Marriage Questionnaire

Stolen from Shayla who stole it from someone else...

How long have you been married? 10 years

How long did you date for? 5 weeks before we got engaged and then married 4 months later.

How old are you? 30

Who eats more? Hmmm. Probably he does, but I can pack it away, too. Give me chocolate or potatoes and I'm a happy woman. :)

Who said I love you first? He did.

Who is taller? He is.

Who sings better? This is a very cool thing about our marriage--we sing together.

Who is smarter? I would say he is.

Who has a worse temper? Probably hubby, but I'm not saying I don't lose mine a little too often.

Who does the laundry and the dishes? Usually I do unless we are completely out of whites and I haven't paid attention so he throws in a load late at night so he has them for morning.

Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? If you are standing looking at the bed he does. If you are laying in bed, I do.

Who pays the bills? Gotta quote Shayla who quoted Denise, "I pay them, with his money."

Who mows the lawn? Ben does. I think maybe i have a few times in my life, but not since we've been married.

Who cooks dinner? Me. Always me. If Ben is "cooking" it's something frozen or Papa Murphy's pizza or McD's. Actually he's a pretty good cook when he does it (he is great at the grill and he makes a super yummy chicken cordon bleu--he just doesn't like to cook much).

Who drives when you are together? He always does.

Who is more stubborn? I have to say definitely him. Love ya, hon. ;)

Who is the first to admit they are wrong? He is. (I think most of these answers have been him!)

Whose parents do you see more? We don't live near either set of parents so I would say it's pretty even. Maybe we see my parents a little more often.

Who proposed? He did.

Who is more sensitive? Definitely I am. There's no question about that one, eh hon?

Who has more friends? I don't know.

Who has more siblings? I am oldest of 5, he's oldest of 3.

Who wears the pants in the family? (This is totally Shayla's answer, but she's such a great writer I have to "borrow" this one.) We share :) It's more fun that way. They are surprisingly roomy. But I also like that thought, "Do you want to speak to the man in charge, or the woman who knows what's going on?"

Could it get any worse?

Yesterday Ben and I spoke in church. The topic was really great, the scriptures and the restoration of the gospel. I went first, of course, and Ben was left to fend for himself with the 4 kids. After about 10 minutes he had to take Carli out. I'm usually out in the hall with her for part of sacrament meeting. Since Daddy was out the girls took upon themselves to come up to stand with me on the podium. Ok, so not good. They take that as show off time. I calmly told them to sit down. Did they listen? Well, for about 5 seconds. How totally embarassing. After a minute a sweet sister came and helped them down and took them out to my husband and sat with Brandon in the bench. How grateful I am to her! The other problem is that whenever I speak in church, bear my testimony or whatever, I am pretty much overwhelmed with the Spirit and I get very emotional. I pretty much cry through the whole thing. After sacrament meeting I just wanted to hang my head and not talk to anyone. I'm grateful to the people who did come up to me and tell me they thought I did a great job (especially being so calm when my girls went up front, but come one, what did they expect me to do--yell at them in front of everyone?). So anyway, it was kind of a nightmare and I hope the bishopric learns from this and doesn't ask us to do that again for a very, very, very long time. We've only been in the ward for 1 year and it's the second time we've spoken. Ugh...

Visit with Dad!

My dad got to come hang out with us for a day a week ago. It happened to be Grandparents' Day at school! My kids were so excited they could actually have a grandparent come to school on that day. They have never been able to do that before. We started with breakfast at home (didn't want to fight the crowd and school and have a not so great meal) and then went to Kate's class. Her teacher had a fun checklist for the kids to do with their grandparent so off they went to see the art and music classes and work posted on the wall outside the classroom. We also hit the book fair. The kids LOVE the book fair.

The second and third grade classes had little musical presentations for the grandparents as well. It was cute. Kate got to play a bell and Brandon played the base (that's what he called it). I had the two little girls with me and my dad and they did pretty well hanging around the school for the morning. During the 3rd grade songs Carli tripped and fell and her teeth cut her bottom lip so I had to book it out quickly and get a wet paper towel in the bathroom. Thankfully, it wasn't too bad. I kept debating whether I should go to the nurse's office, but I just kept the towel on it and it was ok.

