Bubble Blowing Champion

A few weeks ago Abbie's school did a bubble blowing contest. They pulled this off by saying it was a science project of some sorts in recording the different sizes of bubbles, but really I think they were just having a lot of fun. It started with a contest within her classroom which she won, and then it went to each grade level. She was really nervous to go up against all the fourth grade class winners, but she did it and won that as well.

This was getting serious so we made a special trip to the store to buy her a new pack of gum to practice for the official school bubble blowing championship. It was cute to hear her come home at night and talk about all the fourth graders wishing her luck throughout the day. The pressure was definitely on to represent her class. I'm proud to report that she came in second place for her whole school. She lost only to a third grader that must have really had some great bubble blowing skills. She was just thrilled that the fifth grader came in third. As long as she beat the fifth grader she was a winner in her books.

Whenever we have a day without a lot to do we always head over to this fun hike not to far from our house. We love it because it has a beautiful view of the city, it's just the right distance that you get a good amount of exercise, but it's not too long for the kids.

Everyone had to take turns with my silly sun glasses. They really look big on their little heads.

Cute Lizzie even had to take a turn.

Strike a pose!

It's just crazy to think that most of you still have snow. Not to rub it in or anything but the weather is so fantastic this time of year. LOVE IT!!!

Andrew Jackson Phillips

We joke that Andrew was our million dollar guinea pig....but, he was a good pet. He was looking really sick last week with obvious weight loss and hair loss, so I took him into the vet. The Veterinarian came to the conclusion that since we have gone through several doses of antibiotics in the past year with Andrew that he must have some kind of internal bacterial/fungal infection that his body just can't fight off. He passed away on 1/15/11.

He was a cute little guy that loved the girls to talk to him, and I will miss his cute little squeak when he wanted to be fed. Abbie took it better than we thought she would, but Avery is our sensitive one who has had a few little crying spurts throughout the weekend. Abbie of course, being the activity planner that she is, planned a cute little funeral for him in our back yard. We were told at the vet that it was illegal to bury your dead animals in your yard which I found interesting.

So, we found a nice little rock to use as a headstone, but the vet will bury him somewhere nice by Lake Mead. Abbie placed the headstone in our yard so we will always remember him. We had a nice little service where we each had to talk about what we liked about Andrew which was nice for the girls to have closure.

You may have heard of funeral potatoes, but we apparently have funeral cookies at our house. Abbie made these cookies with a flag on them that read:

Andrew Jackson Phillips

We will always remember

You and love you forever

The girls have started a money jar to start saving for a new pet. I think I'm going to enjoy not feeding or caring for one for awhile...but, we'll see how long I can hold them off.

About a week ago I was in my bedroom folding laundry when I heard a little voice saying "I'm a little bit scared, I'm a little bit scared" very quietly. I turned around to find Aliza IN a laundry basket trying to slide down the stairs. She was holding onto the railing on one side ready for take off. Yes, mom did run over to rescue before any damage was done. She doesn't get the nick name "Busy-Lizzie" for no reason I suppose.

Aside from her being the most adventurous of all our kids, she is such a great little buddy to have with me everyday. After the other girls go to school she follows me around the house doing our daily chores. Her favorite chore is helping me rinse off the dishes to put in the dish washer. As you can see from the picture above we usually end up with water everywhere, but that's okay. She even loves to scrub the bathrooms with me....anyone want to take bets how many years I have until she discovers that it's not a fun job to clean a bathroom? It's just killing me to think that she will be in school full time in just a year and a half. That will be a sad day for me.

We now have the dreaded one o'clock church time. Last week I was trying to have a positive attitude about it and realized that it really isn't all that bad. Micah doesn't have to be at the church until ten o'clock rather than six o'clock in the morning, and we can spend some time just doing this before getting ready for the day. With us not having any family get togethers on Sunday evenings we have enjoyed playing games and spending time together before and after church. Maybe it will be okay after all (or at least I'll tell myself that until next year).

