Give Thanks

Okay, call me crazy but I love cooking Thanksgiving Dinner!!! I love planning the menu.....creating a fun table with favors, napkin rings, a center piece etc. Thanksgiving morning Mark and I are always up early preparing the turkey and stuffing it. He is so much help and usually is cleaning up after me doing the dishes as we go along. Once the girls arrive he seems to disappear knowing help has arrived. We all cook the rest of the dinner together, I usually give each of the girls an assignment they are in charge of. Thank goodness my kitchen now can hold us all cooking together.







When clean up time comes around the boys are sure to disappear. You find them hanging out watching football, scanning ads, and basically relaxing....oh to be a guy!!! Good thing we love them so!!





I have so much to be Thankful for our family is so blessed!! I sure am grateful for my family and love them so much!!

Moving On

This Weekend Was Very Eventful!!! Katie was never able to get a Clear Title on her townhouse.......the builder was going Bankrupt and unable to pay off some bills. She found that the Value of her town house just was not there in this present market. With the price of houses coming down Katie felt like her money would be better spent Buying A Home. When she told them she didn't want the town house anymore they said she needed to be out this weekend! WHAT was he thinking?!! Three Girls given 1 DAY NOTICE to be out!! Dad, Nate, Family and Friends To The RESCUE! Katie started packing up boxes and organizing on Friday. By Saturday at 3:00 all her stuff and both of her friends stuff were neatly tucked away in our basement!! Our house no longer rattles it is full again....I LOVE IT!! They have their own little apartment set up in the basement. Katie and her realtor are Pounding The Road Looking...... Relooking..... and Making Offers here and there. Amazing how things can change so quickly. The Three Musketeers will stay until Katie finds something she likes.



Who would complain about having these Three Darling Girls around........Not Me!! Love them!

Back To Basics

Lately all I have heard about is canning chicken. Maybe because I am home now and not working and up to date on what is going on in the home front. Debbie told me about this when she was here and since then I have heard so much more about it. I know they used to do this in the olden days...but I was quite surprised to hear that this is so big right now. There was a great sale on chicken so we decided it was time. Nicole and I took the plung and bought a pressure canner. In the last two days we have canned over 80 lbs. of chicken. For anyone that has done this they know that this represents a ton of time. From start to finish of one batch it takes about 4 hours. I must say that it doesn't look very appealing......we did open a bottle to test.....it was very doable and tasted good to me. It is just a great feeling to have protein on the shelf. I hope to be able to rotate this and use it. How great to just open a bottle and have a fresh chicken salad.





Though we never know when we will face a challenge that will require us to depend on the resources we have stored, we know that the Lord has said, “If ye are prepared ye shall not fear” (D&C 38:30). "August Ensign 2007"

Oh My Huge

Ok I know that the pictures on my previous post are HUGE!! I am trying to figure out how to get them big not HUGE. Anyone out there know. I actually uploaded my pics on photobucket and took them from there. I know there is a way to do it on blogger I just can't figure. HELP!!!

Going...Going...GONE

This weekend we had an Auction for our Young Single Adult Ward...actually there were 4 wards involved. The money raised would be used to finance a Sub for Santa. I had a grand idea.....I thought it would be fun to make a quilt to auction off. I quickly started sewing up a storm. I chose a pretty simple quilt that would work up quickly....it was one of moms patterns. The place I had it quilted was so great to work me in because it was for a charity. Here is the finished quilt............

A Bishop of one of the other wards and his wife were the ones who got it. She wanted to use it as a crib quit for her grandkids...a perfect match!!

Mark and I also auctioned off a horse ride and lunch for 2 hoping to encourage a date!! A darling girl in our ward bought it so we will see how that turns out.

I was the high bid on a custom blog design....imagine that!! I am in hopes that I can have her teach me a few things about how to design a custom blog. It was a great purchase and I look forward to getting together with her.

All in all the Auction went very well and the four wards raised over $4,000. This should make enough funds for an amazing Sub For Santa for several families. This made me realize that Christmas is just around the corner...Yikes, I better get going!!

