We're Ready for Christmas!

Consider this your Christmas card this year. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
We were afraid that Davin would be in the presents and tree all the time, but honestly this is the first time he's touched the tree. He steers clear of all of it!

Darin's Grandma's Christmas Party

So fun! There's tons of food, presents, and a program, but the hi-light of the evening is the nativity. Davin is baby Jesus, Lyndi, Erin, and Kayla are angels and Aubree is a wise guy in the back with sunglasses. (on the right in gold)

SNOW DAY!

Drinking hot chocolate after playing in the snow.
We can't remember our last snow day and we've definately not had one before Christmas before. The kids were so delighted to wake up to this much snow and played with the whole neighborhood all day. They built snowmen, went caroling, drank hot chocolate, and went sledding!

This was the snow 2 days before the big one. Lyndi and I built a snow girl together since all her sisters were sick that day.

Fall Leaves

Fall has arrived! A good windstorm took off quite a few leaves this last week and the kids have been loving it. The trees around town are so beautiful right now.

Parent-Teacher Conferences..I'ts tough to be me

We had parent-teacher conferences this last week. I went to Lyndi's kindergarten class and her teacher said, "I love having Lyndi in my class. She's a hard worker, always on task. She gets along with everyone and has a great sense of humor. I wish I had a whole class full of Lyndis". I went to Aubree's class and her teacher said, "I love having Aubree in my class. She has never had her card pulled, and always gets her work done. She is so smart and I love reading her writing. I wish I had a whole class full of Aubrees." Then I went to Kayla's class. Her teacher said, "I love having Kayla in my class. I can set anyone next to her because I know she'll stay on task and get her work done. She is friendly and gets along with everyone. She always does superior work. I wish I had a class full of Kaylas." Wow, what a boring day for me. Just kidding! Keep it coming!

50 states take 2...plus dancing!

This is Erin singing the states for you. She has heard them so many times from her sisters that she does pretty well. My favorite is "I love Kansas" (Iowa, Kansas). Plus she adds her own personality to it!

50-ish Nifty United States

Lyndi singing the states for you. Bet you can't tell which ones are missing! Her Wisconsin cousins will probably notice one. Still, not bad for a 5 year old. (Notice Erin in the back ground prompt her with the dun-dun-dun, and of course acting just like Erin.)

Happy Halloween!

We had a great Halloween. We did a little trick-or-treating around here, then we went up to Grammy and Papa's ward party. They are the activities committee and they did a great job. Yummy soups for dinner, a hayride, kid games, and trunk-or-treat. In case you can't tell, Darin and Davin are motorcycle dudes, Erin is the Barbie Island Princess, Lyndi is an indian princess, Aubree is a pirate, and Kayla is a vampiress.

Erin says...

Erin was in charge of the lesson for "Homey-Homey" this week. We were talking about talking kindly. We were talking about how Jesus would speak and putting up leaves with different suggestions. I would whisper what the leaf said so she could say it out loud. Sometimes her translation is kinda funny. My favorite was, "Our words, like our actions, should be filled with faith and hope and cheer-leaders".

Davin is ready for fall. Notice the short sleeves. We have had the most fabulous weather this fall. It is georgous and I wish it was like this all year!

Aubree and Lyndi at tumbling/tramp class. They LOVE it. Lyndi is getting really good at her sommersaults and Aubree is working on back handsprings.

Quote of the week: Kayla has learned the song "50 Nifty United States" in school, so we've all been trying to learn it. We sang it about 50 times on the way home the other day and then we decided to see how far each person could get. I made it to Minnesota, Lyndi made it to Connecticut, and Aubree made it to Indiana. Then Erin said "my turn!" so we told her to go ahead. She said, "Alabama...um...what's next mom?"

5 Minute Chocolate Cake

This is my kids new favorite treat. 5 minute chocolate cake. You make it in a mug and microwave it. If you want the recipe, just click on "Matthews Family" on my links.

Halloween Preview

We went to Grandma's house for Deer Hunt Weekend. The boys went camping and us girls entertained the kids. They picked pumpkins, painted them, then dressed in their costumes and paraded to the Great-Grandparents house.

Quote of the Week

Erin is learning about the earth at joyschool. Yesterday she brought home an eggplant that she'd picked out of a garden. She was quite proud of it. I cooked it up and served it with dinner. She took one bite and labeled it "yucky". I reminded her that this was the eggplant she'd picked herself and brought home. She looked at me with big eyes, shaking her head, and said, "I didn't know it would taste like this. I would NOT have brought it home!"

Season Debut

Kayla auditioned for and was accepted into the Zion Youth Symphony Orchestra. They had their season debut last night. She LOVES it and they did great!

Zion Youth Symphony Orchestra

The video is bad, but the sound works. This is just one minute of "The Story of Mumble Happy Feet". Kayla is 3rd row back on the left, 3 in. No you can't see her.