Then we left and picked up lunch for Brandon at Arby's, his favorite, and took it back to him. He and Grandpa got to eat lunch together while I wandered the halls looking for the kids' teachers to give them a little thank-you gift. After Brandon's lunch we signed Kate out early and took the girls to lunch. Brandon didn't want to leave (he loves the times at school when they are just hanging out watching movies and playing games). We hurried Megan back to the school by noon and they had some punch and cookies for the kids and grandparents. Megan didn't want to leave, either, so we took Kate home and relaxed for a couple hours. We picked up Brandon and Megan after school and got to hang out with Grandpa for a while. We ordered pizza for dinner. It was a really fun day! I love it when my Dad comes for a visit. He's all over the country working so when he comes to Texas it's a real treat!

Grandpa and Carli reading a book in Kate's class.Kate and Grandpa going over the checklist. Kate getting ready for the 2nd grade music program for the grandparents.
Brandon playing his part during the 3rd grade music time.Megan showing Grandpa the calender center in her classroom.Carli, Grandpa, and Brandon hanging out together.

Thanksgiving

This year we spend Thanksgiving with some friends from church. I am very grateful for them and their friendship. We moved here at about the same time last year so we became fast friends. We trade watching kids all the time and our kids are great friends. It is great to have such good friends here where we are not close to our parents and siblings. It was a very fun day!

Megan loves to help peel potatoes. She is my little chef!Ben makes his dad's apple pie every year. It's is absolutely delicious! This year he won second place at his office Thanksgiving potluck and almost had 4 tickets to the Cowboys game on Thursday, but he was beat out by someone who made country potatoes (you know, funeral potatoes?--how lame is that!?). Anyway, he's always proud of his pie.

Ben, Carli, me, and Kate getting started on dinner!Madeline, Lindy, Chad, and Allison enjoying the food! Caleb, Sydney, Megan, and Brandon.

Carli loved the rolls! Lindy made her mom's homemade rolls and they were soooo yummy!Kate licking her jello bowl. :)Daddy and Carli relaxing after such a big meal.It's snowing!!!!! Kate was so excited to see the snowflakes outside. All the kids bundled up (sort of) and enjoyed dancing around in the snowflakes.

Megan helping Carli get her coat done up.This is what Carli thought of the snow. ;)Allison. What a cutie!Kate was the first one out dancing around in the falling snow.Megan and Sydney dancing.
Megan and Syndey warming their feet by the fire.Megan trying to catch that snowflake on her tongue.

Mom's Visit

The weekend before Halloween we were blessed to have my mom come visit for a few days. She teaches high school business classes so she doesn't get to come whenever she wants (which would probably be more like once a month instead of twice a year). :) We love it when she comes! It is just great to spend time with her since we don't get to be together very often with her living in Utah so we count ourselves very lucky when she can get a weekend away! We are like that with all of our family since we all live in different states.

Our weekend started out Saturday morning at Brandon's soccer tournament. The kids had fun taking walks with Grandma around the soccer field. Brandon's team won their first game, but lost the second. Mom treated us to lunch in between games. Here are some pictures from the day!

Mom, Carli, and Megan.

Daddy and Carli going for a little walk.Here's Brandon going for the ball.Kate really needs some teeth for Christmas. Got any Santa?Carli loved being with Grandma.Sunday we attended church and the kids were rehearsing for the Primary program so my mom was able to sit in and see it since she wasn't able to be here the weekend they performed it. I was glad she got to see the kids all say their parts and hear Kate sing her solo. Mom thought it was pretty great that she could see it! After church we make sugar cookies in the shape of pumpkins and ghosts. The kids had a blast, of course. Carli especially like eating the dough.

Here she is eating it out of the bowl.

She even ate what was stuck to the rolling pin!

Brandon liked "throwing" the dough, like with pizza dough.

Megan covered in flour enjoying her cookie.

I'm so grateful for such a wonderful mom who loves to come and spend time with us and know her grandkids. They all adore her!

