Sledding

Snow Days

Monday we had a dusting of snow and the kids loved sledding and throwing snowballs. Since Monday we have had six inches of snow come and go then come again. Phil built a snowman with the kids yesterday and today we are getting ready to go out and do some more sledding and take a walk to the library for a movie for this evening. Lyla's birthday is today and she is enjoying having her brother and sister here at home with her and all the snow that came for her gift. I love having school out for the snow and enjoying time together outside.

Conversation

Last night Phil and I were playing cards with some friends and he brought up a conversation we had a few nights ago, when he said to me (not about me), "I wonder at what age you realize you are no longer attractive to anyone." Our friend responded with, "yeah, like women in their 30s and 40s because they peak in their 20s." I laughed as he tried to back out of that one because Phil and I were talking about 60s and 70s and coming up with women and men that we found attractive at this age that hadn't had any form of plastic surgery (or none that we were aware of) and that we didn't know personally so we could judge them based only on their appearance. I could come up with some men, but he could not come up with a single woman. He did say that it was easy to think of women who were older and beautiful if you knew them and that some women did carry themselves really well. I guess I am hoping I age gracefully and when I do realize that I am no longer attractive to anyone I am wrong because Phil will always find me attractive.

Talents

Phil and I have an ongoing discussion that started one FHE while we were teaching the kids about the parable of the talents. We have talked about how we continue to develop talents throughout our lives. Phil believes wholeheartedly that anyone can develop every talent if they work hard enough. Being a person that got A's in art class not because the apple looked so much like an apple, but because the teacher knew I worked really hard to make the apple look as close to an apple as I could. I am also the person that in O-chem had to use the 3D models in order to draw out the dash, line and wedge for the molecules. I cannot see things in my head and tell my hands how to put them down on paper. Phil believes that is because I don't take the time to practice and I believe it is because I do not have this capability. Sometime I wonder how I married an artist and a guy who really can do all things. I guess it is nice that he really believes I could do all things if I really wanted to, but loves me despite my half-hearted efforts to develop these talents.
I have been trying to help my kids develop their talents and since Phil is such an artist and I see the kids really loving drawing, painting and creating I have been trying to provide the opportunities for these talents to grow. We have taken our trips to the craft store for drawing supplies this Christmas vacation and Cannon is loving his sketchbook. Lyla asked me to draw a cat the other day...then she said that doesn't look like a cat and she would ask dad to draw her one when he got done with work.

Oh, December

Well we got Jamie to do our family pictures again this year and love the way they turned out. We have been super busy with things going on this December and we got a new computer that I have yet to figure out how to get the pictures off the camera so I thought I would post these family ones and once I can get the other ones off I will post later.

We started off the month with Miya's 9th birthday and she loved having a party with some of her friends. Then Phil and I headed out to California for his company Christmas party. We were able to see Ashlee and enjoy some sunshine and time at the beach. We got home in time to pick up the kids and head down to Oregon for a few days for one of Phil's office parties. The kids got to play laser tag with all Phil's employees and they loved it. Plus they got out of school for three days and swam in the hotel pool so it was a great mini vacation. Last week we were up at the temple for two days with the Babbel's for Shleby's wedding. The sun was out and the weather was beautiful for wedding pictures at the temple.

The weather stayed beautiful for our Christmas Eve half marathon and I thought during the run that it is pretty hard to complain about the sun in your eyes on December 24th in Olympia Washington. Phil injured his knee about 5 weeks ago so he has been taking it easy on the runs and he said he was going to go slow for the half. I was secretly planning on beating him so when he took off right at the beginning I was determined to stick with him. I had no idea how fast we were going, but I was going to stay right behind him, because he was "going slow". The race was out and back and not marked well so around mile 6 it felt like and eternity to get to the turn around point. Then around mile 11 I had to make a dash to the trees...which were leafless and right on the main road in Littlerock Washington. I finally found a place with some blackberry bushes and then was back on track. Phil was out of sight at this point I was still waiting for him to "go slow". I was so tired at this point that I fell in behind this older man in a green t-shirt and I kept thinking "if he can do it so can I". Needless to say I slowly made it to the finish line (that was not really marked and had two teen aged kids with a stop watch) to find out that I beat my time from September and I was SOOOO tired because my pace was faster than I had been training for. Phil and I slowly hobbled back to the car to race home to meet the Phillip's for Christmas Eve eating and game playing. I ate too much and realized Christmas morning at I stood on the scale that running 13.1 miles does not mean that I can eat everything I want while sitting around playing cards. Phil finished the race at around (remember the two teenage kids with the stop watch and the unmarked finish line) 1:42 and I followed after at 1:44.