Homemade Christmas!
Colette
This year we are trying to reduce our costs at Christmas, but of course I still want to GIVE GIVE GIVE!  So I decided to try and put some of my talents to use!  I made a ton of chocolates and gave those away to teachers and family.  I'm not a habitual blogger yet and forgot to take any pictures of the whole process which was LONG and exhausting!  But fun and of course done with love!  hehe  The Rozell family rotates names amongst the siblings and this year we were giving to the Phinney family!  So I thought that the FHE boards I taught how to make at our Super Saturday this past November would be perfect for them!  Here is the outcome:





For my parents, a friend of mine gave me the idea to do an outline of the SLC Temple!  It turned out really great too!!

And for Slade's parents, I know that having a temple in our midst is so important to all the members in our area, and so I thought it would be nice to do something along those lines (my friend also helped me a great deal with this project!)  I wasn't sure how it would turn out at first, but after some creative juices got flowing I figured it out!!  I am happy with this one as well!


Yay for homemade presents!!  It was a lot of fun!  I've learned some new crafting skills and got to know a special lady along the way!  Thanks L for all your help!!  You rock!  :D
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She's An Organizer!
Colette
Summer definitely can be considered a "mini-me"!!  She loves shoes, she loves pretty things and we have been noticing more and more that she LOVES organizing!  She helps us set the table, she helps me with the laundry, but her favourite task of all...unloading the dishwasher!





So sweet!  Lets hope this carries on through her childhood and teen years!
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Kid's Christmas Concerts
Colette
These pictures just don't do it justice, but I'm putting it on here anyways!  My boys make me feel so proud!  They are so courageous and are always willing to please those around them.  I know that they aren't comfortable with getting up in front of people and especially doing the "girl things" (as Ronan says it) ie: singing and dancing.  But with encouragement and assurance that boys do sing and dance too, they did their best and did and AMAZING job!  They are such troopers and I love them both so much!!


Ronan's school focuses a lot on different words that relate to character.  His teacher told us that he is her gentle giant in the class.  He is always so kind to his classmates and is always willing to help.  So SWEET!!  So his school made this tree in the foyer with each child's name, picture and their "Gift of Character".

This was Ronan's:

*tear, tear*

Mason had a bit of a rough morning proceeding preschool.  I tried to cheer him up a bit before he left, but he was not happy, particularly with me.  I hoped he had got over it by the time his concert started.  I think he had mostly, but upon seeing me again...his memory was refreshed.  :(  Mommy is always the bad guy...but after their first song he seemed to shrug it off and got into it a little more.  My Masey.  He did such a good job considering and I am so proud of him and his determination. 

The girl in the green and red dress, Ava, is Mason's best friend at Preschool.

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Finding Shapes!
Colette
Ronan really likes shapes.  He has been busy finding shapes in the clouds (as most kids do).  I was cleaning out our garage and doing some reorganizing and the boys came out to ride the bikes around while I was working.  The van makes small puddles in the garage when we park it wet, and Ronan found this shape:


A shark.


Kids never cease to amaze me.  I wouldn't have looked at this puddle and thought about what it looked like!  Nothing major, just something cute.  It reminds me to slow down and spend more time actually looking at things and appreciate my surroundings.  What would we do without kids?!  They keep me in check a lot.  Love it!
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Or so she says...
Colette
Okay, thanks to mah friend Suze, I have come across this really great blog "Or so she says..."

I am always searching the internet for gift ideas (especially at this time of year) and I like to window shop as well.  "Or so she says..." is doing a give away of 11 gifts.  All the shops that they have listed there are all new to me, but one, and all the products are SO great!!  I am going to check them all out today.  I love to give things that are unique and go along with someone's character and these shops, from what I've seen so far, do just that.  Great stuff!!  Check it out!
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Beautiful Earth
Colette
Frequently I marvel at the beauty that surrounds me.  I feel so blessed to live in such a beautiful part of this earth (despite the rain... :P).  Occasionally I am honoured to see such beauty from my own widows at home.  Usually from my bedroom window.  I've never really appreciated having a view, even a bit of a view, before.  We currently live at the base of a mountain but are still up high enough to see the earth's splendour.  I have seen some amazing things so far in my 1 1/4 years that we've lived here; unfortunately I don't always have my camera with me.  But here are 2 separate occasions that I felt were blog worthy!

This was the view after a really crazy hail storm in mid November.  LOVE the fall colours!



And this is what I woke up to one morning in early December!



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Twilight Saga!!
Colette

About a year and a half ago Irene introduced me to a novel series written by Stephanie Meyers known as the Twilight Saga.  4 books in total and the series is so AWESOME!  I love reading and these books capture my interest like nothing else.  I can read them over and over and they are always just as good!  So last year a movie was made based on the first novel.  Unfortunately, it was poorly done and I have a love/hate relationship with it.  haha!!  BUT, the 2nd movie "New Moon" is being released on Nov. 20!!  This one looks a lot more promising and we (me and my bestest ladies!) are SUPER excited for it!  So to kick of the release date I decided to throw a Twilight Saga party.  It was themed mostly around the frist book (we were going to be watching the first movie later in the evening) with just a touch of New Moon.  I found party ware on line and ordered that, the rest of these ideas I got mostly off the internet.  It was so much fun!!!!!  I love being silly and a bit nerdy...well maybe really nerdy, but I'd rather be a total nerd than have no fun!!  Here are a whole wack of pics:




A close-up of the CUP!  These tasted SO yummy with the punch!





