Celtic Night

Naomi has been doing Irish dance for the past two years and absolutely loves it!  She performed for the first time at Celtic Night this past Friday and Saturday nights.  It was so much fun to watch her.  
On our way to the theater Saturday night Naomi said she wished she could do this every night!

Snow, Bears and Daylight Savings

 

This winter Kory discovered the joy of backcountry split boarding.  He has a snowboard that is split lengthwise so he can x-country ski up to untouched snowy peaks then the board snaps (I use the term snap loosely) back together to snowboard down.  

 

 Looking back, splitboarding is not for the faint of heart.

  

Benny is a trooper, he loves to be outside exploring and keeps up pretty well both climbing and descending.  And no, he doesn't get to ride down.

  

This is Kory's friend, James, reaping the reward.  Wish I could have put up a pic of Kory, but ya, he was the one with the camera.

 

We spent a few days with Grandma Olsen, Grandma Bronson and Dan and Rachel's family.  Gray and Naomi were so excited to meet their new cousin Isla and play with James.   Isla is such a cutie, can't believe I didn't get a picture of her.  I loved spending this time with family, especially my mom.  It had been far too long since I'd seen her.

 

James' version of a bear attack!

 

Naomi discovered the joy of Old Maid which repeatedly left her in fits of giggles.  She played and played and played.

This weekend we went on Daylight Savings.  While I absolutely love Daylight Savings (once I've adjusted to losing an hour) it made Monday morning at our house a little rough.  I skipped the gym, Gray missed the bus, and Naomi ... well she didn't make it very far after waking up.  I went out of the kitchen for a few minutes and when I came back she was snoozing on the counter.

Christmas 2010, Better Late Than Never

I haven't had the time to put together a proper Christmas post, so this assortment of pictures will have to do. Christmas seemed to fly by this year but we were able to have lots of fun and see lots of family! 

Naomi was so excited to be a Shepherd with James.  I think they spend most of the family party sitting together, and loved it!

Gray and Jaren are reading the Christmas memory books that Grandma Bronson wrote.  What an amazing treasure, to learn about the Christmas's of Grandma's childhood.  Speaking of childhood, Corey sure looks young. 

Aah, the wise man.

A very serious Mary, at this point she is "great with child".

See how happy she is now with her cute baby?

Christmas morning was fun, Gray loved his Vans from Aunt Steph.

Guess who has made waffles every morning for the past month?  In case you're interested, this is the best Belgian waffle mix out there.

Naomi barely made it through opening gifts.  She was so sick all day, she spent most of Christmas day asleep in bed.  It was kind of funny cause the next day she started looking through her presents and it was like Christmas morning all over again.  I think she was pretty out of it the first time she opened them.

Isn't this how Christmas afternoon looks for most of us?  I think this year was a record for us, we didn't get up until 7:30am!

The Last Day of 2010

The last day of the year was a busy one.  We spend most of the day at Beaver Mtn.  Kory and the kids braved the cold (it was below zero much of the day) while I spectated.  After getting home and cleaning up, we went to a USU mens basketball games with the Hills.  Great time hanging out with friends!  The kids were determined to stay up till midnight so we fixed some treats and played a new wii game.  At the stroke of midnight we toasted in the new year with sparkling cider.  Here's to an awesome 2011!

 

Naomi with Kory getting ready for her first fun of the season.

Kory and Naomi finishing up their first run.  Naomi chose to skip a warm up on Little Beaver and went right for The Face.

Gray and Kory went down the backside.  This was Gray's first time and he loved it.  I need to add that at the point where I say "Gray ate it" he made it clear that he did not crash, just kind of got stuck in the powder.

Autumn Saturdays

I have very distinct memories of autumn Saturdays as a child. Maybe it's because fall seems to be full of scents, crisp and clear. Raking leaves, apples, burning fields, the air in the morning ... I could go on. Something else I always associate with fall is the sound of a cannon. For a number of years we lived close to a university football stadium and the sound of the cannon with each point scored is directly tied to my memories of working and playing in the back yard during autumn. Last Saturday was one of those perfect autumn days. We skipped out on bike racing and just stayed home.

The kids caught leaves as they fell from the trees. I realize that from this picture it doesn't look like we have that many leaves, but don't worry just out of sight is a field of orange.

I'd been hoping to get up into the canyons for some family pictures before all the leaves were gone but this picture on the back porch might be as close as I get this year.

Naomi, our little monkey loves to climb and be in the trees. Gray has been a great teacher. As soon as the snow hits, they'll take to the pine trees. I have no idea why, but they only seem to climb them in the winter.

The kids and Benny.

When Kory got home from work, he and the kids headed up to the jumps and rode bikes. It's so much fun to have this stuff in our back yard. And even better, it's a common area for bikers to not only ride, but build anything and everything they want. We never know what fun new trails or jumps we'll find, but we always go check it out after we've heard lots of hammering.

Halloween

This year since Halloween was on Sunday, we did our celebrating on Saturday. We started with a 7:30 am workout. Since this was a special Halloween workout, families were welcome and the kids were not about to pass up a chance to do CrossFit. It was so much fun to have the kids there. Naomi spend some time on the rowing machine, calling us over to see that after 20min. she had rowed over 2000 meters!

Gray impressed everyone with his killer box jumps.

Naomi did lots of hanging on the bars and even threw in some pull-ups, she's got some serious upper body strength.
After our workout, we loaded up canning supplies and headed to Kory's parents house to make applesauce.
Honestly, fresh applesauce is so much better than stuff from the store. I have no idea how many quarts we did, probably somewhere around 40. Notice that Gray and Naomi are nowhere to be seen? They were glued to the tv, trying to make up for all the tv they don't get to watch at home. I attribute that fact that Naomi can do pull-ups and Gray can hang with the adults in a crossfit workout to the absence of tv in our home. Finally, we headed out the door ready for parties and trick-or-treating. Gray spent the evening with friends at a party and Naomi and I braved the rainstorm to do some trick-or-treating.

Kory met up with Naomi and I then we headed home for pizza and a movie. It was a fun day and we all had no problem falling asleep that night.

First Day - New School

Gray and Naomi both switched to a new school district this year. When we moved about a year and a half ago, they didn't want to change schools and since it worked out pretty easily to get them to and from their old schools, we didn't move them. This year however, they decided it was time to change.

Here's Gray bright and early on the first day of 7th grade. It's been a difficult transition for him but he has had some good friends who try to make sure he doesn't sit alone at lunch (probably the number one fear of any middle school student).
Naomi was sure that no school could ever be as great as Hillcrest Elementary, but after just one day of 3rd grade, she was loving her new school (or maybe she was mostly loving riding the school bus).