Frosty Came To Town

We woke up to SNOW! Wow, it just kept coming down hard all day. It is November 5th and we were plummeted with 7" of SNOW!! Well we just couldn't leave it untouched. The little boys were so excited to play in the SNOW. We built our first SNOWMAN of the year. The SNOW did not cooperate it was light and fluffy and would not roll so we had to use our buckets! However.....Frosty is not welcome to stick around too long I am not quite ready for the cold weather. BURRRRRR



A cold day calls for nice warm soup. The guys were out of town, Nicole and I were feeling somewhat domestic and decided to make a new recipe I had gotten from one of my quilting friends. Minestrone soup. YUMMY! Thanks Kathy. Warm soup and homemade bread. Ok, so i did cheat a little bit. It is just soooo easy to throw the ingredients in a bread maker and 3 hours later have fresh hot bread. We made 14 grain whole wheat bread. The only problem is I never seem to get a nice round smooth loaf of bread but it is always tasty!!



The Season is changing......

Warm Coats, Slushy Roads, Boots & Scarfs, Crackling Fires, All those SNOW words, Snow Skiing, Snowmobiling, Snow Boarding, Snowball Fights and of course SNOWMEN!! It's coming!

Mom you left just at the right time...Hope you are enjoying the sunshine!

Miss You

The Polls Are In

My worst nightmare came true!! Obama Wins the 2008 Presidential Election! I crossed my fingers, prayed, broke wishbones hoping that a miracle would happen and that somehow McCain would pull it off! Apparently it didn't happen. Gosh I am frightened! People wanted change.... I hope all the hub bub and rumors of Obama and his so called connections silently slip away and that he can bring about a change that will bring this Great Nation back.

I must say that I was soooo impressed with McCain's speech. He was so gracious and positive as he relinquished the election throwing his support to Obama. I truly think McCain is a man with alot of integrity and honor. He gave so many years of his life to serving the country he believed in. I had so much respect for him as he tried to raise his arms that were injured in battle to stop the people from booing Obama. He is a HERO!! Hats off to McCain!!

Presidential Election

I have done my Civic Duty!! I was a little taken back however as I entered the polling booth. I had come ready to vote for my favorite candidate that I had been following very closely, I felt like I knew where I stood, the issues at hand and I was confident as I walk in the booth. However I was faced with a list of ballot questions, amendments, a few of which I was not so confident on where I stood. Am I the only one?  I guess I could of quickly made a decision based on my scant knowledge. But what if the contest was close... I have to admit I skippped a few items. Guess that means I had to rely on my fellow citizens to make the right choice. YIKES!! I felt bad I was not as informed as I should be. Perhaps I failed on my Civic Duty!! But at least I can say I voted right?

This will be a monumental Election whichever way it goes!!

  God Bless America!!

HALLOWEEN FUN

Halloween......Crunchy Leafs, Carved Pumpkins, Candy and Costumes.

I love the school Halloween parades all the creative costumes and the excitement in the air. Josh was so excited to sing his songs and march around in his costume.



On to the Elementary to see Jake at Howard R. Driggs. This was fun to see him at school because this is where I went to Elementary School. The cutest mummy in town!!


Here's a little lookie at the Monsen Spooks for 2008.

Katie and her friends were on the prowl....Black Cats and a Mime


Megan dressed up several times with her friends for parties.......



The Bennion's
Fred & Wilma Flinstone


The Collins Clan
oops just realized we forgot mom and dad.....sorry

It hit Mark and I this year that we are OLD FOGGIES!! No one to take trick or treating (sniff, sniff), no one to dress up (boohoo), no pillow cases of candy to snitch from (tear drop). The kids used to come home with their bags full of candy and divide it up. Candy bars in one pile, gum in another etc. then they would compare who got the most. They would rumage through their candy and find mom and dad's favorite and were always eager to share. I miss the fun of having little kids! Thank goodness for Grandkids to fill the gap!!

We love all of the Monsen Spooks and hope everyone had a

Hauntingly Happy HALLOWEEN