This Is It

So, this was one of the best Graduation presents I ever received. Thank you so much Dorthy, Greg, John, and Danna. If you can't see well, this is a framed Michael Jackson album.
Oh yes, I said album. There is a very old and very worn record in that frame. Okay, it all starts back when I was five years old living in San Diego. I was in kindergarten and my friends Louis, Katy, and I loved getting together in our neighborhood listening to Michael Jackson. We would meet up with a boom box and our tapes and just dance. Louis was the best Michael Jackson dancer and we would practice all the moves from his music videos. We would meet up after school and on the weekend with our Jean Jackets with snap buttons and medical tape on our fingertips. I am pretty sure we were Michael Jackson's biggest five year old fans in the world.

Right around my seventh birthday my parents bought me the movie Moonwalker. I would watch that movie all the time. I still have it to this day. I used to watch it frequently up until 2004 when our VCR broke and we never replaced it.

I remember when Invincible was released and I was soo excited because it had been the longest gap between album releases since Michael Jackson started releasing albums. I loved it and listened to it constantly.

While living in Connecticut around 1993, my parents had a garage sale they were planning. They sold their 8-track player along with all their 8-tracks. When Jenn and I were helping my mom collect all the garage sale items, we came across the last of their records. They are gotten rid of a lot of records before our move to Connecticut and they were finally getting rid of the last of them. Jenn had a super rad tape, radio, record player in her room and I managed to salvage one record from the pile. Michael Jackson's thriller. Until Jenn finally got rid of her record player in 1998, we still used it to play that record.

It became my centerpiece for my living room for a very long time. I had it on the dresser or mantle in my bedroom until I moved to Utah for college. It graced my living room in Utah. It was the center of my bedroom after returning from college. The album came with me to Hawaii and was put up on the shelf when I was there. When I returned home it was still with me. When Shane and I got married and moved into our first apartment together it was on the mantle in our living room. We always had it out.

One day, my sister Dorthy came from Idaho to visit and saw it in our living room. Her eyes lit up and she said, "No way! My Thriller record! I thought this was gone! You salvaged it when mom and dad got rid of everything?" She was so excited and of course if it was hers I wasn't going to make a big fuss when she asked for it. After all it was hers. I swallowed and happily handed it over. When she walked out the door I just cried. I couldn't believe the record that was mine for so long... was gone. I was so sad. Both Shane and Jenn told me Dorthy wouldn't care and I should just tell her how much it meant to me. I just wiped away my tears and told them I was fine. If one of my siblings had something of mine I would expect them to offer it up, and I would be fine. I was still sad, but had no hard feelings for Dorthy. I cried a few times about that album. When I would look around the room, it just wasn't there anymore. It was never forgotten, but I was okay after a month. A few years later Shane found me a few albums which included Thriller at a garage sale. I was soo excited because they all were in mint condition, but it wasn't the same one.

Years past and I got wind of Michael Jackson's final concert. I was extremely tempted to get a ticket to Europe to go to one. It was my one of my biggest dreams to see him in concert. He was the best performer, amazing singer, and even more amazing dancer. I mentioned it to Shane, but we never seriously talked about getting a ticket.

Then it happened. Dorthy was with the family for Christmas last year and we all got together at Matt and Patty's house. We were all opening gifts from each other on Christmas Eve and Dorthy hands me one more. She says, "This is your graduation present from John & Danna, and Greg & I." I was so excited! I opened it up and just started crying. The Thriller album that was Dorthy's. She never even knew how much it meant to me, but had arranged to get it framed and returned. She said she just thought about it and it didn't really matter to her anymore. She knew I was a huge fan and she knew I liked the album, so she talked to Greg, John and Danna and they went in on it together. Until recently it was the only picture up in my living room.
My amazing siblings! Thanks again!
The day he died I was in Redding, CA driving around running errands. It was so sad. I was listening to the radio, when I heard. Then, I started receiving calls and texts from all my family and friends. They all knew I would care. I cried that night. I wouldn't get to see him in concert. Sad. Every now and then I would cry when I here his music. He was amazing!
He was the King of Pop!
R.I.P. Michael Jackson at age 50.
August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009
Obviously I had been awaiting This Is It. I got to see it on Friday November 6th with my sisters Patty and Tammy and my friend Jessica Byers. It was better than what I expected. I would love to see it again and again. I wanted to see it again right after watching it! I only cried 5 times and luckily managed to stop the crying after starting. The tour was going to be Epic. He had some amazing new material for Thriller and Smooth Criminal. He has been my favorite performer since I was five years old. I don't think I will see a performer in this lifetime that is as talented as Michael Jackson.

