More Pictures with Santa

This tongue never stays inside Choobie's mouth anymore.  She uses it to concentrate.

Meeting the Big Guy

Yesterday we braved the mall and went to see Santa.  He arrived via helicopter again this year, BUT WE MISSED IT!  We stood in line for an hour to let the girls tell him what they wanted for Christmas.  I know these pictures are really bright, but I love ALL of them- they really capture the everyday looks I see on the girls.  And I think the lighting actually looks cool.  Thanks, Rikki, for the use of your camera!!

Choobs was entertained by a rocking horse at Santa's feet.

AAaah.  Priceless.

I Have Something to Say:

Misery is waking up to the shrieks of your now-five-year-old (at 6:30 am Thanksgiving Day) sitting on the toilet: "Shoo fly!  Don't bother me!" to a gnat.

Bliss is ten minutes later, listening to your five-year-old and her older sister chatting happily in the kitchen, emptying the dishwasher and doing their 'sponsibilities.

Only for You, Kenda!!

This picture shows how I feel about being "tagged," but I'll do it for you, Kenda!

MY 8 FAVORITE TV SHOWS:

umm . . . I don't really watch t.v. very much.  But when I do, I like the following-

Oprah

Studio 5 (a local daytime lifestyle-type show)

Rachael Ray

Curious George (yes, I like it)

uhh.  that's all.  ok.

RESTAURANTS:

Macaroni Grill (love the bread and appetizers, love the entrees, love the dessert)

Tony Caputo's (SLC- yum, yummy Italiano)

Olive Garden (order the Tour of Italy- three meals in one!)

Tuscany (SLC area- bring lots of $$$)

Cafe Pig (GA- pulled pork so good that I bottled the sauce and flew it back to Utah with me.)

Los Hermanos (and, no, I don't go there for the "authentic" Mexican food.  I like the fake kind.)

California Pizza Chicken (love the BBQ chicken salad)

Little America Hotel Breakfast Buffet

THINGS THAT HAPPENED YESTERDAY:

I ran into Karli Haglund from ATL at my favorite boutique, found out she WORKS there (lucky dog), and she ordered in a little birthday surprise for Madeline on the house in their cute little bistro!  We had a maahvelous time, and little Miss Middle felt like a princess with her own little birthday cake on a doily, (which was on a silver tray), frosted to perfection with a tall. lit candle and a Fizzie Lizzy to drink.  (Think Delta Crown Room- Sprite with grenadine on the rocks) with REAL freshly whipped cream in a tall clear plastic cup and a tall straw.  Ah!  I really envied her!  (Madeline)

I packed Madeline up for school with her basket of "corn" (Caramel Rice Krispie Treats wrapped in corn husks) for her pilgrim feast at preschool.  She dressed up in an old-fashioned-looking dress that I wore when I was little.  (And it was also the one I wet my pants in at the Fox Theater in ATL on a third grade class field trip.  Now that was fun!)

I made some MEAN fajitas for dinner.  And I ate the leftovers this morning at 9:55 am.  Close to lunchtime, right??

I attempted to take a nap.  Madeline sNOreS, and Choobers decided for the first time in like a month that she wasn't going to take her afternoon nap.  Yep, it was a POOPER!  (Not that I couldn't take a nap, but the reason for Kensington's naplessness.)

I got to hang out with my hubby!!  Very precious time spent together.

I sang Happy Birthday to Madeline.

I ate chocolate cheesecake.

I almost said to an unmentioned person, "I know you are, but what am I?"

THINGS TO LOOK FORWARD TO:

Bedtime tonight

Seeing Dallas tomorrow

Eating turkey dinner

My next workout

Playing Santa (or should I say, "Mrs. Claus")

Putting on my doggie pj's and curling up with a good book

Chocolate cheesecake leftovers

Spending a day with my family tomorrow

THINGS I LOVE ABOUT FALL:

Crisp air

Apple butter on homemade bread toast

Pumpkin pie and cinnamon smells

Lots of cozy blankets

The holiday season starts

Hee Haw Farms

Orchard apples

Comfort food

ON MY WISH LIST:

All-Clad saute pan 

French lessons

Violin lessons

Living closer to my parents

Stability in the world

A clutter-free life (but then what else would I do all day?)

Can't think of anything else; I enjoy the here and now.

People I Tag:

JT Tolsma

Heather Walker

Amanda Frye (because you really need to update your blog.)

Trina Van Ausdal

Bryn Starr (what's your new last name??)

(Amanda Lewis, I WILL NOT tag you because you have too much going on in your life right now!)

I think this is the last TAG I will ever participate it.  R.I.P.

New Kids Concert Photos (Because I Know You're Dying to See Them)

Sweet little Downs Syndrome fans.  Melts your heart.

If I had traded places with Shayla, I would've been like five people away.  But alas, she didn't offer to trade with me.  So I was more like eight people away.  sniffle.  Joey McIntyre was my imaginary boyfriend in 5th grade.  (The one in front in all black.)

The one in the front right here was my cousin Jessi's boyfriend.  (Or was it Jon?  I can't remember.)  Wait, no.  Our boyfriends were actually the Osmond brothers, who we hooked up with at EFY when we were 14.  Was the New Kids infatuation before or after that???

This is how we felt about the first opening act.  Really lame cover band. 

Overall a lot of fun!!

New Kids on the Block Concert

I don't know if this concert is necessarily blog-worthy, but we had an interesting night!  It was Lisa's 50th, and Allana (Dallas' cousin) bought six tickets to go see the New Kids show, so all of the Matthews girls went for a girls night out.  It was me, Shayla, Meridith, Lisa, and Allana.

