Happy New Year

Dear Family,

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Year's Eve. We had a fun Christmas at Mom and Dad's house, but we learned that sometimes there can be too many presents for the kids (I didn't think that was possible before). We're busy now getting ready to go to Cincinnati. It's pretty overwhelming but I think it will be okay. BethAnne is being admitted to the hospital on Sunday for bowel cleanout and the surgery will be on Tuesday. We'll keep you all posted on how everything goes. Thank you for your prayers.
Love,
Aubrey and family
P.S. I wanted to include pictures but that feature is not working for us now.

Merry Christmas everyone!!

We've had a really nice Holiday so far. The best part is that Brian's been off of work for a whole week. We had a great time in Boise last weekend. We had fun playing at the Discovery Center, eating good food, and enjoying eachother's company. Then we came back to Logan and got snowed in for Christmas Eve. The kids put on a cute Nativity scene while Brian read from the scriptures. Christmas morning was magical, of course. Our sweet boys were so excited -- I think this picture of Cameron captures it best. We started a new tradition of making crepes on Christmas morning, and then I spent the entire day putting together a lego castle for Brian (it said for ages 6 and up, but it nearly drove me insane -- especially when Cameron and Adam ripped the whole thing apart twice before I finally got it put together. Where's Uncle Carl when you need him?). It was worth the effort, though, and little Brian thought I was awesome and thanked me over and over again for my help. We've had fun playing with toys and hanging out all week. We hope all of you had a nice Christmas, too!

Christmas Travels!

Hello family! Just thought I'd write a quick post to let you all know that we made it safely to Omaha after many hours of traveling. For those of you who don't know, Jon, Steven Lauren and I drove down to Las Vegas Friday night to see the Vegas bowl on Saturday night (wasn't that a cool game!) Right after the game we drove down to LA to take one of Steven and Lauren's cars there (they just graduted and are starting a job in california). Then this morning we flew out of LAX to Omaha and we finally ended our weekend of journeying when we got in tonight at 7:30! The Hastings' home is decorated beautifully for Christmas and there are cookies, brownies and toffee galore! I'm really going to miss being home this Christmas, but this will be next best--I really am blessed in my in-laws! Merry Christmas!

Blue Eyes

Isn't this a pretty picture. Have a great week! I can't wait for the Llewellyns to come!
Love,
Aubrey

Merry Christmastime, Everybody! We've been busy and happy. We've been decorating for Christmas, and I'm hoping I can get stockings made for Eva and Aiden before Christmas Eve (otherwise we'll just have to use the random ones we used last year). The kids are having a great time making forts and boats out of the shipping boxes we've received. Aiden took his first steps a couple weeks ago, and now he can zoom on foot from one end of the room to the other whenever he wants ("whenever he wants" being the key term since he still prefers to crawl a lot of the time). He is so sweet and very cuddly lately. Eva was in a darling Christmas music program at her preschool last week. Those concerts are always such a hoot because of the way half the kids are looking the other way or making faces or whatever else.... Eva is so cute and such a good helper. Yesterday at the ward Christmas party she got two cookies (she loves cookies) and, without anyone asking her to, gave one to Aiden (I suspect she licked part of the frosting off of his first, but it was still a nice gesture : ) ) She really is good at sharing. Eva and I decorated a gingerbread house today after church. I put the pieces of gingerbread together and squirted on the frosting for Eva at the beginning, but by the end of it, she was putting on the frosting and the candy all by herself!

We are getting SOOO excited for Christmas around here. We made cupcakes with green and red sprinkles after church today (I had to bribe Tyler to go to church without complaining -- it worked surprisingly well). Adam ate 3 (yes 3!) cupcakes, and is now happily sleeping. Adam has been a challenging little boy lately. If I put him down, he squeals like his finger is being slammed in a car door. I hope it is a passing phase. The rest of the boys have been really good (by Llewellyn standards). We have fun.
Like Chrissy, I have to brag about my husband for a minute...He took his Logistics final on Saturday and got an A! He will most likely get an A in the class. We had a nice break from school and work Saturday to celebrate (went to the Temple and out to dinner -- much needed quiet time!). Hope you all have a fun week! If we were still living at home, we'd be opening a bag of candy with a number on it every morning, and going caroling tomorrow night for FHE. Fun times....

The Infamous Slide Show

Some of you have noticed the slide show at the bottom of the blog. It comes from my Family Slide Show album. It's meant to contain our family milestone and favorite moments.  Unfortunately, the slide show doesn't show the captions. But if you go to the link above you can browse through the album and see the captions. I've tried to include dates wherever I could. 