Pictures, Family, and Fun!

Today Jason came over with Tracey and Sarah just to visit and the property here looked so vivid because of the rain I robbed them from heat for a few minutes to get some good pictures. Jason played with his nephews the whole time he was here, but I don't blame him. I am not as cool to hang out with as Eli, Seth, and Jacob.
I have been wanting to get family pictures for myself on my parents property because of this very driveway. I just think they have the best driveway and trees for a backdrop. This is my sisters Sarah and Tracey for those of you who don't know them. I loved how a lot of the pictures turned out today.

This was such a silly picture of Tracey. We got a lot of great pictures, but I had to post this one. It was a goofy accident, but all three of us girls love it! It's going to forever make me laugh. She looks so 'one with nature.'

Sarah got a lot of great pictures too. She just looked great in them. It was so fun to have a couple of my little sisters over on Saturday.

Happy 28th Birthday Shane!

Daddy, we miss you and want to say, "Happy Birthday!" When I told Jacob it's your birthday he started singing, "Happy To You. Happy To You." He really loves you and misses you.

Seth says, "Happy Birthday Daddy. I love you. I'll give you this best toy, a Bakugan. I hug you. I like when you play games with me." Eli wants you to know, "I really miss you Dad. I wish you were here. I like it when we play games together. Happy Birthday! When you come home I'm going to give you a present. I like it when you're here. I wish you worked in Washington. I like it so much, so much when you're here. I wish we could do art together and go to the Wolf Lodge together and go to the Wolf Haven together and play together. This a thing I like about you, I like all the talent that you have. I hug you."

Happy Birthday To You!
Happy Birthday To You!
Happy Birthday Dear Dad!
Happy Birthday To You!

You want to know what I love about you? Everything. You make me feel safe and secure. When you are by my side I feel like I could do anything. You are a huge support financially, physically, and emotionally. When I am concerned, sick, or tired you're strong arms surround me with love and I am at peace. I would have never been able to skydive without you by my side. I would never have been able to go to BYU Hawaii and Graduate College or go to China and Mongolia without your support. You are amazingly smart. You have passed training classes with nearly perfect scores from lawn mower engines to wind turbines after a week long course, no prior knowledge, and a couple hours of study. You graduated college with a single A- lowering your GPA. You are soo funny. You are fun to be with. You are the best I know at any video game. You can usually beat the best player of any game on a first try, but every once in a while you need to play for 30 minutes, then you can win. You are amazing at sports. You are a great artist, even though you don't utilize that talent. I love your tender voice when you quietly sing songs to me. I really love everything about you, mostly because there is so much to love. I miss you.
Happy 28th Birthday.

Oh, and I can't forget the power of your kiss. Every kiss is like our first kiss. It sends shivers up my spine and I know I want to be with you until the end.

Halloween Night

This is what Seth gives me when I ask for an action pose. He is so sweet. He was so tired because the boys and I went for a mile walk this morning, then we walked another mile and a half for trick or treating. We met up with Mom, Sarah, and Tammy with Jason, Rosie, and Mary. Honestly? I was exhausted. I haven't been sleeping the best and I have been walking a lot lately, so after trunk or treat being last night I just wanted to snuggle up on the couch and watch a movie. Trick or treating was fun though. Seth was concerned about his whip a lot of the time, so Tammy and I ended up holding it most of the time.

