You Can Learn A Lot of Things in Sacrament Meeting...

Last Sunday, my mother and brothers and I went to hear my dad speak in a different ward. It was a great meeting, and we all really learned a lot from Homely's talk, but my mom and I ended up coming away with some other, non-gospel related info as well.

During the meeting, we watched a cute young mother entertain her adorable little girl with some really clever homemade crafty thingies.

Now, I am not usually a fan of homemade crafty thingies, no matter how clever. I don't have most of the skills necessary to make crafts, so attempting to do so (or even thinking about attempting to do so) can cause me great stress.

But these particular crafty things seemed like the types of things my niblets would enjoy and, since I am in the middle of Christmas break and therefore relatively school-stress-less, I thought I would give them a go.

The first crafty thingy was a little color matching game. I stopped by the hardware store and picked up some of paint sample cards, clothes pins, and clear contact paper.

The contact paper is optional, but I thought using it to laminate the cards might help them last a little longer.
My nieces were kind enough to test-drive the matching game for me. I know they look less than impressed in the photo below, but that is just because they were concentrating.

I think.

Serious pondering faces not-with-standing, I think the color matching thingy was a success. Although, I am hoping they will leave out the victory cheers when they play during church.

The other cute craft that the cute little mom had for her cute little daughter was a felt version of a classic root vegtable-based toy.

Because the root vegtables, body parts, hair pieces, and clothes are all made of felt, they stick really well on the fronts of church benches, the backs of church benches, and on the suits of any brethren who may be sitting on church benches.

I may have had a little too much fun making pieces for this little quiet game, but the girls seemed to enjoy the variety.

Even without church benches (or suits) on which to stick the little guys, they were fun to build.

After figuring out how quick, easy, and stress-less these crafty things turned out to be, I am seriously considering making a few sets of potatoes and color games to use in the nursery for our stake Relief Society meetings.

The only problem with that plan is that I might be tempted to spend time playing with the crafty thingies in the nursery instead of helping with the actual meeting. The felt root veggies are especially addictive. Even when they are chickens and penguins and root vegtables.

Like I said, I may have had just a little bit too much fun with these.

Me, having fun with a craft? It's a Christmas miracle!

Letters to Santa

So, you know how I know a lot of famous and important people? Well, a few weeks ago, one of my celebrity friends asked me for a little favor. It seems that, during this time of year, he gets tons of mail (literally TONS) and needed a little help writing replies.

I would have loved to help him myself, but I have been kind of busy trying to do my own Christmas-Prep. Not wanting to leave my dear, old friend in the lurch, I volunteered the services of my honor's English kidlets.

Honor's English kidlets come in handy. They make great pack-mules when things have to be moved from one classroom to another. I also like to send messages around the school via carrier kidlet every now and then.

But for this little service project, the kidlets were writing letters instead of delivering them. It seemed my good buddy Santa had an over abundance of letters from our local 3rd graders, so they helped out by answering some of them for him.

My kidlets were a little apprehensive at first, and it took a bit of convincing that Santa had actually answered the letters they wrote in 3rd grade. He was just a little to busy this year to answer the letters from this group of tots.

The letters (both to and from Santa) turned out so cute, I decided to share some of them with you. The third graders names have been changed, but their spelling errors have not. Enjoy!

Dear Santa,
You should come to my house because I am a good person. One fantastic thing I do is clean and windex the bathroom every Saturday. Most of the time I do it with out a hassle. Another great thing I do is vacume. I vacume the living room and bathroom carpet. I even vacume around the edges. Last, I shovel snow. Sometimes I do it with out being asked. Clearly I am an excellent person, so please fly your sleigh to my house on christmas eve.
Sincerely,
Chase

Dear Chase,
Thank you so much for your letter! I am glad to see that you help out your family by doing all of that work. You’re a very good vacuum-er. Also, it is good that you do it without being asked because that shows that you are a very responsible child and shows that you can have more freedom as you get older. I have been watching you and I think that you are a great student. The elves say “hi” too. Keep up the good work Connor! By the way, the reindeer have been working out even more so that they can pull the presents extra fast this year.

