Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was held at Robert's parents house this year. It was a small get together with the grandparents, Uncle Brent and Aunt Deb as well as their youngest daughter Sadie. We had a wonderful meal and enjoyed spending time with everyone. The kids were their usual bundles of energy. After dinner we got the privilege of listening to Sadie play the piano. She has only been taking lessons for about seven months but sounds like she has been taking for at least a couple of years. She is so talented!

The best part of Thanksgiving dinner at Mike and Vicki's has got to be the pies. There were 7 pies for 12 people! Vicki made the lemon, caramel, cherry, and pecan pies. I made my famous chocolate mousse and a pumpkin pie. Deb made her famous banana cream pie. Brent surprised us all by making his old fashion raisin cookies. They were all so yummy! (And yes I had a little slice of them all by the end of the day).

Of course, no family get together would be complete without the traditional Stephenson "cream" puffs. They call them cream puffs but I have never tasted cream like this! Hold on to your hats folks--the "cream" is a mixture of cheese whiz and miracle whip. The "cream" is then piped into a pastry puff and topped with icing and chopped nuts! Every year the family tells me I'll get use to them. Even after 10 years I still can't eat them. Yuck!!!

The highlight of the dinner was the turkey table decorations the kids and I had made. Even Grandpa Karren ate his! I just love the holidays!!

Happy Halloween! I know it's past but I didn't get my pictures posted on Sunday like I planned. This week was a little less stressful than last.


We carved pumpkins at Grandma's house on Saturday the 25th. Here is a picture of the kids in front of all the pumpkins. After carving pumpkins we headed to the ward Fall Festival and annual chili cook off. I made some chili with no intent of winning the contest. I just knew they needed more chili. The primary had sugar cookies for the kids to decorate. They thought it was great!

I thought it was fitting that we woke up Halloween morning to a bright orange sunrise. How lucky am I that I have a view like this from my front door.

Ellie dressed up like Cinderella (or Cinder-Ellie as I like to call her) and Micah was Anakin Skywalker. The weather was perfect for trick or treating. The businesses downtown let kids trick or treat at their stores during the day. I took the kids after picking up Micah from preschool. Micah could have walked up and down Main Street for hours getting candy. Ellie kept asking when we were going to be done. Next year I think I will take the wagon. Later that day we went to the ward trunk or treat. Both kids loved it and came away with a haul of candy. Micah's bucket was so full the handle broke!

Here's another picture of CinderEllie. I took this right after I did her hair and makeup in the morning. Yes I let her wear makeup. She was in heaven!

After the trunk or treat we took the kids to see all the grandparents. Ellie fell asleep on the way home. I couldn't resist taking this picture. It pretty much sums up the day.

Are you surprised I'm updating my blog!!!!

Holy Cow!!!! That is all I have to say. The last month has been the craziest month ever in my entire life. I can't even begin to tell you everything that has been happening. I'm just going to give you some highlights. At the end of September I was called as 1st counselor in the primary presidency at church. Shortly thereafter our ward split. My brother in law got married October 3rd and I am now done with course work at school. I started my internship this week. I will be completely done with my masters in November of '09. So yes, that means I will be in my internship for the next year. I have to complete a minimum of 1000 hours to graduate and I have to take a year to do it. I just discovered the world of Facebook this past week. I have been having a blast catching up with so many of my old friends. For those of you that have a Facebook page, look us up. Robert and I both have one. Needless to say, life is good but it's busy.

I was getting ready for the day when the phone rang. When I went back into the bathroom I found Ellie helping herself to my makeup bag. She loves to wear lipstick.

Our cute little family at the wedding.

Micah and Ellie had so much fun at the "party." They loved getting all fancied up!

First Day of School

Micah started kindergarten on August 25th. I didn't cry but I did have to hold back some tears. Ellie wanted to stay with him. Kindergarten around here is only 2 1/2 hours! Micah's preschool was longer than that! Anyway, Micah seems to be enjoying it. I didn't realize that they gave out homework in kindergarten. Public school has changed so much since I went. Here are some pictures of the first day of school. Micah had to have Spiderman shoes and a Transformer (Bumble Bee-specifically) backpack. He's growing up so fast!

I know, I know, I'm slacking again!!!!

So the last 6 weeks have been the busiest weeks of my entire year so far. Let me fill you in. I just got done with the most time consuming class of my masters program-Dependency and Addictions. It wasn't that the content was hard...we just had a lot of homework. We had two assignments due each week plus about 150 pages of reading each week. I learned a lot in the class but I am sure glad it's over. Two more classes left and then it will be time to start my internship!!!! I can't wait!!!!

So in the middle of my addictions class we took a vacation to Brian Head (southern Utah) the week of the 4th. For those of you who don't know Brain Head is a ski resort in Southern Utah close to Cedar City. Why go to a ski resort in the summer? For the fireworks of course! They had the most awesome fireworks display I have ever seen! (Erin- you guys will have to take the kids next year.) It was good to see my brother and his family and spend some time with my folks and my Grandma. My brother drove up from Arizona and my parents and grandma flew into Vegas and drove up. It was so fun! My parents were kind enough to watch the kids one day for us so Robert and I could go to Zion's National Park for some hiking. Zions was gorgeous and we had a blast hiking. On the way back down from the cliff it started to pour down rain. We got absolutely soaked! I wish we would have stopped someone to take our picture. I'm sure we looked like drowned rats. It was so much fun!!!

After our trip to Brain Head we had to return to real life. Robert took off for basically two weeks for a couple of business trips while I played the single parent and tried to catch up on some hours at work. Micah had swim lessons at that time too (which he loved). Also during the last six weeks I have been busy trying to get our yard done. Who knew that trying to hire someone to put in a sprinkling system and plant some grass would be so difficult! The phone had to be surgically removed from my head by the time it was over.

Now things have slowed back down to a somewhat normal speed just in time for me to get Micah ready for kindergarten in about three weeks. Where has the summer gone?? I didn't get near the things done I wanted to this summer. Oh well, such is life! Enjoy some pictures from our trip.

My nieces and my kids enjoying the 4th of July parade in Parawon.

Robert and I attempting to take our picture at Zion's (before it rained).

The beautiful Golden Columbines in Zions. We saw white Columbines at Cedar Breaks.

Zion's just before the storm.

Zion's after the storm.

Cedar Breaks at sunset.

More Guy Stuff....

Kind of looks like I need to do my own blog here. I never thought that I would ever have more to say than Heather. Oh well. Heather has been so involved with school projects, finalizing her internship, working a few days a week for a counseling center in Logan, and..... chasing the little hoodlems around. There is just no time.
The other night we put our weekly Netflix movie in and she was out in less than 10 minutes. Sleep is a luxury sometimes, even during Rush Hour 3.

OK, on to the guy stuff...


My brother Anthony and I took time off a few weeks ago to run down to the new Miller Motorsports Park in Tooele to watch the Utah Grand Prix. They have 4 or 5 different race series that compete all in one day. We got there around 9am and stayed until nearly 6pm. I don't know why watching cars race is such an addiction. Must be the tiresmoke-loudexhaust-180mph-racegassmelling male gene.

One of these days we are going to invest in one of the 3 day race-car-driving-schools that they offer there at the track. Let me emphasize invest. Last time I checked it was around 3 grand for the whole package. Ok you're right, I'll keep dreaming...

Here's a few photos and video of the cars and racing..

Race School Cars

Corvette from the American LeMans GT1 class

Audi R10 Turbo Diesel LMP1 Class

SCCA GT Class Racing

Ellie's B-day!

Make a Smilebox slideshow