New Moon

So here is Shawn and Michelle doing the door prizes. Things like Edward clocks and other souvenirs that said things like "I heart men who sparkle."
Note Michelle's temporary neck and face tattoos.
I was super impressed with their enthusiasm and planning. They made it really fun.

I took this picture of Nathaniel and turns out he really is a vampire.
All the men present got a box of Junior Mints just for being manly enough to show up.
You go Nathaniel!!

Lily had a stats exam and a blind date the following day. I'd haven't heard how those went yet.

The best part of the night was our VIP passes. I passed through the hoards of people waiting in line fighting the urge to say, "Ummmm..excuse me, VIP coming through."

Now for the truth. (Don't read this is you are a fan.
Truly, I have more friends than not that love, love, love these books.)

My expectations were not high, but New Moon was possibly the worst, most poorly acted, pathetically scripted movie I've ever seen. Lily and I shook with silent laughter until we cried, which kind of made me feel bad because the girl next to me was actually crying. Our favorite parts were the floating images Bella would see of Edward. When the wolf first appeared it felt awfully reminiscent of the scene in "The Neverending Story." We were all wondering when this movie was going to be over. Of course, to be fair, sitting in the front row wrenching our necks and backs (not to mention our pride) was getting a little old too.

I gotta say I liked the first one quite a bit more. Maybe because of the whole new romance experience. Funny thing is Lily, Sarah, Nathaniel and I went to that one together too, and Lily wasn't even living here then.

Let's face it, Jake's ripped bod was the only redeeming quality. Every time we saw his shirtless self Lily and I would say, "Well, hello there."

Now I can say I've been to a midnight premiere. I think once in my life is going to be more than sufficient for me. And I was also happy to come home and climb into bed with my own very pale man.
Plus, BONUS, he's warm.

Twilight Saga

Two friends in my ward rented out a theater for New Moon tonight. I called to ask one of them yesterday, "By the way, when is the movie at?" 12 AM??!!
I guess I was the only one who hadn't clued in to the fact that it actually comes out for the first time tomorrow at 12:01. Sarah doesn't know we're going. I'm waking her up in 1/2 an hour. She doesn't know it but she won't be going to school tomorrow. I can only imagine her disappointment. It might as well be Christmas.
They are having a big party with door prizes and everything. As I have shared before I'm not a fan of the books but I enjoyed the last movie well enough. (With the exception of the referral to the Spider Monkey comment--was that bad or what?) I thought if nothing else it would be a really fun experience for Nathaniel and Sarah. Lily is going with and we are all going to go to IHOP after. Looking forward to Jake's rippling muscles--I hear we'll see a lot of them.

Lily says her favorite line is, "You're my own personal brand of heroine."
Gotta love pathetic woman fantasy.

Rebecca turns 9

Rebecca's birthday was on the 13th. We did the cowgirl theme because as everyone knows that is her future aspiration in life. She came home from school to brand new genuine cowgirl boots.
We played shoot the pop cans with the dart gun, taffy pulling, decorated sugar cookie sheriff stars, and the a massive scavenger hunt. My favorite thing is to make the kids run up and down the stairs--basement, upstairs, basement, main floor, garage, upstairs, basement...They had 18 places they had to go and it ended up in John's closet where I put cowgirl bags I made with fabric tied with rafia and a sheriff badge (very cute and easy). One kid just gave up and sat on the couch waiting for them to find the prize. Then they went outside and found Rebecca's new bike.

Of course John was mad all day that it wasn't his birthday. Sometimes I dread him getting a birthday invitation because he throws a fit of envy every time.

By the way, remind me again why I always insist on cleaning house before the party?

Bridal Veil Falls

A few weeks back we finally went to Bridal Veil Falls. It was cold and started to rain, but here is a picture of the kids having the time of their lives.

And could someone identify this little guy? We caught him and let him go after we all got to examine him. He's not a mouse--maybe a mole? He had a flat little tail.

Lily

If I'm making chocolate pudding and you ask me for some I'll probably give it to you.
But only if I can feed you myself.

Annie came

Did I mention that "Annie" was my favorite movie when I was a kid?
I never knew how soon it would be I would actually have one of my own--


Rebecca was Annie for Halloween. I did the hair and found the dress at DI for $10.
I thought she was a slam dunk.

the man of my life

Ever go downstairs to your husband's home office and wonder about the person you married?

Me neither.

