Where's the sun?

Will the snow ever melt? It feels like the longest winter of my life. I am so tired of scraping the windows on my car, getting stuck in my own driveway, having a wet stinky dog in the house, being cold, bundling up, driving on slick roads, get the picture. I am ready for the warm weather.

We had a pretty big storm on Sunday and Monday, there was ALOT of snow. They closed the highway between Blanding and Monticello for awhile. I didn't leave the house for 2 days (with one exception, I went to rescue my mom, whose car was stuck in her own driveway). I thought there was alot of snow in Blanding. Then I went to work in Monticello. Holy cow, they got burried. I'll have to take some pictures next week.

Here are some pictures of snow around our house. The sun did come out for awhile yesterday and melted quite a bit of snow off the roads and such.

Snow falling off our roof.

View from our front door.

The deck.

Our backyard, and swing set.

Bad Dog Toby

Just when we were thinking Toby was a good dog, he and his girlfriend Rose had a little violent streak. They killed a cat and attacked a small dog in our neighborhood. The owner of the other dog took it to the vet, it has some broken ribs and several lacerations requiring stitches. That we have to pay for (which is reasonable).

We were so surprised. Toby has never acted this was before. How embarrassing. So he is being punished now and has to be on his chain at all times. Which has proved harder than you would think. We bought a kennel this summer to keep him in and he pushed through the fence to get out. So we lined the edges with railroad ties so he couldn't push through, and he just dug a hole under. He can unwind the wire that holds the fence down and gets out no matter what we tried. So we decided to chain him up. Well he would just get out of his collar. We would come home at night to find his chain with collar attached, but no Toby. So we just let him roam, he spends most of his time over at Rose's house (our neighbors). Since the attack we bought this harness, thinking there was no way he would escape it. Wrong. So our most recent purchase is a choke chain, the harder he pulls to get out, the tighter it squeezes around his neck. It has worked good so far this week, maybe we're on to something. This is probably of no interest to anyone, but I am just venting.

Rabbit Hunting

We have been out rabbit hunting a few times in the last couple weeks. Each time we went one of the rabbits that Javan shot fell or ran down into a hollow log.


This is Javan and Ethan trying to fish out the rabbit with a stick.


This is Javan trying to rip apart the log with his bare hands to retieve the rabbit.

Toby had a blast, once he got on the trail of a rabbit he would chase it under a bush and then look up and wait for Javan to get over there. He was a pretty good hunting dog. We actually had him jumping into the truck (Up until now he will not jump into the back of Javan's truck, he will jump into the jeep, or Davey's truck, but never Javan's.)

We shot about 5 or 6 rabbits in all. Javan was super excited because he wanted to eat them for dinner. And we did. I wasn't so sure about it but we fried it up like chicken and ate it. The meat tasted okay but it was pretty tough.

While hunting, we headed down a road that had huge ruts and was all washed out and muddy. Sure enough we slid right down into the rut and slammed against the other side of the road. This is not what you want to do in a brand new truck. Javan was pretty ticked that I was taking pictures, probably becuase he knew I would post them on the blog, but that's okay.


This is Javan assessing the situation and the damage.



This is the back wheel, off the ground.

Weekend Getaway

Last week, one of Javan's suppliers invited him to Mesquite for a weekend of golfing. So I tagged along too. We stayed at the CasaBlanca Resort & Casino. While Javan enjoyed 2 full days of golfing, I enjoyed some relaxing alone time. I started the twilight book series, which I could hardly put down. But I did manage for awhile to enjoy a wonderful trip to Wal-Mart. (There's not much shopping in Mesquite.) They were having a fantastic toy sale though.


On Friday night we went to St. George (the CasaBlanca was all booked). It was Javan's 31st Birthday! We went to dinner and a movie. The whole time we were gone Javan wasn't feeling quite up to par but was a good sport. On Saturday morning he was really feeling bad and I had to drive home. He was about dead by the time we got there, so I made him go down to the clinic, and low and behold he had pnemonia. What in the world? How do you get pnemonia?
So that was pretty bad, he only had it in one lung and was in quite a bit of pain. So if you can ever avoid getting pnemonia, I would highly advise it.
All in all, we had a fun weekend. Saw some old friends, spent some time alone, and celebrated a birthday.

Survivor Santa

Ethan tied up these reindeer and was pretending to be Santa.

I asked him why he needed the scissors and he said "I need those, cause I am Survior Santa."

Whatever floats his boat.

Mommy, I pretty?

Ally has discovered a newfound love for make-up. Each morning she loves to climb up on the counter in my bathroom while I'm getting ready and use my make-up.


Isn't she lovely?

New Christmas Outfits

Here are some pictures of the kids in their new Christmas outfits.



Ethan would only pose for the pictures if I promised him he could do one with a funny face.

And that's it for 2007!
Thanks for sharing it with us.

Happy Birthday Grandma Patsy

Javan's Grandma Patsy celebrated her 75th birthday this year. All the family got together at the church for a big party.

As a Christmas tradition Grandma fills a jar full of money and lets the kids stick their hand in and grab as much as they can. Go Ethan!


Ally and Uncle Mike

"Grandma can I help?"

Cole, Ally, Ethan, and Havyn all helped Grandma Debra make some yummy homemade ice cream.

"I don't think you're doing that right Grandma."

Wii want to play!

Both Amber and Michael's families got Wii's. We had so much fun playing them together. We had tournaments, rivalries, and all sorts of fun. The question is how long can we go without one of our own?






I guess I only got pictures of the boxing. I know the pictures aren't that exciting to look at, but man, was it fun!

It's Christmas!

The kids had a great time on Christmas morning. Santa had come bearing gifts! Plus the rest of the presents under the tree.


After we opened presents at home we got ready and went up to Grandpa and Grandma Halls' to open more presents.

We spent the rest of the day hanging out, playing, and eating (a myriad of delicious foods). Yay!

Aunt Amber reading a story to Ally and Havyn

Halls Christmas Party

This is the first Christmas in a long time that we have had everyone together (for Christmas Eve Eve anyway). We had our traditional soup and scones, that were delicious. Then the kids played Christmas Bingo for prizes.




After Bingo the kids opened their cousin gifts. Havyn was asleep, but had to be awakened for the picture, poor girl. I was just suprised it wasn't one of my kids.

Cousins

Ally has two cousins that are 4 months younger than her, Havyn and Cydnee. They aren't all together very often so we wanted to get a cute picture of them together. See how well it turned out? It's so sad cause they had so much fun together.
(Havyn broke her leg on the trampoline the week before they came. She had a cute little purple cast that Amber glued some jewels on. It slowed her down a little, but boy could she move with that thing.)



Ethan and Cole had a good time playing outside on the big dirt (mud) hills and riding 4-wheelers. They are good little buddies too.

The Best Christmas Pagent Ever

We had our Young family Christmas Party on Dec. 21, 2007. We had a delicios dinner and then Javan started the party off with a nice pillow fight. Once we got the kids settled down, we reinacted the nativity. Daniel, Max, and Reed were the wisemen. Andrew and Ashlynn were shepards. Ally played the angel, but not a very happy one. Ethan was Joseph, and Kamron was Mary. We ended our Christmas program with a lovely song. .
Then the kids had a great time opening their cousin gifts. I love the Holidays