Jacob really would not keep his Yoda hat on, so I threw it on and got this picture before he ripped it off. He was so sweet. He walked almost the whole way. I kept offering to pick him up and the response I got was No, Thank You. I also offered multiple times to hold his bag for him and the response I got was I Got It. He was so worn out that around 10pm tonight he climbed up on my bed and put himself to sleep. I have been holding him until he falls asleep for the past few months now. I have been too tired myself to do the constant him getting up out of bed and me needing to put him back, so we settled with the method of cuddling, holding, or rocking to sleep.

Eli needs to train his brothers what to do in an ACTION pose. See Seth? Eli did really well and I didn't see much of him because he was in the front of the group and Jacob and I rounded up the back. It was fun.

At this house, Jacob was determined to kick the little branches that were in his way. I had to pick him up and walk away to make him stop. It really was too much fun. We stopped at a house from a member of my church ward who was making scones and had hot chocolate for everyone who came by. It was so great and a nice break at our half way point. We went to Gamestop to show off Eli's costume and the two guys working there were impressed. The boys felt great going there as Sora, Indiana Jones, and a Jedi. We picked up a couple cheap used games and went home to try them out. We headed down to Grandpa and Amanda Boyd's to pick up spoils from them which was so nice. They really enjoy visiting with Grandpa and Amanda. Then we went home, showered, and off to bed. As for me? I posted pictures, blogged, and now I will be laying down to a movie with some toast and hot chocolate.

More Trunk or Treat pictures!

Rosie as Tinkerbell

Chris Byers as a Judo Master and Peter Corier as the Phantom

Action shot of Teancum as Snake Eyes, Jason as the Grim Reaper, and Seth as Indiana Jones

Xavier as a Lion and Mary as Dorothy

Trunk or Treat

The night before Halloween was fun. We went to the church building for some trunk or treating in the parking lot, a chili cook off, and carnival games inside. The kids all had a blast together. Chris took around Jacob for me, thanks guys for the help, while I passed out candy from the trunk of my car. Eli was Sora, Seth was Indiana Jones, Jacob was Yoda, Jason was the Grim Reaper, Teancum was Snake Eyes, Xavier was a Lion, Rosie was Tinkerbell, and Mary was Dorothy. It was very fun!

Jacob loved getting candy, but didn't care much for wearing the Yoda hat.

Seth loved the games and did a great job waiting in line. Eli loved that there were a couple of fourteen year old boys that thought his costume was the coolest thing ever. There were three video game characters that were all hand made costumes: Eli as Sora, Chibi Robo, and a ODST Halo guy. Very cool.

Here is my rock'n'roll trunk. You can't see the guitar, drumsticks, mic with a stand, and of course music playing. It was so fun!

The Sora Costume!

It's all Noelle's fault. The story goes like this. I read Noelle's entry about finishing Brody's Where the Wild Things Are 'Max' costume, and I told Eli about it. The costume is amazing and I can't wait to see Drew's! Kudos Noelle! The boys and I got on topic of what to be for Halloween. I decided Jacob was going to be Yoda since about a year and a half ago, but last year I couldn't find him a costume. I got one for cheap this year. Seth wanted to be Indiana Jones which was perfect because he had purchased a whip already, his church bag is a Indiana Jones replica bag, and we already owned a hat from when Eli was 3. I looked around his closet and found pants, shirt, belt, and shoes that would work. I was getting so excited that I had two down and one to go with only spending $15. Eli's first and only idea is a video game character from Kingdom Hearts named Sora. We start looking for costumes and the cheapest Sora costume is 80 bucks! I was in shock, but the craziest part is I actually thought about budgeting for it. That idea ended after I thought it through clearly. The hard part is Sora is such a special interest character that the only costumes are hand made and usually for Cosplay. I know, I know, look it up, ultimate nerdy goodness. (Actually, a friend, Chris Byers, brought it up that my boys are all going trick or treating as cosplayers. Soo funny!)
So Eli says, " Mom, you could just make it. Brody and Drew are getting their costumes made for them by Auntie Noelle. Please."

