Sunny Christmas

Well - we are safely in California at Virginia's house, with cousins and siblings around. We arrived late Friday night.
By way of catchup, we spent the previous week in a fog of colds. I brought it home from school. Mike picked it up and got a worse version. Krista came next and missed a day of school. Tyler caught a very mild version that didn't even affect his appetite. I still have a runny nose, but I think that is allergies, bot the cold still hanging on. I don't think many people have winter allergies, but I seem to be so blessed.
The end of school is a big blur. I had one day where I was busy with the Faculty and staff luncheon and then the next was another day of busy work with the end of year drawings. Thursday night was surprise. As I drove home the sky was clear, with big black clouds to the north. I was going to have Tyler drive to his haircut appointment, but as he was set to depart, the hail started coming down. I decided to drive him and it was horrendous by the time we arrived. By the time we got out, the roads were icy and slick and covered.
The next morning I think there were 6" on the cars. Mike and I shoveled, blew and scrapped before he took the kids to school. I was so glad I didn't have to drive to South Jordan in the mess. I did venture out later in the day and several errands. Our plane was only slightly delay and we had a bit of turbulence. I was just glad we weren't trying to get into LAX, because getting around it was hard enough!
Saturday we slept in and relaxed. Then in the afternoon, Mike, Krista, Tyler, Carolyn, Corrina and I headed to Hollywood to see WICKED at the Pantages theater. It was fantastic. So much better than the book. I am so very glad we planned this long ago. The girls of course enjoyed it, but even Tyler said he was surprised that we haven't done things like this before, because he enjoyed going to the theater so much. Who knew!
Today was church with the Elders and Virginia and then Mike, Carolyn and I went to finish our shopping, we hope!

Gingerbread Evening

Monday night we went over to the Robison's house to make gingerbread houses. Last year was kind of a disaster, because the houses wouldn't stay together. This year we used a hot glue gun to get the job done right! Then we used frosting for all of the candies and decorations.

This is Cady, the Robison's daughter.


Krista wanted an all red house, just so that she could call it her Stanford house and annoy her father. She added a second story to her creation at the last minute.



Tyler's is the most elaborate of the group. He seems to have outbuildings with attached covered walkways. For someone who was orginally interested, he became the most intently active of us all.

Random Photos

We finally got a nice dumping of snow. Lucky Virginia - she got out of town the morning before this storm. It was actually very beautiful. The snow fell late enough that it didn't melt off the branches before night fell. So when we went out, the trees were bedecked with snow balancing on each branch. And if it were a partially lit tree, then it was very pretty.


Krista created this torn paper self-portrait at the end of last school year. Back when she had long hair and liked to brush it over one eye.












Heks seems to have finally ingratiated herself into Spelen's world. Spelen was actually cuddled up on the coach when Heks wormed her way next to her. Spelen licked her ears a few times and then resigned herself to a companion.





Heks has found her newest play toy - a box. Originally she was content just sitting in the box and occasionally chewing on it, but I turned it on its side and cut a hole in it, so now she likes to run inside it and bat at you from her hiding place.

And we are thankful

Then the children thought they should try to lift Tyler -
But the results weren't always what they were going for!

And lastly they tried for Mike - And you can see for yourselves how well that went.

Giving More Thanks

The kids tried so hard to lift each other up; sometimes they succeeded, but sometimes they didn't.




























Pier chidren showing off their can-can skills!









Building a pyramid of children!



























The Totem pole of grandchildren.

Giving Thanks

We spent Thanksgiving at Bob's house. Virginia, Mike's mom, had flown in Tuesday night and she spent Wednesday hanging out with Mike. We headed over to Bob's just before noons and didn't get home until 9:30. It's great that all of the kids get along so well. Rachel feels a little left out because she is the youngest, but all in all I think everyone had a grand time.

Lisa's family came by just in time for dinner and left before dessert. Except for her sister. Ugh was there with his foster daughter, too.


When it came time to gather the kids together for pictures, they didn't seem too keen, but once they realized I wanted them to have fun, they got into it.














Here is the extended Pier family clowning around and then the one serious photo that Lisa made them stand for.

Pictures, pictures

Nope - no pictures here! I've just been playing with pictures all day. I received pictures from Bob and Betsy for the calendar - sorry mom and dad, I'm not sharing any of them with you yet. I also went to Kristy's blog and pulled out pictures of Olivia mostly and a few of Jim, Kristy and Kristy's sibs. Now if Tom and Carolyn and Laura (Mike's cousin) would respond, I could make everyone happy.

Not just pictures today. Krista and I raked leaves - this is the second year in a row the tree in front is losing its leaves before the first snow - could it be a sign of global warming? We threw the Heks (the new kitty) in a few times, but she refused to pose for us. THere are still plenty of leaves on the tree, so I will entice Tyler outside and get a picture of the kids another day.

We also spent the after noon clothes shopping. Krista and I did a major purge of her closets and drawers. After a huge cleanup fest. She seems to think she owns the entire upstairs. I never say a word about Tyler's room, because at least it isn't spread everywhere. Anyway, both kids got some warmer gear. Both of them have grown taller. A few more pair of socks, some new ski gear and we should be set.

Tonight we watched the CAL game vs USC game. Thank goodness our friend Jeff didn't come over - I think he is louder and more intense about the whole thing than Mike is (imagine that, if you can). And Jeff is an USC grad, so the gloating would have been too much.

At school this week, I taught three days out of four - all day long. I went through an International Cinderella stories lesson with all of the geography classes as an introduction to their world studies. At least a few of them prfessed thanks and enjoyment, so it was tiring, but rewarding. My assistant has finally realized that ALL of our projects in the library are ongoing - so she has lost that feeling like she has to hurry and get something done - we jut keep ding what we have to, because more of the same is right around the corner. Not that we don't get things done, its just that there is always more. Once we have these books repaired, cataloged, checked-in, shelved; there are more books to repair, catalog, checkin, shelve. And after this book fair is over, its time to plan the next one. Never ending! But a lot of fun.

Love!