All of your Google accounts have photo albums built in. From google.com , under the "More" link you can select "Photos" and it will take you to your own web album page. I also came across the program Microsoft Live Writer . I think it make it easier to format blog posts.

Thank you all for making the blog a fun way to share our lives with each other. I love you all.

Rogers Family Update

Hi All,

It's a good idea to post more often, I love to read your updates and see your pictures. As you all probably know, we saw the doctor in Utah for a second opinion and he encouraged us to continue with Cincinnati. He said "they are one of the best, if not the best, in the country." We were really glad to meet with him, he answered some of our nagging questions and eased our minds. We are now confident in our decision to go ahead in Cincinnati. Everything else is going pretty well here. We all have a cold, which is not fun, hopefully none of you that we saw on Thursday will catch it. I'm really happy for the good things going on in your lives. If there's one thing we learned from our trip to Utah is that the Lord loves us. I felt inspired to go to Utah to speak to the doctor there, and now I feel that it was just so we could feel confident and comfortable with going to Cincinnati. The Lord knows how much I second guess myself and now I don't have to with this big decision. We are so blessed. I love you all. Have a Merry Christmas!

Love,
Aubrey

Finals Week!

So I feel really guilty that I reemed you all out at the end of October about not posting Halloween pictures, and then I haven't posted for a month and a half! I agree with Carl though that we should all try to post more often...I absolutely love it. Before I forget, this picture was taken at the BYU-Utah game after our awesome victory. As Carl said, finals are next week, and I think we're all excited to get this semester over with. Jon's finals are going to be pretty tough, but mine will be a breeze after I get this 15-page paper turned in Monday. I'd take a test over a paper any day...it definitely wasn't the writing that inspired me to teach English! With that considered, though, my favorite class this semester and probably of my whole college career was my Teaching Writing class and I now feel somewhat prepared to teach the process that is so painful for me. I was so excited to say that Thursday was my last day of classes ever (except for a seminar every other week next semester), and I'm so thrilled to get into my student teaching. Seventh graders are absolutely hilarious and I think it'll be a great experience. My mentor teacher is letting me take a lot of creative license in my planning (for good or for bad), which I think will make the experience even more valuable. The main bulk of my teaching will be on Greek Mythology, centered around a really fun new young adult novel called The Lightning Thief. I recommend it to everyone--Mom's already read it and liked it, and it's a quick read. By the way, a few other reading suggestions if anyone is "bored" over Christmas break (ha ha you guys must be thinking--I know you are all super busy): March, by Geraldine Brooks is a beautiful pulitzer-prize winner about the father in Little Women (that's actually the book I'm writing my 15-page paper about); Gilead, by Marilynn Robinson is another pulitzer-prize winner that is a must-read for any Christian. I know there's more books that I loved this semester but I can't think of them...

Things are going really well for Jon too right now, though he is busier than ever. I loves working on his NAHB competition and is working hard to wrap up the majority of his work on that before Christmas break. I don't know if I said this before, but he and his team are creating a development proposal for a real community that is in the process of being built right now in Florida (that's where the competition is being held). Jon is in charge of the marketing plan and analysis for his team, which has included creating a website that looks absolutely incredible. We've also been really fortunate recently to get some extra work from Jon's dad on revising floor plans for his company. Jon gets 100 bucks for each plan he revises and can usually do one in less than an hour. The projects don't come often, but when they do, it's really nice to alleviate some financial stress. This semester Jon took a computer-aided design class where he and a partner worked all semester to create house plans both in AutoCad (the two, dimensional, detailed plans) and Revit (three dimensional renderings--this is what he works in at work). At the beginning of the semester his professor was hired by a wealthy young couple to design a luxurious custom home, and so he assigned each partnership to create their own house plans for this couple for practice. The couple gave the students their specifications and they took a field trip to the lot and then they were let loose. Jon's love is custom homes, so this was a really fun project for him. last week all of the partnerships presented their plans to a panel of judges that included this young couple, though it wasn't a competition because it wasn't like they were about to choose a 20-something year old's idea over the professor's. However, Jon was approached by his professor earlier this week and told that the young couple was so impressed with their design ideas that they asked the professor to work with Jon and his partner in doing the "real" design for their house. isn't that awesome?! Jon also secured a TA job with this professor for next semester, so things are really looking up for him. Sorry that was such a long paragraph about Jon, but I am just so proud of him!

