I recently started reading Harry Potter to the kids. When I was growing up, my dad used to read to me and my brothers. He read us Black and Blue Magic, the Princess Bride, the series for Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and the Lord of the Rings. It’s so fun for me to keep the tradition alive. The older girls especially love this time and always beg for more, and I have been really enjoying the illustrated version of book one with them. It is such a great book!
With people being sick and it being cold outside, we’ve been having a lot of cozy time. Here is Lily reading to Clarissa and Ammon and Mary enjoying the white-boards they got from my mom, in the Christmas bags she gave them.
Lily has decided to start cooking a lot more. She bought tons of groceries and today she made an absolutely delicious cabbage, bean noodle and chicken soup.
Also, the kids continue to dance, and Lydia has been adorable doing choreography with the other kids.
Lily wasn’t feeling well today, so I took the kids to the Darais party. It was so nice to see my extended family and chat with everyone.
Here are a couple parts of the program I captured on video:
We were gone for about 4 hours (party started at 3), so when we arrived home, there was concern that it might be too late to do gingerbread houses. I instructed the kids to give Lily their very best puppy dog faces and see if Lily would oblige. Lily obliged 🙂
We had lots of fun making gingerbread houses and decorating gingerbread cookies!
For Christmas, Clarissa got a new night-light bunny that changes colors when you press buttons on a remote control. Lately I’ve been tucking her in with the remote, and I was tickled to catch this picture:
And speaking of beds, here is Lily being cozy in her gnome sheets which she is completely in love with:
Since I’ve been so busy working on deals for the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate and its starting to get a little less busy, from about 9:30 to 11:30 today, I was with Lily, Ammon and Clarissa and we drove to Big Springs trail in South Fork and walked for about an hour. It was so nice and we loved looking at the ice crystals on the ground.
Afterwards, I went back to work and Lily worked getting the house looking really nice. Also, a tree consultant came over to give suggestions on what trees to plant where and that was really exciting.
In the afternoon, Lily and the kids had a playdate with Amy and her kids, I took my first ride on my mountain bike with my boss, Brandon, and also Clarissa started feeling sick. She’s been super sleepy.
We have really been enjoying our view and the amazing skies we have in Utah.
Lily has had so much joy putting books in place and reading to the kids in our new reading area.
In the evening today, Lily, Lydia, Eli and I went to the most unbelievable concert of young musicians who played concerto pieces with the Utah Symphony Orchestra. It was the most unbelievable evening. Some of the things we got to witness were:
My favorite part was the Tchaikovsky violin concerto. That is one of my all-time favorite classical music pieces. The story behind it is amazing. Tchaikovsky wrote it with the help of his friend/lover shortly after his divorce, which completely devastated him. He didn’t dedicate it to his friend because of how socially unacceptable it was to be gay in Russia (especially at that time). That seemed to have caused a rift between him and his friend, because they didn’t talk again until his friend was dying. He then dedicated the piece to someone else, who rejected the piece and said it was too difficult to play. I think it took about a year for someone to come around who would and could play the piece. It is that difficult to perform! Yet, a teenager (the last performance) performed it perfectly (as far as I could tell). Even without any of the backstory, it would be an incredible piece. It is so melodic and alive, yet also a bit chaotic and fun. I just love it.
Everyone had an incredible time. We were all blown away by the talent.
We have loved being with Basil again (see two pictures below), but this entry is about how my mom and Jay took care of him while we were gone.
When we decided to go travel for the whole month of October, we didn’t totally know what to do for Basil. Worst case, we could leave him at dog boarding, but a month is a crazy long time for that. We figured maybe some friends could help, but we hadn’t lined anything up, and we felt bad about asking because Basil is a handful.
Then came my mom, and without any prompting just offered to take Basil for a month. We were so relieved and so happy to know he would be in a great place. My mom and Jay love animals, and my mom has a great yard for him. Not only did my mom watch him during our trip, but she regularly texted us pictures of our Basil while we were on our trip, which made everyone so happy with each picture and video. It was like little shots of sunshine during our already amazing adventure. It was so thoughtful!
My mom confessed at the end of it all, that it was a bit tough at times, and she did it during one of her busiest times for her tax business. It was such a sweet sacrifice, and we are so so grateful for her help. Below are some of the pictures she sent us.
Lily and I spent most of the day blogging. We were delighted to be invited to Lorilee and Jeff’s Halloween party. We trick-or-treated in their neighborhood after a delicious chili dinner, and it really made us feel like we got to celebrate Halloween. Isn’t their yard beautiful with the fall colors!
