Little MerNaid

Look who's learning to swim?

She says, "I'm swimming like the Little MerNaid!"



It's amazing how different the youngest child is. The older siblings were nervous and skeptical when I first took them to a pool and sent them off with a stranger who immediately dipped their face under water. At each of their first swimming lessons, the other kids clung to me with anxiety and hesitation. Not Quincy. We walked in, she tore off her cover-up, put on her goggles, got right into the pool, stretched out her arms when the teacher prompted her, put her face underwater when the teacher told her to, then looked at me and smiled.
And that was that.
This has been her way with practically everything. She watches her older brothers and sister do things and of course she just does it too. There's never a question in her mind if things are hard or scary. I love it. She is one easy chick.

Rays of Sunshine

It's been a rough week at the Clark household. I can't even talk about it. It has to do with a corrupted hard drive in my laptop. That's all I can say without crying and thinking bad words.
And to make it worse, my BS was out of town for the week :(

BUT. There are little rays of sunshine that bless me when I need to be happy and forget my troubles. These rays come in the form of my 4 little children. On the day I realized the bad news, I wanted to crawl up in bed and cry and feel sorry for myself and angry at myself. But instead I had to get one little girl to her very first dance class...

And one little boy to his Junior Jazz basketball game...

These pictures of Will portray the state of mind I was in that day. I mean really, what mom takes their child to his basketball game to play in snow boots???

Even worse, one boy on his team was going to let Will wear his shoes while he was sitting out and when Will took off his boots....no socks! So I told him he would just have to play in his boots. He wasn't very happy, but he did it! And everyone was really nice not to laugh at him.

Before the game, at home, I was scrambling to get dinner cleaned up, get Sambo picked up from a friend's house and ready for Scouts, and get to the game with the kids on time, all while trying to deal with my new-found tragedy. I put Will's jersey and shorts on him and told him to put on his shoes and get in the car. And that was it. I didn't check. And I know better because he always needs help tying his shoes in double knots.

Yep. I'm an awesome mom.

Watching these 2 kids made me smile so big and laugh so hard and help me forget about the hard things in life.

I'll explain the tragedy sometime soon when I've coped with it better.

New Years Evening

I'm still playing catch-up. I'm posting about New Year's Eve 2 weeks late. But as of yesterday, I think I'm finally getting on top of things for the 1st time in 2 months. Whew!

We returned home from the cabin, unloaded the car, changed clothes, and went straight to our friend's house to bring in 2011. The Rust family knows how to put on a great party! There was a ton of good eating and playing games. We were having so much fun and the kids played together so well that we didn't get home until 1:00 am!

Everyone played "Just Dance 2" on the Wii...even the little folks and the Mamas.


We got so caught up in all the fun that we dang near missed the ball drop. We broke out the confetti poppers, the blowers, and the horns.

Happy Twenty Eleven!

Snowy Birthdays

BS and I have birthdays right after Christmas...27th & 29th. So even when Christmas is over, the party goes on and on (into New Year's Eve). This year, BS spent his big day working and driving all over Salt Lake Valley in a snow storm. He has been very busy with surgeries (everybody trying to get surgery before the end of the year because they've met deductibles). But that's what's nice about the cabin - it's close enough that people can come and go as needed without being a big hassle.
We managed to pull-off a little party for him when he got back that night. We were all so sick of sweets that we just couldn't make a birthday cake; so we used a cookie instead (he likes those more anyway).


We got him some shirts, a sweet toothbrush, and some way ugly trail running shoes. A little birdie told me that he wanted these for his ultra-marathon racing. They are awesome but they are super ugly. He was surprised for sure.

For my birthday we did one of my most favorite activities...SKiiNG!
We went to Snowbasin which is fairly close to the cabin and everybody skiied. It was Ellie and Cambree's first time so they took lessons. They were amazing and well on their way after 30 minutes! Caught on so fast. It was really, really snowy all day but nobody cared. Snowbasin has the best lodge ever - Grandma Cindy hung out inside by the fire and watched baby Cole. Quincy and Bode even went out for some skiing.

Quincy

Sambo and Millie

On the last run of the day, I took Sambo and Millie to the upper lift so we could have a longer, more challenging run. It was so fun! When we got to the bottom they took off their skies and ran inside the lodge, leaving me with all of their gear. I was a little irritated. But when I walked inside the lodge, the whole group was standing there around the table and started singing "Happy Birthday" to me. Millie and Sambo were in on the secret. On the table were huge, gorgeous chocolate cupcakes with snowflakes that the Snowbasin chefs had made. Sooo yummy!



What a perfect way to turn 34!

Cozy Cabin Christmas

Dec. 23, my 3 darling nieces flew in from Minnesota. Our whole family welcomed them at Trolley Square where we went to dinner at The Old Spaghetti Factory. Yum. Then the cousins drew names for who to give a gift to. Each child got $5 hen we went across the street to Smiths Marketplace where they shopped secretly for their Secret Santas. Look who we ran into...

It's Jeremy Evans from the Utah Jazz! He was super nice and soooo tall. Anyway, we exchanged gifts in the corner of the store because the kids couldn't wait. It was lots of fun!

On Christmas Eve day, we loaded my huge car (the Thule on top) with snow gear, ski gear, luggage, coolers, food, gifts, and the kids. Then we headed up to the cabin.