Upstairs I had twinkle lights and tea lights all over.  It was magical!








This "Werewolf Kibble" was SO good and actually looked like dog food!!


We gave all our food a name that went a long with the theme...I can't remember them all though!




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There's A BUG in My BED!!!
Colette
I hate bugs.  I have stated that here.  But I keep having run-ins with these repulsive, but necessary creatures!!  Some blog worthy...others not.  This story...is definitely blog worthy.

This begins probably around June of this year.  I was in my living room and had some friends over, as well as my cousin, Gillian.  She noticed a bug "hanging out" on some of the decor I had on my mantle, so I of course freaked out and couldn't even begin to think about how I was going to get this nasty thing out of my house.  It was HUGE.  About an inch long with long skinny legs.  Its body was flat across and it had long antennae.  BLAH!!!  It was sick sick sick.  I get the shivers just thinking about the thing. 

ANYWAYS, so my cousin bravely picked up the thing that it was sitting on and managed to shake it off outside over the deck.  Since then, I have been nervous about seeing this bug again.  I have never in my life seen the like and really hoped I would leave this world never seeing it AGAIN!

Not so...

The kids came in and woke me up early this morning, it was probably about 6:45 and mildly dark.  Mason, on occasion, sees a bit of lint and thinks it's a bug, so he said to me:  "Mommy, there's a bug in your bed..."  He said it kind of casually, so I figured it was the usual bit of lint, but then he looked over in the direction he was pointing to and made a face that was a cross between worry and disgust.  That was a new development.  Mason doesn't usually have a problem with bugs to begin with and he's never looked at lint like THAT before.  So then I was worried...I leaned over and THERE IT WAS!!!!!!  Just a foot and a half away from my pillow!!!!!  Lurking in my bed.  How long had it been in my bed?!?!?!?  Did it crawl on me while I slept?!?!?!?!?!  Ew!!!  I will be forever plagued by these questions.  Here it is, the precious little thing:


In comparison to a small glue stick.


And here in comparison to Ronan's hand.


Once again...I HATE BUGS!  : P
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Halloween'ing
Colette
Every year we go trick-or-treating with Irene and her family. 


Brandon the TIGER!! Raaaawr!                                            Erikka, the roughed up soccer player!                















It makes it more fun for the kiddies and we used to do that with our cousins growing up.  More special and memorable!! 
Jared as Wolverine!                                                                           Alyssa as the B-E-A-Utiful Snow Queen!

















The boys were so excited and got right into this year.  Only towards the end when we had 2 houses left did Mason decided he'd had enough, so we tromped back in.
 
The ever faithful Optimus Prime and Bumblebee!

                                  The Queen Bee!!
Summer was having the TIME of her life!  She was running around and had no problem going up to the doors.  She didn't really get why and didn't seem to care too much about the candy.  It was pretty cute.



 Even I got in on the dress up action!!  Not too flattering, but whatever...it was fun! 



We had a fun night, the weather was perfect, although cold, but thankfully no rain!  It was a beautiful day, so everything was dry too.  That's always a bonus.





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Kids Halloween Party!
Colette
Big thanks to Ginny and Kathy for their hard work to put on a really fun Kids Halloween party this year!  We all came up with a game or activity for the kids and brought some yummy snacks.  It was a lot of fun and a great way to entertain (and excite!!) the kids during the day before trick-or-treating!  I only managed to snap a few shots during the festivities, there was just too much fun to be had!!

The crew in their costumes!


Playing hot potato only with mini-pumpkins!

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I Play With Makeup
Colette
I love makeup. I love to experiment with makeup, try new things, try new brands, new colours, new techniques. Fun fun fun!!! My brother Reece has been obsessing about his Halloween costumes for 364 days. He asked me to do his make up for his 2 costumes he had decided on for this year. One, an old wizard, and the other was Kiss. I deterred him from doing Kiss...so over done and not really "wow" worthy. The old wizard was the costume for the Abbotsford 2nd ward Halloween party and I convinced him to let me do a creepy face for the YSA Halloween dance. I used several different brands of regular make up to do all the Halloween masks in this entry. I did a couple on myself as well. Just masquerade type masks for fun. The first one for the Abby 2nd party, the 2nd for Halloween which I tied off with a florescent pink wig and fairy wings. lol I'm such a child, I know, but SO much fun.
Reece as an old wizard. He carved the staff himself!
I think I added about 40 years to my 22 year old brother and he looks exactly like my dad only older!

My first mask. I don't know what it's supposed to be, just a show case of colours and glitter.

Reece as a ghoul! Eyes open.

Eyes shut. This one took about 2 1/2 hours. There are some mistakes, but for my first time, I was pretty pleased with myself.

My 2nd mask for Halloween night. I have 3 pictures of this one just to show all the colours and shading I did. This one turned out pretty neat. I could have done a bit of a better job on my nose though...it looks kinda funny. lol Oh, and I am NOT pouting my lips. They are drawn to look like I am.

Showcasing the glitter. There must always be glitter!!

Eyes shut.

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