I am loving the winter weather in so many ways.  For one, it is not very cold yet, and the Mikkelsen's wood burning stove has glass doors.  It makes the whole living area extremely cozy.  I love watching the flames cast shadows and dance all over the darkened room when everyone has gone to bed.  I have decided that when I grow up, and get a house of my own, I want one for sure.  To top it all off, my Dad brought us a load of Cedar wood.  I love how it crackles and pops.  Yeah, I love the beauty of winter down here.  It never bites that hard with it's chills.

    Homecoming week was pretty eventful.  I realized after reading my last few posts that I had forgotten to discuss that week.  It was filled with all kinds of fun.  For one, the whole town gets involved with the happenings which is pretty fun.  I did struggle to some degree too because every night we were up late with stuff, and poor Dill had had it by the end of the week.  Jams and Sags had a great band and orchestra concert one evening, and it was great.  Dill kept trying to run around and get on stage which was discouraging though.  There was also a parade and a pep rally.  All of my older kids were in the parade.  Sags was on the FFA float, Rooshkie marched with the middle school drill team, and Wames was on the High School drill team float.  There was a pep rally after that, and it was hard because Dill just wanted to go to bed.  They had a tail gate party with free hot dogs and chips which all of my kids were excited about.  Wames danced in the program, and their dance was pretty cool because they turned out all of the lights, and danced with flashlights.  My biggest problem of all of that was Mo.  He was terrible.  He kept plopping on this random girls lap, and when he would sit by me, he would kick the young man in front of us.  I kept apologizing, and he kept saying that he didn't mind, but c'mon!  Who likes to be kicked in the back over and over again?  I must admit that when the Bishop came and scooped Mo up, and held him on his lap, I was all kinds of grateful.  This kind of a thing goes above and beyond the calling in my book, and I was able to keep some level of sanity after that.     

     The next night was the big game.  I forgot to mention that some kid had asked Rooshkie to wear his jersey.  It is kind of a sign of friendship or a bit more in this town according to Ryan. Kind of like wearing a letterman's jacket. She tried to sneak out of the house in it, because she knew that I would make a big deal about it, and I did...I mean c'mon it's my job.  I did snap a few pictures which made her extremely uncomfortable.  She kept making it clear that she was just friends with the young man, and that it was no big deal....whatever Rooshkie...you guys are getting married now for sure.    I will say that I was kinda a basket case about that jersey for the rest of the day.  I am aware, now more than ever, at how much sports cost a family to participate in...this jersey was beautiful, and heavy and expensive looking.  I hounded her non-stop about not getting anything on it, and not letting the kids touch her with weedo, or cheeto hands...needless to say that I heaved a great sigh of relief when she gave it back to him without holes or stains.                                  

     Sometime during the day, Mo had come across some green silly putty.  He had somehow gotten it into his hair, and had molded and shaped a nice horn that stuck out to the side at an odd angle.  Needless to say, that by the time I noticed it, it was time to go to the game, and I had no time to try to remove it.  To top it off, he wouldn't let me touch it, or try to remove it, or comb it.  Whatever....we arrived at the game with no shoes and a horn.  At least it was a green horn, and it matched the school colors.   

     Wames danced beautifully that evening.  I was way proud of her.  It was a number that they had joined with the cheerleaders on, and it was way fun to watch.  The kids were bawling and ready to go by half time though, and our team was winning easily, and so we left a little early.  Arden played a great game too, sacking the quarter back etc.

     My next confession is, that Mo carried the green horn on his head for a few days after homecoming.  He was just not letting me try to comb it out without having a complete come apart.  I finally asked Carol what she thought I ought to do about his green horn.  I must take a moment and say this about my lovely Mother in Law...she can figure out how to fix any kid mess or disaster.  She has seen it all, and has dealt with it all, and her fixes always work.  She took Mo's horn into consideration and told me to try some coconut oil on it.  So, that evening when he was watching Fatty Fats (Wild Kratt's)  I caught him unawares with some, and the putty came right out.  I was seriously thinking that we would have to shave his head bald.  Thank goodness for Grandma's that is for sure!

     Since homecoming we have all just been crazy busy with Young Women's stuff, drill team, and cow branding and working.  Ryan worked on the house for awhile too.  The other night I was displeased with Mo because he had brought his train to the dinner table, and had slathered a thick layer of butter all over it (what is it with Mo and butter???)  I started to get after him, but Ryan claimed that his tractor just needed a little grease, and so why was that a big deal?  Oh, I don't know maybe because Mo is kinda famous for wasting butter all the time.

     The other night for scripture study, I became aware once again, that Oak turned eight months ago, and I have yet to buy him a set of scriptures of his own.  I asked him if he had been reading any at all, and of course he hadn't.  When the girls were his age, I used to bribe them all the time to read their scriptures every evening.  I told him that if he would read his scriptures every night for a month, I would buy him a sling shot...this made Sags all kinds of upset, and she threw a huge fit.  She made it very clear that if Oak got a new sling shot, she would be getting nailed with it non-stop.  I cannot say that I disagree with her theories, but it was important to me, to get my kids into the habit of reading their scriptures every night.  So....he is getting a sling shot if he keeps up with his reading.  Hopefully, he will play with it outside.

     We had Grandma Great last weekend, and she is finally starting to recover from her hurt rib.  She does not get out of bed any more though, and I was really struggling that day to get her to eat anything.  I finally sat down on her bed and spoon fed her some pudding while she complained about her aches and pains.  I spacily left the pudding on her night stand as I tried to rub some of the pain out of her legs.  Well, I left the room, only to come back in and find that Dill had spread pudding all over her sheets as Grandma peacefully dozed.  Not good Dill!  I was also not amused to find that Dill had gotten into Ryan's stash of bullets and had sat and shoved a whole bunch of them into my body wash...yes, she took the lid off of my body wash, and filled all of the excess space with Ryan's bullets...not sure if the soap will ruin the bullets or not.  I was not ready for Dill to be starting into these messes.  I came home from a shrsh meeting on Sunday to find rice scattered all over my kitchen and living room....did someone get married or something?  Why was rice tossed everywhere?

     And speaking of shrsh...Mo decided that it was a good time to do the Wonder Pets cheers in the middle of sacrament meeting...right when it was nice and quiet..."we're not too big, and we're not too tough, but when we work together we've got the right stuff.. GOOOO WONDERPETS!"  He also began playing "the Wild Wild West" in the middle of the meeting...not good...if I didn't have my lessons and scriptures on my phone, I would leave it home for sure.

     The other night, Ryan and I went to the temple for our anniversary.  When I got out, I noticed that one of the kids had tried to call repeatedly.  I called them back, and it was Wazz.  She claimed that she had watched the kids all evening, and that no one had helped her, and she was getting tired of it all.  I must admit that I know this is true to a large degree.  The older girls get on their devices, Rooshkie, gets on her lap top, and yeah, Wazz ends up babysitting.  Ryan and I grabbed her a cotton candy at the Golden Corral as we were leaving, and it helped to reward her for keeping Dill happy.  However, I was not too pleased the next morning to find that someone had taken the little cone thing, that they wrap the cotton candy around, and had placed bandaids strategically all up and down the cone.  Why do I buy stuff?  All of the stuff I buy is largely wasted on such things.  It's either dumped down the drain, or on the floor, or wasted in some other way....not too happy about that.

Arden-painted and got the blue bus running...wow