New Years Eve

New Years Eve at our house was pretty simple and low key this year. We didn't have anything special going on, so we had our own little family celebration. We started with warming up the hot tub for a little swimming.

Then ate a wonderful steak dinner with grilled squash and baked sweet potatoes. We never have steak, so this was a treat. Micah even looked up a rub for the steak that was really yummy.

Then this is what happened right after we ate......

As you can tell Avery and Aliza were not getting along. The video (audio) was caught by accident as they struggled over the camera. You can hear Avery saying "you're going to break it" and then Aliza chimes in with "I'm giving it to mom." And then, just as Avery predicted, it ended up broken. Needless to say we weren't thrilled with this development, and as a side note we should mention that this is not the first time these two have struggled over something only to have it end up broken. So, apparently our new year will have to mean a new camera as well. So the rest of the post is without photos to document our wild party.

After dinner we lit sparklers which were great and then Abbie headed off to a little party one of her friends in the ward had invited her to. She had a great time and everyone was tucked into bed before the clock even struck midnight. We also couldn't wait for Micah's parents to arrive for a visit the next day. On New Years Day we did head out to Lake Las Vegas (no pictures) for a fun adventure eating yummy gelato and Abbie and Avery trying ice skating for the first time (no pictures :( ). They had such a great time on the ice that Abbie is begging for an ice skating party for her birthday next month. We'll have to wait and see about that one. We definitely can't have a fun party like that without a camera. Happy New Year!

Christmas 2010

We started our Christmas celebrations this year on the 21st of December opening gifts from each other at our house. We ate breakfast for dinner in our PJ's to pretend that it was Christmas morning. Our annual shopping trip to buy gifts for each other is something I look forward to each year. It's always fun to see what they pick for each other.

This is a picture of the girls impatiently awaiting the go ahead to open presents. Two day's later we were headed off to Utah to spend the holiday with family. The girls were so excited to see snow that we packed all the snow gear in hopes of making a snow man. When we got there this is all there was. But of course Abbie couldn't help but run outside and make the best out of what snow was there.

This picture of them in the snow didn't turn out that great, but I think it's funny that Abbie's scarf landed right on her head for the picture. On the day of Christmas Eve we went to see the movie Tangled which was so cute, but Aliza thought it was a bit scary. She spent a lot of the show asking to go home.

Each Christmas Eve we have a fantastic connection with the North Pole because Santa always arrives at the Phillips family Christmas Eve party. All of us young or old get a chance to sit on Santa's lap for one last request before the big night. You can tell Aliza is willing to sit on his lap, but still a little nervous. This is the first Christmas that all of our kids were ready and willing to talk to Santa. Nobody was clinging to me or hiding in the other room. It was nice.

Abbie played a wonderful duet this year for Santa with her cousin Zoee on the violin. They played We Wish You a Merry Christmas with great confidence. Santa enjoyed it so much he asked to hear another carol next year. Can't wait to see what they come up with. If you know Abbie you know she will be literally thinking about it all year to prepare.

Avery was thrilled to get a Barbie doll from Santa on Christmas Eve. Her comment to me was that he really must have read the letter she mailed a few weeks prior. I'm sure he did.

Christmas morning was so much fun this year. Aliza was asking for a new doll and roller skates which he did deliver. She was ecstatic and couldn't wait any longer to break into the skates. She got pretty good at them on the carpet. On a slicker floor is another story.

Our kids must have been really good this year because Santa brought both Abbie and Avery Nintendo DSi's. They have been begging for them for quite some time and they worked out great to keep kids entertained for the long car ride home. Aliza did get a Leapster to keep her entertained.

Later that day we were able to visit with Great Grandma Joy and Grandpa Alvin, then we headed over to my parents for more present opening. We stayed with my parents for a few nights so we could attend our old ward in Saratoga Springs. I still can't put into words the way I felt at our old ward. When we walked in we were greeted with hugs and happy hello's that made it hard to hold back the tears, but I did. Then after the meeting we were able to see so many people we have missed dearly. Abbie made the comment later that evening that it felt like she was a movie star with everyone surrounding her. I thought that was a funny comparison. Oh, how I have missed our old ward and our friends in Saratoga.