Merry Christmas!
Santa



Dear Santa,
Please travel to my roof because I have been great. I try to do my best. Some of my songs from piano lessons are very hard. I try my best to make it sound right. Next, I try new foods. I once tried oysters. I am also very truthful because I rarely lie. Finally, I am very helpful. I do the laundry, my chores, and when my mom is subbing I help her during recess instead of going outside. I am not perfect, but there are four things I do well, so please come to my house on Christmas Eve.
Love,
Adam

Dear Adam,
Thank you so much for your letter! It sounds like you have been really good and helpful. I bet that
Oyster tasted delicious! I love playing you can get it per the piano too. It is hard sometimes, but if you keep practicing you can get it perfect. My elves say that they heard you playing the piano once and it sounded fabulous! Keep up the good work. I checked my nice list twice and you are on it! Be sure to stay on the nice list and I will do my best to come to your house on Christmas Eve.

Merry Christmas!
Love, Santa

Dear Santa,
Please fly over to my cottage because there are many ways I’ve been very fantastic this year. One great thing I do is put my dishes above the dishwasher without being asked. As soon as I am done eating, I pick up my dishes and take care of them. Another plus about me is that I eat most of my dinner every night. That keeps my mother from getting cranky. Finally, I try to be helpful to my teacher often. Yesterday I took the class back to the room to get their library books, and I locked the door after them. I have been great, so please come to my house.
Love,
Katie

Dear Katie,

I have been keeping an eye on you through my magic snow globe and I am very proud of you for doing the dishes without being asked! That is very good of you to help your mother out. Putting your dishes away after you eat is very good manners. Here at the North Pole, my elves put their dishes away after eating a big meal Mrs. Claus made for us. I am so proud of you for eating most of your dinner! Eating all or most of your dinner is very healthy for your body. Please keep helping your teacher with all of the things she has to do. Keep up the good work! I am watching your good deeds.
Merry Christmas!
Santa Claus

Dear Santa,
Please visit my home because I have been mega cool. I have been a very responsible person doing my chores without being asked. I clean my room and help start loads of laundry. I have been great at trying new things such as sushi and fried spam. Both of them were super delicious. Last, defiantly but not least, I’ve been truthful. When I think I might get into trouble, I don’t lie to get out of it. I may not be perfect, but I have been super awesome, so please visit my house this Christmas eve.
Love,
Brittany

Dear Brittany,
I will be visiting you home. I am very happy that you are being responsible. Thank you for doing your
chores and helping do laundry. Sushi and spam are delicious, they are my favorite foods. Thank you for being truthful and responsible. Truthful kids are my favorite I’m proud of you for being such a good girl this year. The reindeer and elves are getting ready for Christmas Eve. So I will be seeing you in a couple of weeks.
Thank you so much for your letter!
Merry Christmas!
Your friend,
Santa Claus

A Tale of Two Christmas Parties

'Tis the season for Christmas parties!

The Woodhouses hosted our Family Home Evening Christmas Dinner last night and it was the perfect combination of beautiful, spiritual, and belly-laugh-inducing funny.
The side splitting laughs came courtesy of the white elephant gift exchange and, while the gifts themselves were pretty funny, the truly hilarious part was the accompanying poetry.

Everyone wrote a poem that correlated with the gift they were contributing, and the poems were sooooooooo stinkin' funny. Almost as funny as President Jones being so entertained by the boa-wearing gift that Kristy ended up with.

The pajamas that Brother Woodhouse ended up with were pretty fun too. I wonder how many other Potato Council honchos wear Micky Mouse jammies?

Then tonight I went to my ward Christmas party. Now, I have been to a lot of ward parties and many of them have been pretty unique. I can honestly say, however, that this was the only ward party that I have ever attended that started off with a "happy hour" wherein the bishopric served drinks. Seriously, they walked around with trays of ginger ale and cranberry soda and offered people drinks as they mingled.

