Smith Family Gingerbread

Important message from Preston

 Before

 Preston

 Miah

 Leo

 Jacob ~ Matt's face in the back makes me laugh. Weston must have blown his mind.

 During

 Mike showing Preston the beginnings of his duck pond.... Nova making a chimney

 Nova (Leo & Melissa)

 Shannon

 Jacob

 Miah's friend made a puppy out of Lindor truffles and mini tootsie rolls

 Jorja & Michael

We got a surprise text while doing gingerbread.

Stockton and Elder Kelly with a cute family.

 After....

Derek

 Nova

 Melissa

 Melissa and Nova

 Leo

 Matt

 Sherry and Matt ~ Sherry's contribution was the bananas. Hahaha!

 Miah's friend

 Miah

 Friend and Miah

 Sherry, Matt, Friend, Miah

 Jacob

 Steve

 Weston

 Shannon

 Weston, Jacob, Shannon, Steve

 Michael

 Preston

 Yes, the gingerbread man is about to detonate a bomb

 Preston lit candles that say dynamite on them

 He is planning on making the wreckage next week at the Millburn gingerbread party

 Oh boy.....

 Jorja

 Maysen

 Mike made the yard for his duck pond. He is planning on making a duck house next week.

 Jorja, Preston, Maysen, Mike

After everyone left, we actually had energy to decorate our Christmas tree! Maysen decided to go home tomorrow morning, so we are taking advantage of having her here!

Preston

 Maysen

 Mike 3D printed a goose topper

Jorja wanted to do family paint night. Mike was the only one willing to play along. Mike painted a duck and Jorja painted quarters. Too bad we couldn't find an Arizona quarter. I must find one for her.

Mike

 Jorja

Odd Jobs

Jorja's odd jobs group met at our house. Mike put them to work by assembling the gingerbread houses for our Smith family gingerbread party tomorrow. It was actually so nice to have that done for us!

Random person, Drew, Seurette, Gabe

 Mike and Jorja....random person and Drew

 Seurette and Gabe

 random person and Drew

Maysen and Preston went to the store with Mike and I. They were so dang cute and adorable. Those two love each other to pieces. It's awesome. I tried to get a picture of them walking together, but I wasn't able to capture their adorableness.

Preston & Maysen

Alarm

Grandma Honey died 14 years ago today, so that's stupid. Maysen came home for the weekend and that is great. I made gingerbread. Jorja did odd jobs after school to earn money for the make a wish fundraiser.

So...lately Jorja has been taking my phone to bed at night to watch movies to help her fall asleep. No way is she allowed to have her phone with her at night. I set my alarms on her phone for me to wake the kids up. Rarely am I woken up by an alarm. Probably once a month if I'm being generous. So, the alarms are mostly my reminders of when to wake them. Today I had one set for Jorja at 6:30 and one set for Preston at 8:00. Preston has late start on Fridays. The chances of me needing to wake him up on Fridays are slim, but still I didn't want to forget. At exactly 7:57 I realized my mistake. I set the alarm on Jorja's phone, which she now had with her at school. Even though her phone is on do not disturb, the alarm would still go off. I started frantically texting her. Luckily she saw the message. Gotta remember not to do that in the future!

Festival of Trees

I watched Amy today while Matt went to the temple with Sam. Sam is still in the hospital, but she got permission to go to the Salt Lake Temple for a few hours. It is close by the hospital, so she could get there fast if anything went wrong. Greg had daycare, Jeff had preschool and Anne had school. She actually had a field trip to the Festival of Trees! Jorja was able to miss school and volunteered at the Festival of Trees today with her PLT class. What timing! Too bad they never saw each other though. That would have just been too cool.

Anne and Greg

 Stephanie and Amy ~ I took this and closed my eyes

 Because I looked super old with my eyes open

Amy just wanted to be held the entire time. She slept on me for a few hours. It made watching her easy. My dad came down around 11:45 so I could go to the ward relief society birthday lunch. They do the lunch birthdays by month. My birthday is in December, so.... That was fun too. I talked with Sara Henderson, Katie Willes and Laura Longhurst most of the time. It was great.

 Alta PLT

I heard from Maysen today. She was able to get marketing as her official minor. She also got an email from her marketing teacher that said, "By the way, you've done really well in the class - hope you might consider at least minoring in marketing." Haha. Talk about timing on that one! Looks like she is going to be able to pull off a major in psychology, major in English with an emphasis in creative writing and a minor in marketing. Nicely done Maysen, nicely done. She is on the wait list for her last marking class, but they told her if she doesn't get in it she can still graduate and take it as an online class during the summer. If she gets in, she will have 18 credits.... going to be a busy last term!

Day With Mike

Mike took the day off to spend with me. WHAT??? That has never happened during the Christmas rush! It was his idea too. We had a great time together. We exercised, went out to lunch and went to the temple. It was fun and relaxing. Maysen also finished her marketing project and Jorja said her math test was easy. Yay! Successful day.

How Did She Survive?

Seriously! How did Jorja survive me being in Israel? I had a doctor appointment this morning. Jorja has late start. I talked to her a long time last night about how I would be gone. She promised she would get herself up and ready to school, no problem. We even talked about her making avocado toast for breakfast. After my appointment I texted her that I hoped she remembered her essay and that I loved her. I thought about running some errands after my appointment. Glad I didn't. When I pulled into the driveway her car was still there. She was SOUND ASLEEP! She was shocked she slept through her alarm. Jorja hurried and got ready, but she forgot things she needed, so she came back home. She ended up missing all of her fifth period, which is AP English. Jorja ended up staying after school for a few hours. She talked to her English teacher and then studied her math. Her math teacher ended up leaving before Jorja was ready to leave. Jorja went and found her 9th grade math teacher. She taught Jorja the thing she couldn't figure out. Jorja was so happy! She ended up staying and talking to Mrs. Waters for a long time. Jorja has a math test tomorrow and is feeling really confident about it, so that's good.

Rachel sent me pictures of linings for the stockings today. It was fun to see all her choices. These are the ones she picked. I love them! Especially the trees on Mina's. I think it's perfect! Can't wait to see what it looks like when it's finished!

Jorja had two white elephant parties. She came home with a soccer participation trophy and a bag of candy. I can't remember how the Young Women white elephant turned out. Despite the rocky start, she ended up having a great day. Preston's activity was cancelled and he was very happy about that. He is a home body. Just like his dad.

Cyber Monday

Mike survived. He didn't get home until late, but that is over now. I made dinner and everyone survived that, so today was a win.

Adam

Adam Doan (from Georgia) came over for a bit after church. Wow! We haven't seen him in a long time! I can't believe he is almost 30 now. He also lives in Jackson Hole Wyoming. He says he drives to Idaho Falls all the time. I told him to stop by our cabin over Christmas. That would be funny if he actually did. It was cool to talk to him though.