This is Aliza Christmas morning wearing her stocking stuffers from Santa. We of course had to try them all on before breakfast. My mom put together a yummy after Christmas lunch Sunday afternoon which was perfect. We were able to visit with my sister and her family that afternoon. Monday morning we headed over to play with friends (the Hacketts) for most of the day. We ended the evening with our dear friends the Bass family to have dinner and walk around temple square. It was a perfect evening other than the fact that absolutely no food area's were open. We tried many places and they were either too busy or closed. After walking around for quite some time we just hit Trax over to the Gateway to grab a bite to eat. It was so fun to be in Utah again. I didn't realize how much I do miss it. We made it home Tuesday mid afternoon with the luck of not hitting a single snow storm going to or from Utah. We are now enjoying our time together before it all starts up again Monday morning. Yuck!

Christmas Traditions

It seems like every time the Christmas season comes around we look forward to the same fun traditions every year. This year Abbie started us a new one that was a lot of fun. She was practically begging me to have some friends over to act out the Nativity which I was really hesitant to do for some reason. Then when I realized that she could plan this activity to pass off a project for Activity Days I decided to let her take charge. She made invitations, assigned everyone parts, and even made refreshments. I was very appreciative of the other families who came dressed in their parts, and took the time out of their busy schedule to help Abbie. We had a lot of fun and learned how we can make improvements for next year.

Technically I don't buy them Christmas dresses every year, but this year I couldn't pass them up when I realized that this may be the last year we could get matching dresses for all three. Not just in size, but Abbie is getting too old to want to dress like her sisters. So this was technically for mom and I loved it.

You may have noticed that we don't have five girls. Some of our friends in our ward had the same idea. Both Avery and Aliza were thrilled to find their friends in the same dresses. We must have the same taste.

This year our attempt at our Christmas countdown didn't go as smooth as years past. Sadly as each year comes we are getting busier and busier with our kids getting older. It was really hard to squeeze in some of our regular countdown activities with everything else the kids had going on each day. Next year I will have to do a simpler version so we can fit it in easier on those busy week nights.

Our wonderful "Elf On The Shelf" came to pay us a visit again this year. I love how each morning the girls would run around the house trying to find his new spot for the day. This was one of my favorite spots.

For years we have been having a FHE at the start of the Christmas season to talk about service and serving others. Each time the girls did a kind deed they were able to put one piece of straw into the manger to make a bed for baby Jesus. It's fun to see the manger slowly fill with hay, and see the kids doing things for each other.

This year we were given another Christmas tree from my parents neighbors. I had mentioned to my mom that I would like a taller tree because of our vaulted ceilings and it just so happened that their neighbors were trying to get rid of a tree. My parents were kind enough to bring it to our home on one of their visits to see us. So we had two trees this year, one in the front room which was my tree and one in the back family room that the kids made lots of homemade decorations for. I loved having both trees. That way no matter what part of the house I was in I could see a Christmas tree. I don't think Micah thought it was so great though when it came time to put them away.

One evening out of our Christmas Countdown we did make gingerbread houses. This is my version because they stick together really well. Plus they each were able to make their own. Every year the Christmas season goes by too fast. I'm already looking forward to next year.

Holiday Activities

It's been a very busy month for the Phillips family. Between school, church, and getting together with friends we've had a very busy season. The videos are in raw form for those who want to watch the whole thing (i.e. grandmas). First is Abbie's singing performance at the elementary. She's been putting in extra time with rehearsals and here is one number of her performance. We love to here her sing around the house, and she's enjoyed being in the choir.

Aliza and Avery have both been putting in time at dance and we have a video with each of them at their recital. It was fun to watch them perform. This was Aliza's first "on stage" experience, and she did really well with it. Avery was so pleased with the whole experience that she characterized it as the best day ever. Aliza is the second one in from the left on this first video.

Both girls in dance were easy to spot from a distance because they always seem to be the shortest ones. They each did a great job, and we are very proud of them.