Meanwhile, BS loaded his car with the dogs, his work and school stuff, and more gifts. We were planning on Santa Claus finding us up at the cabin.

The next 6 days were a total fun fest! Take a look:

A photo slideshow by Smilebox

We were originally planning on going to Arizona on my birthday to visit Aunt Sarah and meet new baby Alex, but between the crazy snow storms and BS's busy work deadlines we weren't able to go. That was the only bummer. But BS did meet his number and got a bonus!$

So we stayed up there longer than anticipated but we had a blast and enjoyed being all together. The kids could not have asked for more. Good food, new toys, good fun. Thanks family for a memorable Christmas!

***And thanks Grandma and Grandpa for the Lagoon passes :)

Clark Family Party

I'm trying to get caught up on events from the past couple weeks. I regret not being better at writing down some of the funny and great things my kids did and said. Just the little details that make Christmas so awesome. Now it's all kind-of a blur. Especially the days between Dec. 18th-24th. So busy. I remember going shopping with Grandma Cindy and Aunt Heidi. We stayed downtown overnight and it was the best. I love and "relish" those days we get together.

I also remember a fantastic Christmas party at G and G Clark's house. We always have so much fun together and I love when we all hang out. We played Bingo, Don't Eat Pete, watched a Bowl game (don't remember which one), ate, talked with Santa, and opened presents. Here are pics from the big event:

This slideshow design customized with Smilebox

A night to remember

As everyone knows, the weeks leading up to Christmas are so busy and fun. It was finally Friday...the end of one of those busy weeks and I was looking forward to a night where we had NOTHING PLANNED! The previous night we put on the annual neighborhood get together in which we went caroling, collected donations for the food bank, and ate donuts and hot chocolate. It was tons of fun but super cold. All the neighbor kids did awesome at caroling every doorstep.

Anyway, I finally was going to get a breather Friday night and I was planning on getting the house cleaned and make preparations for Saturday. We were going to be hosting another party, this time for some of our couples friends. But that evening I got a phone call from our home teacher, Matt, who offered us 2 tickets to the Christmas concert with the Tabernacle choir at the Conference center. You know, the one that was featuring David Archuletta and the one where people where selling tickets for $50.00 which were actually free.

I was so torn because I really, really needed to stay home and get some work done. But, I knew that my Millie would LOVE to go see this concert so I knew I couldn't say no. I couldn't turn down the opportunity to go on a mother-daughter date like this, so I accepted his offer.


But soon I realized that ticket holders were supposed to be in their seats no later than 7:00 and I knew from the news that on Thursday night's performance ticket holders were being turned away if they weren't there early. So I started to panic because we still needed to get dressed, meet Matt at his work to grab the tickets, get ourselves downtown in traffic and find a place to park (which isn't easy in downtown SLC in December)!

Once we had the tickets in our hands I got on the freeway at 90th South and I started to feel doubtful that we were going to make it. I weighed my options and thought we should park by The Great America hotel and jump on Trax. We BARELY managed to snag a parking spot and get on the train, down to the second. I pushed Millie in and I got squeezed in the doors as they were closing. It turned 7:00 while we were riding Trax. At that point I told Millie to prepare herself that we probably weren't going to make it in, but I was trying to be positive. Once we reached our stop I grabbed her hand and we ran like the wind. When we reached the grounds of the Conference center, I was sucking air so bad and Millie was coughing hard because it was so cold and we were breathing so hard. We looked ahead and there were 3 GIANT lines of people waiting to get in. We got in one and coincidentally we were right behind one of Millie's friends from dance and her mom. Two minutes later, they started closing the doors. For a second I accepted defeat but then something in me just wouldn't accept it. The dance girl and her mom in front of me started complaining to an usher that her husband/dad were already inside and had seats for them. So the usher told them where to go. I grabbed Millie's hand and we followed them to the door and inside. I didn't say I was with them, I just stood close like we were with them :) Nobody else was let in after us! Phew!

The story goes on but it is getting too long so I will cut to the chase. There were no more seats left and hundreds of people were roaming around desperately looking for a seat. The show was about to start and the workers were ushering the masses to the "overflow" in the Tabernacle. I quickly called Grandma Cindy. She and Grandpa ushered at the Conference center for like 10 years. And it paid off. She gave me some hints and who to look for to name drop. We walked into the main floor and it was dead silent. 20,000 people...silent. President Monson was taking his seat. Amazing. Then the orchestra started to play, the beautiful lights came on, and Millie and I found ourselves sitting front and center, 10 rows back! Some of the reserved VIP seats were not taken so we were escorted to those seats by a man who I am so grateful to.


All of our efforts were soooo worth it! I would not waste so much time explaining the details of our night if we didn't think that it was one of the best performances we have ever seen. It was incredibly awesome! Archuletta couldn't have sang better, and he really is nice looking! The dancers were right next to us in the aisle. I could go on and on. Millie was absolutely loving every second.

Afterward I introduced her to one of my favorite restaurants, Settebello. We got pizza and gelatto. Just her and I. There were events that kept happening getting back to our car and we were laughing our heads off. It was a night to remember, one we won't soon forget.

***THANKS MATT!!!