St. George Marathon

We had hoped for good weather, since it never rains in St. George, but we woke to a very soggy, windy day. Darin's goal was to finish under 4 hours, but about 3/4th of the way through that goal changed to "Just Gotta Finish!" He was pretty disappointed in his time of 4:15, but we were proud of him for finishing in that dreadful weather. He was soaked, his toes were pickled and blistered, and he was chilled through. Good times! Oh well, there's always next year!

Watching the runners during a lull in the rain. We brought out the umbrellas a few minutes later. Well, we brought out Grammy's umbrellas since we don't own one.

Back to School

The first day of school. Aubree is in 3rd grade, Lyndi started Kindergarten,

and Kayla is in 5th.

We're back in school now and finding a pattern to our lives once more.

Go to school, eat lunch, raid the candy bucket...

Kayla entered the Peach Day's Fiddling Contest again this year.
She is now the 2 time fiddling champ for her age division.

Here are Davin's sister's baby pictures. Who does he look like?

ERIN

LYNDI

AUBREE

KAYLA

New Family Photo

We had this picture taken in San Diego this summer.

Erin and Lyndi playing dress up.

Oh, what do you do in the summertime?

Our cousins are here this week. We took them to Kolob Reservoir and had a fun time. Darin borrowed this canoe from the scouts next door, and we paddled all over the lake. The cousins walked across a waist deep sand bar and discovered "Cousin Island". Then we had a dutch oven dinner.

This is what we do in the summertime. Snow cones. One in every flavor!

Davin and his cute cousin Lucy. She's twice his age, but not twice his size.

This is our primary in the 24th of July celebration. Kayla is the one playing the fiddle. Lyndi is in yellow and Aubree is next to her in dark blue.

Kayla's 10th birthday. She had a video party. Her friends created short t.v. skits and I recorded them. After cake and presents, they walked the red carpet, signed autograph books, and watched their movie.

Lyndi holding Davin, which is quite an accomplishment since he weighs 18 lbs. and she's 32 lbs.

We've been so busy this summer. Kayla was on swim team and went to the pool every morning. Kayla and Aubree both had sewing lessons. Kayla, Aubree, and Lyndi were in an acting class. The library has programs twice a week that we often go to. Aubree turned 8 and got baptized, and Kayla turned 10. Plus our vacation to San Diego and cousins coming to visit. It has flown by and school starts in one week. As fun as it's been, we're ready for school.

Aubree's baptism. What a beauty!

Baptism

This was Aubree's special weekend. She got baptized! She was so beautiful in her white dress and we're so proud of her. She is a sweetheart and we love her so much. It was great to have so much family there to support her.

Kayla, Aubree, and Jordan put on a magic show for us after dinner.

Aubree

We thought Davin would be scared of the fireworks since he doesn't like loud noises, but he loved them!

Watching fireworks. Richfield does such a good job with their 4th!

4th of July

We love the 4th of July!

VACATION!

Darin's parents took 25 of us to San Diego for a week. Darin, his 4 siblings and their families. This includes 13 children under the age of 10. Yes, they are crazy, but we're glad they are. We had a fabulous time and didn't want to come home. This is the pink palace where we stayed. We had 3 units for all of us, and since we have the most kids, we got one all to ourselves. Yeah!

The San Diego Zoo was one of the hi-lights for us. Our faves were the pandas, monkeys, and the aviary.

Darin and Kayla went to a Padres game one evening. They had a great time and the Padres won 5 to 1 against the Dodgers. Go Padres!

This is at the Wild Animal Park. Aubree was chosen as a volunteer to go up and take a snake out of the basket. Of course it was fake and popped out of the basket right in front of her. I snapped this picture at just the right time. The snake is at the top of the picture and Aubree has a great look on her face!

I have so many pictures of this trip it was hard to pick which ones to include here, but I couldn't resist this picture of Lyndi at Sea World. She asked to look at the map as we were walking along. Just as we walk up to the new Sesame Street play area she announces "Mom, I found it!" and points to it on the map. Good thing we have such a good navigator!

All the cousins, except Alex. On the way home we discussed our favorite things. Here's the list.

• Collecting shells on the beach at 6:30 in our pajamas.
• The ride Atlantis at Sea World
• Watching Tiger Woods at the U.S. Open (Darin's favorite)
• The Musical Cats
• Being serenaded at the Mexican restaurant Guadalajara
• Watching monkeys at the zoo
• The Padres baseball game

There were many more, but these were some of them.

Lyndi's 5th Birthday

Today is Lyndi's birthday. I've always wanted to make one of these cakes, so I thought I'd better do it before I ran out of chances. I wish we had a picture of her face when she saw it. It was a hit!

Braces!

Kayla just got braces. This is the before picture.


And here they are. She loves them. Everyone in her class is jealous. She'll have them on for 6 months, just to straighten out the front teeth. She'll get the full set in a few years. We'll show you the after picture when she's done!

We just finished soccer season. Both Kayla and Aubree were on winning teams this year and they really enjoyed it. Darin coached Aubree's team. Every picture of Aubree she was making the funniest faces. She really expresses herself when she's playing!


Aubree and Lyndi's ballet recital.


Our little cougar fan.