Me being a stay at home mom with no current hobbies in process said, "I could try. Eli, mommy doesn't sew and doesn't have a pattern, so if it turns out bad we need a backup plan. How about Wolverine?"

"Okay. I like Wolverine. You already know how to do his makeup and hair. Right mommy?"

"Yup, and we have jeans, a t-shirt, and retractable wolverine claws."

"Ya."

So I started getting paranoid immediately. I started looking around the house and found a blue shirt, (hand me down) over sized black cargo pants, blue spiderman 3T pajama bottoms, his snow boots, and a 3T black hoodie. I was inspired for a moment and actually thought I could pull this off. I borrowed my mom's sewing machine, picked up a few accessories, bought some fabric, bought a hot glue gun, and got to work. I drew out a picture and colored it for a guide. I started with the easier things first. The gloves and the boots. I used hot glue for those two parts and they were finished in a couple hours. The shirt was next and that was very easy and it turned out well too. My last items were jacket, necklace, and pants. I did the jacket next. I cut it off and added white trim around all the edges, then started to add the lining to the hood. That was hard, but it worked out. I added shoulder pads on the exterior of the hoodie and hot glued the shimmery grey shoulder pieces. I finished it up fairly easily minus the work on the hood and shoulders. One motivator was every time I finished a new piece, Eli and Seth would give me so much praise and encouragement. They would say its perfect and it looked just right. I took a long time to get the necklace and pants done because I just stopped working on it for a while. I used my dad's dremel for the necklace crown. I drew it out, cut it out, sanded it, and panted it. The chain was a purse handle that I added more links to so it would be the right length. The necklace only took me 3 hours, but over an hour of it was figuring out how to use a dremel! It was fun to learn something new. I like doing that on my own because it feels like an accomplishment. I avoided the pants after attempting to add the white trim between the blue and black between the legs front and back. I called in help from a friend from church. Sis. Greene happily fit me in for 40 open minutes of her day about a week ago. She taught me how to add the trim, but ended up doing that part for me. That was a huge help! Thank you! All the touch up and elastic around the knees was done today. It took me about five hours total for the rest today. I have never been so relieved in all my life. Eli was excited. I decided I don't enjoy sewing, but I do enjoy creating. The necklace emblem was a blast for me. I like power tools! The final aspects of Eli's costume are hair and makeup. We tried the hair yesterday, but I think it'll look better tomorrow and Halloween night. All he needs for makeup is intense eyebrows. I will post a couple more pictures from Halloween weekend to show off the finished product with hair and makeup. I am just glad it's done!

Happy 2nd Birthday Jacob!

Jacob's birthday party was short and sweet. He has a short attention span at 2 years old and it was a school night, so it worked out well. First off, I want to thank Chris Byers for the idea for the picture. I love it, and its perfect! Jacob had so much fun with many of the people he loves being there to celebrate with him. We started off the night with snacks and then birthday cake. He tried to blow the candle out, but I had to block him from spitting all over the place. It was so cute. I am pretty sure the candle was blown out with the help of Seth and Rosie. Thanks for that helpers! We ate quickly and moved right along to present opening time. He really didn't interest in opening his presents, but again he had big helpers: Seth, Rosie, and Xavier. He loved all the toys and clothes, so thank you for those. I think his favorites so far are everything. He just kept switching from one to another. We also had big helpers to open all the boxes and get the toys out: Jason, Teancum, Eli, Seth, Rosie, Xavier, and Mary. Thanks kids for helping out so much at the party!

I had all the candy and snacks left over from decorating the cake so people could eat them and decorate their own cupcake if they wanted to. I also had large and small pretzels out to eat those yummy and fun pumpkin cheese balls I made. I used soft smoked cheddar rolled into a ball, the bottoms dipped in chopped peanuts, garnished with a fresh parsley leaf, and pretzel stems. It was really funny to me that half the people there were not sure what they even were. Frosting balls? Candy? I thought they would make a fun looking truffle, but cheese it is.

