A Festive Night

THANK YOU THANK YOU my girlfriends for a wonderful night out!! What a blast to get together and talk about all the random silly things we use to do. And thank you for refreshing my memory about the stupid things I did! And very apparently still do!! Ugh, when will I ever grow up? We all have issues :) For pictures of our happy evening, please see Vanessa and Shannon's blog, because of course, I didn't bring my camera. Love you Mailee, Shannon, Vanessa, Amy and Jody!!! :) :) :)

NOW STARRING BRAYDEN PETERSON in.......

In Grantsville there is but one event that defines your third grade experience. THE NUTCRACKER!!! Apparently it is a Christmas tradition dating back to.... well I don't know when, because I am a newby, but it's a BIG DEAL! They only allow each family 6 tickets and you can only get into the gym with a ticket. Brayden had the part of a spanish dancer. He did an awesome job and he got to touch a girls hand every Tuesday for the past 2 months (rehearsals). LUCKY!! I have to apologize for my terrible camera skills. I have only a couple of crappy shots for my blog, so here goes.


The Dance
(back row, far right)

Final bows, Brayden is in the middle.

The costuming was really great, the kids all knew their parts and participated without too much complaining. What more could you ask for from 8 year olds? Soon to be 9.... tomorrow!!!

Hilly Billy Thanksgiving

DANG... it's almost Christmas and I haven't updated my blog since Halloween. WEAK!!! So here is a snipit of our hilly billy Thanksgiving in Monticello. It actually was a great time! We got there late Wednesday night and all the kids piled into the heated garage (which really doesn't look like a garage, except for the cement floor) for bedtime.

Thursday morning we woke, fed the 16 grandchildren breakfast and started prepping some of the food for the feast. Dinner was fun with 30 of us joining the festivities. My mom and dad, Grandpa and Grandma Hansen, Cindy, Mary, Laura & Rod. Jim, Nat and Kids, Jen, Mike and kids, Me, Brandon and kids, Shery, Quin and kids!!!! Woooo hooo!!!!

Friday we went to the Days Inn hotel that mom, dad and the grandparents were staying at (in Monticello) and swam in the pool. The kids had a blast and we finally dunked Uncle Jim after much hard work and coordination. All in all a great way to spend three days. Jim and Natalie did an awesome job planning the holiday and accommodating all of us. Thank you again guys for the great memories.

Halloween in Grantsville

A big, mean, scary grim reaper was Brayden's choice of costume and a beautiful, dainty fairy was Maddie's choice. We had a super fun time trick or treating in our new neighborhood. They don't do trunk-or-treating out here (yeah!!!) and EVERYBODY was home, so the kids got lots of candy in just a couple of hours. The weather was great so Maddie was able to really show off her costume and not be bundled too much. I missed being with my family in Pleasant Grove, which was our tradition in the past few years to eat chili and bread sticks and then go around my mom's neighborhood. But the kids were as happy as could be; so I was too, after a while. Below is my attempt at using the pattern kit with the little saws.

And here are the kids cutie cute pumpkins. Maddie would have had about five faces going around her pumpkin if I hadn't put a limit of three on her.

Work-Schmerk

Yes, it's true, I have once again joined the ranks of the employed. I am temping with a company named Ajilon. I work in the office of Boart Longyear in Salt Lake. It's an okay job, but I can't imagine that anyone ever did this as a full time position. I am a filing clerk, so far I have just filed, alphabetized, and matched invoices to check vouchers. Pretty much what you would expect for the title of filing clerk. I definitely don't miss the office drama of putting 6 women together in a small space with no windows. I am preparing my Halloween post, so stay tuned! :)

Home

This is a picture of our new house for all those who did not recieve my progress reports during construction. There are only a few of you, because I sent those updates out to just about everyone on my contact list. We are settling in a little. It will take time to get comfortable here. I was hoping we could just pick up where we left off in Lehi, but it will take time to make friends and bonds and trust people here. I forget that we lived in Lehi for 8 years and were neighbors with some of the people there for those 8 years. I hope we made the right decision moving here.

Hunting Carnage 2007

Alright already Vanessa... geeeeeeeze.... so I tried to do two things in one weekend and it about killed me. I played in a softball tournament in St. George friday night and all day Saturday, drove to Ephriam saturday night, woke up Sunday morning at 5:30 a.m. and shot a deer in the leg. NICE!!! We walked and walked and walked until I had blisters on my heels looking for the massive two point. Finally we gave up and went back to camp (grandma peterson's house) and made chicken dumplings for everyone. We took the kids out with us sunday evening to the same spot where we last saw my wounded trophy buck and low and behold it jumped up from behind a tree and tried to make his get away again. This time I was able to make a kill shot and it took him a while to lay down; so poor Maddie was behind me in a little quiet voice saying "mommy, mommy, mommy". I was sooooooo tired Sunday night, and my feet hurt so bad I decided next year I need to choose between the annual Peterson family hunting weekend and softball. I don't know what I will choose. I know the picture looks scary with the gun right at Maddie's head, but if you look closely you will notice that she is quite a ways behind me, and of course, there is no bullet in the chamber and gun is on safety. I took Hunters Safety at Snow College thank you very much :)

Random Playground Accidents

Who would have thought you could do a Charlie Brown move in real life? It can be done! Today Brayden was playing soccer at recess and went to do a "big" kick and missed the ball. Feet went flying and he landed on his neck/shoulder. He was refusing to move and said his neck hurt, so the school called me and I got there to find him laying flat on his back with three or four teachers standing around him. Scared me to death. I thought it would be best to have the paramedics come and do an assessment on him to determine if we could move him or not. The paramedics said did not show any signs of spinal chord trauma. He had feeling in his hands and feet, could respond, and did not black out so I decided to take him to the hospital myself. We ended up at the instacare with a P.A. who diagnosed him with strained muscles in three different areas of his right shoulder and up his neck to the base of his head. The P.A. prescribed Motrin three times a day and icing it every hour. Brayden thought he should stay home from school today... naturally .... but it's okay, after all, he did get to have the ambulance come for him.