One of my two fabulous home teachers, who is also the ward executive secretary, was one of the bar tenders.

His lovely wife is our wonderful Relief Society President, and had the assignment to help with the party decorations. After listening to some good natured teasing from the High Priests about the Relief Society's propensity for going above and beyond the call of decorating duty, she decided to view the whole situation as a challenge. The resulting cranberry ice sculptures were the stuff ward legends are made of.
And speaking of legendary party moments, word had been going around for about a week that there would be a special surprise guest performance during the program. Sue was helping with a lot of the music, but she wouldn't spill the beans on who the Very Special Guest would be.

There were plenty of guesses: Members of the Mo-Tab? David Archuleta? Donny and Marie?

But as cool as it might have been to have those famous LDS performers show up, our real Very Special Guests ended up being even more well known and beloved... at least around these parts.

The Stake Presidency playing Christmas songs by smacking their skulls with the head whacking pipes was a big "hit" (Pun whole-heartedly intended).

Between their performance and the ice sculptures, the 11th ward is going to have a hard time topping this next year, but I am really looking forward to watching them try.

A Few Things...

I have been a bit busy the last few weeks, so I thought that, in the interest of record keeping, I should post a couple of photos.

What kinds of photos?

Well, let's start with the newest occupant of my bulletin board: Tyrone Turkey. The kidlets spent most of November working on grammar exercises about the plight of poor, doomed Tyrone. Even learning the ancient poultry self defense art of turk-jit-su and offering the kidlets Taco Bandito coupons couldn't save Tyrone from the Thanksgiving turkey platter. In other pretend-animals-in-school-news, I went to our junior high science fair last week and fell madly in love with this giant, remote-control flying shark. It was awesome. So awesome that I seriously considered driving to the store in Twin where they are sold.

Seriously. I must have one.

Also on my "must have" list, is a fiftieth wedding anniversary celebration like the one my dear friend Diane and her husband had the week before Thanksgiving.

It was a great party and, since Diane has helped with so many of our Stake dinners/conferences/trainings/more dinners/meetings/etc., Jolene, Sue, and I were more than happy to help out on Diane's special day.

Sue and Joleen were the live entertainment, playing beautiful music all evening.

And I was the bouncer.

I guess that, technically, I was the guest book person, but that title just doesn't do the job justice. "Bouncer" is much cooler and far more impressive.

It was actually a pretty tricky job, thanks to the special silver guest book pen. The special silver guestbook pen was tricky becuase the end that people thought should be the writing end wasn't. I tried to warn the signers, but they didn't believe me. They just kept trying to write with the wrong end. I must not have a very honest face.

And speaking of people who don't believe a word that comes out of my mouth, my sister and her stalwart husband brought their kids up for a quick 24-hour Thanksgiving visit. It just

so happened that the apartment above my parent's garage was tenant-less, making it the perfect venue for a little after dark ghost hunting.
Before the kids came upstairs, I kid my ipod in a closet, playing ghostly sounds on a loop. They were pretty terrified for about 12 seconds.

The spookiest part was hunting for ghosts in the dark, scary storage room under the apartment.
At least, that was the spookiest part for me. I have seen the spiders that live down there and, let me tell you, I would rather come face to face with a ghost.

With Thanksgiving break in the rear view mirror, the kidlets and I are focusing on getting our End of Course Assessment study guides filled out, "A Christmas Carol" read, the first yearbook deadline met, and my favorite narrative poem "The Highwayman" thoroughly enjoyed.

And we will be focusing on those things until next week, when the focus will shift to anticipating the trappings of Christmas vacation, including sleeping in, eating good food, opening gifts, and not doing a bit of school work. By the time school dismisses on the 16th, Christmas vacation will be an all-consuming obsession.

And the kidlets might spend some time thinking about the break too.