The cake I made was a monster. I baked the body in a oven safe Pyrex 2.5 quart bowl, and the feet were cupcakes. He had purple butter cream frosting with donut, gummy life saver, skittle eyes, a candle nose, candy corn teeth, blow pop arms, pretzel legs, and a fruit by the foot tongue. It was fun to decorate and to look at after. This was my first time baking a cake in a bowl and I was checking on it every 15 minutes. It looked funny throughout baking, but it turned out great and was soo easy to frost. The frosting is always fun to dye too. Just as a reminder to everyone who likes to color food. Always go get the thicker coloring from the craft store because you can get many colors and it creates super rich coloring. I swear by it! Jacob picked out the cake idea from a birthday cakes for kids book I have. Of course I showed him the page to begin with, he looked through it with his brothers, but kept coming back to the monster page and saying, "Raaar!"

Past Cakes part 2

October 2009: Here is a better picture of Jacob's monster cake this year. He really got a kick out of it. I know the two is backwards, but I just threw it on there so I wouldn't lose track of it. I should have paid more attention to it before taking the shot, but oh well. Soo funny!

October 2008: As you must have noticed, there are no cake pictures for Eli and Seth for 2008. That's because I was in my senior year final semester in college, I was working out a ton, and just had a new baby four months before. They both had cupcake cakes made from good old Foodland! There is no shame in that! This October cake was my favorite ever so far because it was my own idea, and I did it all myself! This may sound like a little big-headed, but I am really proud of this cake! I thought of it, and it looks so good! Jacob's personal cake was a mickey mouse cake with Wall-E decorations. I did use the nicer dye from the craft store! This used very little dye to create such vivid coloring. I used a small round cake pan and cut the ears off the remaining parts from the Eva 13 x 9 pan.

This is my Eva cake. She was easy to make. I just baked a standard 13 x 9 cake and cut out the shape of Eva (and two small Mickey ears). She turned out so cute, but I really wish I frosted her more neatly. All of the smeared frosting around the edges was distracting. I know if you cut strips of waked paper and place them on top of your cake board and under your cake, then you can slide them out really easily to prevent minimal smearing on the board. I haven't tried it yet, but I mean to.

The main cake was made with different sizes of circular pans for the face and ears. I loved decorating this cake soo much! In the top right is the Wall-E that found the little green plant on a hill. Ill of the other Wall-E's are cleaning up garbage. They had different colors of frosting on their hands depending on the frosting they were near and I made the tracks as if they all went through the center black pile at some point. I actually made the tracks with a fork tipped in black and applied to the cake behind each Wall-E. I know my family loved it, Jacob didn't care as long as he could eat it, but I adored it.....and still do obviously. Elijah and Seth's 2009 cakes were also store bought this year, but I am determined to let them choose from my beloved book for 2010. Seth already said he wants a frog cake, so we shall see.

Past Cakes part 1

February 2007: This is the first time Shane and I took on the cake project. It was my fault really. My nephew Dante was doing his school fundraiser and my sister Danna sent me the link to buy things online. I fell in love with this Birthday Cakes for Kids ideas cookbook. I bought this totally awesome cake idea book and silly me said Eli could pick out whichever cake he wanted. Of course the kid has to pick the hardest cake in the book! I even tried to get him to change his mind. Oh No! Shane and I stayed up late the night before Eli's party baking, frosting, decorating, and trying to keep those four corners together. It really turned out well considering we didn't have the right materials. Also, as a note I used the cheap dye you can buy at the grocery store with four little cone topped squeeze bottles. We used every drop of two greens to get the towers that green. It was so fun to do this with Shane, but it was hard for our first time.

March 2007: Seth's birthday came around and I was having a hard time with classes at school, so I hid that cookbook and told Seth and Eli that I was making Seth a blue mini ninja cake. It was fun and easy. Seth loved it! Once again I used those cheaper dyes from the cone topped bottles. 2 bottles later and I wanted a dark ocean blue, but instead we got a bright blue cake. It was still fun, don't get me wrong! Seth really thought his cake was the best, and Eli loved it too.