weeks ago on Sept 3. we finished up building our shelves and got everything organized. The painting of the garage will have to come later. It is sort of towards the bottom of the priority list right now.

#67 and #94 are combined (do some vinyl crafts with my silhouette machine and have canisters for all the food in my pantry.) I know they are nothing fancy, but they will be behind closet doors in the Pantry. They make me happy and I love having my food out of bags and boxes. It was fun playing with vinyl for the first time. I don't think I will be doing this small of letters again it was pretty tricky. I am looking forward to more vinyl crafts in the near future.

# 87. buy canning equipment. I didn't actually buy, but I got it as a gift from my parents. Well, I have most of it, the steamer is still on it's way, I will have it by my birthday. I still want a pressure cooker, but do to price I will just be borrowing my moms for awhile. We put Peaches up the other day.