Thanksgiving and Service

We had a very nice thanksgiving dinner at Kathy and Matt's house.  Kathy is a gourmet cook and everything is always delicious.  This year she decided to try a "brined" turkey and it was very moist.

As tradition, the men and kids all went to a movie.  This year it was the movie "Frozen".  They seemed to really like it and put them in the Christmas Spirit.  

We didn't do our usual Salvation Army food deliveries this year since my parents went to see Tony and Suzy in City.   However, we still had some good service experiences this month.  Jenessa organized a food drive
in our ward to take food and money to a poor woman.  She did such a great job and collected a lot!  and was able to deliver it via the woman's bishop.

I also was in charge of decorating a tree for the South Jordan Youth Council.  Jenessa and all of the kids on council met to decorate 5 or 6 Christmas Trees to deliver to children who had cancer.   As it turns out
one of the trees was meant for Robyn's grand-daughter.   It was such an awesome experience to take it to her home.  The little girl was so excited to get her "pink" tree.  She was laughing that her daddy would have
to have a pink Christmas tree this year!!  It was humbling to spend the day delivering the trees to these children and their families.  We sang them all a few Christmas Carols.  It was a great experience.

 The youth council did such an awesome the decorations!

Delivering the trees:

This was special to me since it was Robyn's grand-daughter's house

Bookclub Cornucopia

I hosted Book club at my house this month.   We decided to share our favorite books with each other instead of having everyone read the same book.  We called it Cornucopia of Books.  So of course I had to serve a snack to match the theme!  :)

It has been bitter cold outside this week and so I made some hot wassil and made sure we had a warm fire

and a yummy autumn trail mix:  Licorice nibs, candy corn, M&M's and cashews

Random pictures from 2013

picture dump so we don't lose the memories: 

Jenessa with no braces!

Kaitlyn and Maiya

 Kaitlyn and Bess

Temple Square after Regional conference

Brycen makes butter for a school project

Young Women In Excellence - such cute girls in our ward!

 Chris re-performed the marriage for Ben and Cho Seung Joo Scoville

Cougar craze

Kaitlyn turning into a teenager too fast!

Kaitlyn and mini minerettes

Retiring a Flag

Brycen and I went to his scout pack meeting to see a flag be retired.  It was really cool (since I like that kind of thing)  I've always loved our flag.  I learned to love it from going to Girls State when I was a Junior in High School.  They taught us to respect and salute it appropriately.  It was a great experience.

My parents also taught me to be patriotic by going to parades, hosting mass meetings in their homes and participating in the government process.

One of my most favorite pictures that hangs in my home, and that I also gave to my mom one year for her birthday is this:

I gave it to my mom because she taught me to love God, Country and Service     (she served at the Beehive House and still at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building)

so back to the flag retiring:

It was a cool ceremony held in the Freeman's backyard.  The boys were told to be reverent.  The old flags were then cut apart piece by piece and each piece was burned separately.   As each stripe is burned the boys would recite the name of the original colony that it represented.  How cool is that?

Ty's 18th

And just like that he became an adult!  I can't believe I am the mother of 3 adult sons!  
Believe me when I say...your children grow up just way too fast!

We celebrated as we always have.  With a family halloween birthday party and then going out to dinner on Nov. 1st 

Other cousin birthdays: McKay, Matthew and Andrew