Visit to my hairdresser

Got my hair colored and trimmed. I have to go pretty red because it always fades quite a bit.
I've actually stayed with the same hairdresser since moving here, which is pretty good for me because I'm not so loyal that way--like hairdresser cheating or something. But Lacey has been really good and BONUS only two minutes from my house.
Plus she always tells me I'm "darling" when I'm done so that helps too:)

Yuuki and Nathaniel

Sarah got this cute pic of them sleeping in the car

Nathaniel and Yuuki really hit it off. Nathaniel drug him along everywhere. They went down to play basketball at the park, fed him American candy until he was pretty well done with it, played video games, and forced him onto rides he wasn't interested in riding at the amusement park just to watch him panic. Sweet teenage humor.
Yuuki had never been on a trampoline, a wake board, or skates before. He was very timid with the tramp testing it out with his foot. Nathaniel even put him on the jumping stilts. He did surprisingly well holding onto the fence for balance.

I kept having to tell Nathaniel not to knock on Yuuki's door because the poor kid was exhausted. The students just go go go and never get a chance to recover from jet lag before they are off again for Japan. Yuuki would go to sleep almost instantly when he got into the car.

Several had swine flu before they left Utah and many more got it before they went to Disneyland. Out of 260 boys 70 of them ended up with swine flu-like symptoms before they left. Apparently they brought it with them somehow--maybe on the planes or something. They said nothing like this has ever happened before in all the years they have been doing this. Thankfully Yuuki didn't get it. We recently got this email from him:

Dear Mitchell Familly

Thank you very much for hosting me.

The time which I had with you was very fun.

This experiece is my best treasure.

If I have a chance,I want to stay in America for a longer time.

Because Japan is wonderful country if you have opportunity to come to Japan,please contact me.

I'm looking forward to seeing you someday!

Today is Nathaniel's birthday!

Happy birthday to Nathaniel!!

It will be a wonderful year for you!!

Your sincerely,

Yuuki

Fall

Took these pictures a couple of weeks ago. All my good intentions of getting better pics of fall this year failed, but at least I got ones of the house.
Fall goes so fast!

Hair again--gone tomorrow

(after)

Chopped my hair off again. Can't decide whether I like it or not. Sometimes I like it and sometimes I forget I cut it all off and shock myself as I walk by the mirror.
It really is quite short. When my hairdresser Lacey was cutting it I was thinking "hmmmm...she just keeps on cutting."
But I figured she had a vision in mind and I don't have a whole lot to lose anyway as you can see here-- (of course I also look somewhat exhausted/bored out of my mind as well...)

(sometime before)

My dainty feet

Nathaniel feet, no polish--Mom feet, pink polish:)

I have big feet, which only got bigger when I had my kids. Size eleven. They look like boats compared to normal feet.
However, my son's feet make them look almost small, or at least normal (though from this picture still very, very white)

We went to buy him roller blades for his birthday and had to order them online because Big 5 doesn't carry rollerblades in size thirteen.

My 13 year old son (14 tomorrow) wears a size 13 shoe and is now taller than his dad. I swear to you I just bought him shoes in size 12 no more than two or three months ago.
His friend Cameron says he's a "manchild."
I thought that was a good way of putting it.

Yuuki

Our exchange student has now come and gone. It was fun and the kids absolutely loved it. A lot of work though driving him here and there. We took him for American hamburgers--he inhaled them. He ate pizza, Mexican food, spaghetti (his favorite) and tried pumpkin custard. Our friends hosted a birthday dinner for him on Sunday. Took him to the mall where he didn't find anything but then we stopped at Wal Mart where he bought $300+ worth of Yugio(sp?) cards, which are apparently a lot cheaper here in the US. Peter and Lily took the kids and Yuuki to Lagoon to ride on all the roller coasters and Nathaniel said the best part was listening to him scream. Sunday we went to Temple Square.

I think one of the fun parts was teaching him to play card games like 5 Crowns and Skip-O. But the best was carving pumpkins, something he had never done. He was hesitant to pull out pumpkin guts but got really into the whole process of carving. We mistakenly bought pumpkins this year that were as hard as rocks! Yuuki's was the worst! We had to pound in a screw driver just to get some some of the cuts started. It was like sawing wood! Poor Yuuki must think we are all crazy Americans. They don't have Halloween in Japan.

Nathaniel showed him off to all his friends and they came over and asked him a bunch of questions. It was very cute. He spoke very limited English. Half the time we weren't even sure if we had really understood each other and then we ended up speaking broken English to every one else out of habit.

The only bummer was getting him up every morning. We set two alarms for him but he would just sleep right through them. We would stand outside his door and knock and yell his name and once Nathaniel just went in and turned on the light. The first night he slept on top of the blanket because he didn't get that he was supposed to pull them back. He didn't know how to use the shower and was puzzled by the automatic doors on our van. He also insisted on washing his clothes every night, even though he had plenty to go three or more days.

The last morning he had to be out the door by 6:15am to catch their bus to Salt Lake Airport and we were all pushing him to move. It was totally futile. We didn't even get him to emerge from his room until 6:05. I was ready to tear my hair out worrying he would be late, but Peter drove to BYU in good time and got him on the bus at the last minute. No tears this time, thank goodness, though I know he was not looking forward to going home. Too much fun!