T'was the night before Christmas....

and all through our house, 4 creatures were stirring, and hopefully no mouse....

(is this pose getting old?? I seem to be a one-trick pony this Christmas...)

...the children were nestled all snug in their beds (or sprawled all over lou-lou's floor for the Christmas Eve slumber party)
...with Ma in her kerchief and Brooklyn in her cap...
and I'm all out of cute little substitutions for one of my favorite Christmas stories ever, but we'll just say we've had a wonderful Christmas- Brooklyn loves her sock monkey (thanks Taunya!)







They've played basketball...(thanks Beboo and Papa!)









and they now have adorable new Sunday clothes, which will be featured in an upcoming post (thanks Grandma and Grandpa!) along with details from our fun visit with Uncle Audi (or Uncle Abby as Madison calls him/her). And were spoiled with other fun things from doting aunts and uncles who really shouldn't have, but the kids are so glad you did!

So all that's left to be said is.....

to all, and to all a good night!

sleep and underwear--both important.

Brooklyn has decided that sleep at night is over-rated, and feels the need to wake up every single hour. She's been doing this for a few nights, so I'm feeling it- big time.
And yet...when I see this:
or this:


I don't mind as much.

Lou-lou, on the other hand, has decided that clothing (and more specifically, panties), are over-rated. The other day we went to Walmart- she was dressed in a cute little dress. But as I was lifting her into the cart, I realized she had decided to go "commando" as I felt bare bum on my hand. So we went to the kids department first.

Fast forward to today:
I had to run some errands, so I asked her to get dressed and reminded her, "don't forget to put your undies on." "Otay, Mommy."
Maybe I should have been more specific:I love my days with these 2 girls! And for the record: that's mascara on her eye/nose- not cuts- and sometimes she really does leave her hair done.

got tagged by my angel-girl....

What is your favorite:

color: red
holiday: Thanksgiving
sport to play: racquetball/volleyball
pet: none- but if I had to choose...dog
friend: the loyal one
season: fall
number:3
food: homemade egg rolls
drink: tang
wild animal: parrot (is that wild?)
mythical creature: Pegasus
toy: plasma car
movie: white christmas
book: pride and prejudice
song: Time to say goodbye
scripture story: jaredites journey to the promised land
teacher: bro. christensen from Ricks College
board/card game: settlers of catan/risk

Copy and paste the survey and fill in your own answers. Then tag 5 people.

I tag...mel, tiffany, alexis, NAT-THURSTON...(yes, you!), and liz

did you know...

*"There are many different kinds of skunks. They vary in size (most are housecat-sized) and appear in a variety of striped, spotted, and swirled patterns—"

*Skunks usually nest in burrows constructed by other animals, but they also live in hollow logs or even abandoned buildings.

*Each female gives birth to between two and ten young each year.

*They are nocturnal foragers who eat fruit and plants, insects, larvae, worms, eggs, reptiles, small mammals, and even fish.

*In colder climates, some skunks may sleep in these nests for several weeks of the chilliest season.

*And *apparently*, when nests are not available, they'll make do in MY GARAGE:

The day before Thanksgiving I headed out to the car in our garage to get something, just in time to see a s-k-u-n-k run in front of our porch and behind our freezer. Long story short: it stayed there for almost 2 whole days. The whole time I was just praying it would not spray. I called Animal Control- they only take "control" of cats and dogs... so I called Critter Control (yes, that's what they are called) and learned they'd come get the skunk out of our garage. For a bargain price of $285. Needless to say- my dad and Tim were the Critter Control:this was right before the skunk came out and just slowly slunk away into the night. outside. where he *belongs*.

The next day we had a delicious feast with all the traditional trimmings- and gratefully didn't have eau de Skunk ruining our meal. Then after dinner, we did the traditional Thanksgiving sparklers. We have our decorations and tree up: (tammy- this pic of the wreath is for you- not impressive, but I honestly tried.... it looked better in my head. I need practice)

Friday night we had our Ward Christmas Party and the kids were in good moods before we left since they were going to see Santa. So I was able, for the first time in my child-infused life, to get a cute shot of all 4 kids in front of the tree...I sure do like these 4. poor lou-lou is cutting molars and has a nasty rash on the bottom of her lip- I thought it had been binky-related, but the bink is long-gone and the rash is still here. Teeth/frigid cold weather are the only things I can come up with. Any ideas for how to get rid of it?

Elf yourself....

so just in case you've been living under a rock and have never seen this, it just wouldn't be Christmastime without a trip to the elf-yourself site:

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

a couple new blogging tricks I just learned...

keep in mind, I'm still very new at blogging/coding/etc. so I'm easily impressed....but

the first is just a little detail that I'm stealing from a friend. So here's a thanks and a shout-out to MAREN!!! Hollllaaaa.
Did I just say that??? I *must* be tired.
Anyway- the detail: you can sign your name at the end of each post- I love that.

The second is, when tweaking the HTML in your layout, here's a cool website where you can find the code for any color under the rainbow. I love that too.

And now for my signature...good night!