You may not remember this about me, but when I was little, I was a HUGE NKOTB fan.  (See, I even use their initials like we're on a first-name basis.)  I collected their trading cards and pins, had their posters, went to their concert in 5th grade (Yeah, it's been twenty years.  Literally.)  Luckily, the whole infatuation died down, and when Allana invited us, it felt like more of a joke than anything.  Little did I know that New Kids on the Block has a SERIOUS following of hysterical fans.  And they have a new album- did not know that either.  And they have a really BAD opening act, whose name will go unmentioned because she is NOT worth mentioning.  Although their second opening act was Natasha Bedingfield, who is a DOLL.  I loved her.  Too bad it was too loud to really hear her music.

I have to say that they really built up the anticipation before they came onstage, and I think I was screaming like I did back in the 5th grade!  (Only this time my mom and Nate weren't there.  Poo.)  I didn't brush up on any of the songs beforehand, but they all came back to memory when the New Kids started singing!  It was hilarious!  I was in a constant cycle of screaming like a die-hard fan, laughing at the stupidity of it all, plugging my ears from near-deafness, and covering my eyes when they threw in their Michael Jackson moves.  It was a blast.  But funny enough, we ended up leaving a little early because it started getting pretty suggestive and inappropriate.  Not the squeaky-clean boy band I remember.  And I stayed up til 2:00 am telling Dallas all about it.  (Not a good way to prepare for the Sabbath.)  But we were glad we could take Lisa out for her crazy 50th!)  Happy Birthday!

Oh.  How could I forget?  We sat on like row 38 on the floor- really good seats.  But even better: in the middle of the show, they came up out of the floor RIGHT next to us.  We were like 8 or 10 people away.  So close that I made EYE CONTACT with them.  And then the security guards started roping off a path for them to run back up onto the stage, and we were on the front row for that and got to touch their hands as they ran by!  Hilarious.  I think I must be a little infatuated still because I'm going on and on about this.  ha ha ha  Check out the video.  It was fun.  Thanks, Allana!

I feel so empowered!

I just hacked into Dionne's blog (okay, she gave me the username and password...) so I'm going to play a little guessing game for you all to guess who I am! Here are some little known facts about me:

1. When I was 14, my brother let me drive his rental car to a friend's house. (don't worry, I had him and another brother in the car, telling me how to drive...not that it makes it any better...)
2. When I was little, we had the missionaries over for dinner on my birthday, so they were there when I opened presents. I got this cool waxy stuff that you can make artwork out of, but before I could open it, one of the missionaries took it out of my hands and opened it and started playing with it! Shocking, I know!
3. I have a secret desire to become a potter. I love working with clay and I just loved my ceramics class in high school.
4. I used to work for used-car dealerships, taking pictures of cars and putting window stickers up with all the information about each car. My favorite place to do that was at the Jaguar and Mercedes dealerships in Salt Lake. Obviously.
5. I LOVE spaghetti.
6. When I was little, I had crazy crazy crazy hair.
7. Here's one that NO ONE KNOWS. When I was in 3rd grade, I had a crush on Benjamin Creighton. He was in a different class than me. In the mornings before school, we would sit in the commons area and have announcements and stuff. One day I decided to write him a little love note and put my phone number on it. I did, and took it to school. I had a bunch of kids pass the note along to him. Later on that day, my friend Ashley told me that Ben was going to be waiting outside by the bathrooms in 10 minutes and that he wanted to talk to me. I went out to the bathroom but he wasn't there! So I went inside the bathroom to avoid it all and I waited in there so long because I was so afraid, and when I came out, he wasn't there. Scarred me for life... Just kidding! But it's kind of an embarrassing story now...eeek.
8. My favorite color is yellow, my favorite movie is You've Got Mail, my favorite season is summer, my favorite candy is skittles and dark chocolate, my favorite band is Sigur Ros.

WHO AM I?

Quick Quotes

Madeline: "I like when people trace my feet because it tickles a little and feels good."  

Raleigh: "This owie on my arm used to be on my wrist, but now it's down here because my arm grew."

True Love is . . .

waking up at 6:15 am to cut Dallas' hair.  

Dionne, you are one cool wife.

(This is actually Dionne typing.  But Dionne, you are nice.)

More Sad Photos

Here are some more sad photos of Tinkerbell.  I think we might just have to recreate Halloween and try to take some new ones.  Of course now there's 6 inches of snow on the ground, and our pumpkins are frozen solid.  That big puffy thing that Madeline is holding is the end of her wand.  We'll get some pictures of Raleigh in here, too.

By the way, Madeline got lots of "Milky Wave," "Butterfoot," and "Nestle Crutch" in her stash.

A Happy Halloween (with sad pictures to show for it)

I spent hours and hours working on the girls' Halloween costumes, and these pictures are what we have to show for it.  sad  Something is obviously wrong with our camera.  And I couldn't get the pictures to upload to iPhoto to rotate them either.  Well, I've been wanting a new camera anyway.  sad sad  My mom made Madeline's cute Tinkerbell costume, and I made the wings (with a little help from Dallas), her slippers, wand, and ring.  (I will try to keep working with the pictures so you can see them better, k, Mom?)  I made Raleigh's complete costume, and Kensington's for that matter, and Rikki got Raleigh her cute witch's broom.

Dallas put together his own costume for our Ward party.  I'm not sure if he was a prince or a footman, but  I thought he sure looked good in my jacket!  (I was some kind of princess.) We had a ton of fun, and we're excited for all of the other holidays, too.  Can you tell I'm not in the mood to blog??  Sorry.  Just had to get these so-called pictures on here.

Our sweet puffy butterfly.  (In its second round of use- Madeline wore it when she was little.)

Tinkerbell and the Butterfly

Two Sweethearts