Recipe of the week

I posted one of my favorite Thanksgiving recipes for this week on the sidebar. I did not care much for yams or sweet potatoes until I tried this recipe that my Grandma Johnson makes. I hope you try it sometime and love it!

Little Update and Primary Program

I left Thursday afternoon with a good friend and drove down to Austin. Kirsten's hubby had surprised her with a trip down to see me and all our friends in Austin. She and her family moved not long after we did from Austin. They have settled for a little while in Dayton, OH, so it was really exciting to get to see her for a few days! I forgot my camera--me? forget my camera?--YES, i did! :( Kirsten was kind enough to take lots of pictures of our adventures down there and will upload them for me when she gets home so I will post all about our trip when I get the pictures. Warning: there are lots of adorable little babies!

I came back from Austin Saturday night so I could be here for our ward Primary program. I'm so glad I didn't miss it! It was a wonderful day. The entire primary did so well. They sang all the songs and sounded awesome. Kate had a solo on the 2nd verse of I'm Trying to Be Like Jesus and it was so perfect. I could barely hold it together I was so proud of her! Her voice was clear and on pitch and just so beautiful! She didn't even miss a word. As her mom I was just beaming. She is such a talented little girl! I have a whole other post I'm going to do about her.

Megan got up there and said her part perfectly, too. Every time she practiced it at home she would sing the words instead of just say them so when she got up there I was fully expecting her to sing, but thankfully, she just said them the way she was supposed to. It would have been too funny. She has a beautiful voice, too, though! I can't wait to hear my girls singing duets together.

Brandon is who we were most nervous about. Last year it was a nightmare and I had to take him off the stand because of his acting out. He did really great yesterday! Up until the last 5 minutes when he started to get very fidgety he was pretty well behaved. He is one who will not get up to give a talk in Primary and he actually walked up there and said his part with no problem! So all in all it was a very successful program for us!

Recipe of the week

My good friend, Laura, started posting a recipe on her blog and I thought I would copy her because I thought it was a very good idea! I'm not very original so I "borrow" ideas a lot. ;) Thanks La! Hope you don't mind.

Every week I will post one of my favorite recipes on the sidebar there on the left. This week I put a recipe that I found a few years ago in a Tast of Home magazine. I just love it! Try it and let me know what you think. I made it yesterday when we had the missionaries over and they loved it.

Chocolate!

I'm just happy to say that my daughter takes after me and loves chocolate...

This is what I found one day last week when I heard her calling for me from upstairs. She found a little bowl full of chocolate chips her big brother hid up in the game room and she devoured them. Little stinker!

Halloween Fun!

It was quite the eventful day! We had a fun little Halloween party to go to in the morning. The kids played a fun Halloween Bingo game and then made ghost lollipops and decorated a pumpkin sugar cookie. The moms all brought a dish to share so we had some yummy food and lots of chatting going on. Then after I picked up all the kids from school I took them to Hobby Lobby and we picked up some canvas bags and fabric pens so they could decorate their own trick-or-treat bags. They had a blast doing that and were all so proud of their creations! Then it was off to the church for Trunk or Treat. It was the perfect weather for the event and everyone had a great time. Carli got especially excited when she learned the bag was for putting candy in and everyone was just giving it to her! She was so cute in her little witch costume. Brandon was Spiderman again, Kate was Belle, and Megan was Sleeping Beauty. The girls love getting to wear mom's make-up and putting on sparkly powder.

Carli as our little witch. This is my favorite picture.

Megan as our beautiful Sleeping Beauty. Ready to go to the party!Megan and Sydney playing Halloween bingo.Carli sees an airplane while I'm taking pics! She's fascinated by them right now.All the kiddos ready to go trick-or-treating! Brandon playing with a little ball. He could not leave Carli's hat alone. She finally gave up and left it with him.Kate and her good friend at the Trunk or Treat!Carli is ready to fill up her bag!Ben and the girls handing out the last of the candy. The night is a success!
Me and Carli with a mouth full of candy.

Well...

Today is the day...the big 30.

That's all I have to say about that.

I am so behind on blogging this last week. It's been busy!