We are excited for Christmas in Omaha this year, and especially excited just for a chance to relax. Before we head to Omaha, we are going with Steven and Lauren to watch BYU football at the Vegas Bowl with front row tickets! We are playing UCLA again and look forward to creaming our dear cousin Ben this time. :) i start school with my seventh graders on January 3rd and Jon again the next week. Despite how busy we are, Jon and I feel so blessed during this time in our lives and can really see the hand of the Lord in helping everything run smoothly. We love you all!

Finals and the Finale

I am sad that everyone has slacked off in posting to the blog (this includes me). I love reading your posts. I love seeing your beautiful children. I realize that everyone is busy and has things that are important. a couple of posts a month would be great if everyone could do that.

Well next week is finals week. So much fun. I am taking all of them on Monday. I like to challenge my mind... Actually I am just super anxious to be done and to get on with my winter break.

We are super excited for Christmas. I don't think that Ben really realizes what is going on with the whole Santa thing... but he says he want a Balooo (as in the color) Bike.

We were at Grandma's house and Ben found this slinky and he will not put it down for anything. He won't go to bed without it... and in the mornings its "Shrek, Shrek, Shrek."

Anyway, we love you all, and hope that you all have a Merry Christmas.

LOVE the slideshow!!!

I'm not sure when it was added, but I just noticed it now. If you don't know what I'm talking about, scroll to the bottom of the page. Did mom or dad do this? I couldn't stop smiling as I watched all of those memories pass by. Crazy that we are starting families of our own already.

Online forum

If you want to see all of the online deals (there's some for Toys "R" Us, Bath and Body Works, Best Buy, etc), here's a link to the main forum (not just the Amazon thread)...

http://www.pinchingyourpennies.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=10

Word of caution: can be addictive, and if you don't need anything, don't look (because then you'll find something that you think you need, and then you'll try to find other things to meet the free shipping minimums, and then you'll have everyone's birthdays and Christmas taken care of for the next 2 years)...

Love you all,
Lisa

So thankful for my boys...

My boys are charmers this week. I can't get enough of the two youngest (though all of them have been pretty sweet). Cameron has toned down his terrible two agression this week, and Adam is overflowing with the cutest little personality. He's started getting into everything (the tupperware drawer is always empty these days...)The Book of Mormon/Tyler sleeping picture is legit. Brian has started personal scripture study at night, and Tyler thinks he's big enough to do it too. One night I heard him flipping pages for at least 10 minutes. When I went to check on him later, he was zonked out and I couldn't pass up the photo op.

On another topic, I'm 100% addicted to online Christmas shopping (hooray for Amazon and free shipping!) The only thing better than getting toys 60% off is having them delivered to my door. For anyone interested, the latest Amazon deal thread in my forum is http://www.pinchingyourpennies.com/forums/showthread.php?t=79527 - if you jump on it you should still be able to get them
in time for Christmas (some of the deals go quick, others have been around for awhile). I think I'm finished shopping, except for dad (anyone have any ideas?) I'm SO excited for the boys to open their presents in a few weeks. I'm even more excited to go to Boise the weekend before. It will be fun to see half of you!

We've had snow the last couple days. Brian went out and made a snowman with the boys yesterday to give me a few hours of quiet time -- a great time was had by all! I finished the 7th season of Gilmore Girls this past week as well. I can get back to normal and stop having dreams that I'm Rory. Well enough about us. I hope everyone else is well!

Care Package From Rick

Well, Rick just sent us our first care package. It contained among other things: his boots that turned out to not be "mission authorized", my ancient digital camera that his missionary buddies had labeled "the brick", a cookbook, 2 of his used missionary planners, a hand-written letter (very nicely punctuated and capitalized, I might add), and a memory card of pictures and movies from his "new" camera.

His movies were huge so I'm not posting them. One was a tour of his apartment, which included a nice investigator white board, scriptures, church pictures on the wall and other typical missionary stuff like 20-30 different types of junk food (featuring Chips Ahoy and Krispy Kreme donuts), a few unwashed dishes, a companion in p-day garb, etc... I think the Krispy Kremes might be one reason he didn't need the cookbook anymore.

The other two movie shorts featured Elder Baker and his companion Elder Johnson in true missionary attire swaying/not-really-dancing to the tunes of "Winter Wonderland" (Mom's favorite) and "Feliz Navidad." Joking aside, it was great to see him in pictures and read his letter. Rick is excited that an investigator that he had tracted out a few weeks ago set a baptismal date.

I enjoy the uplift I get from Rick's letters. What an effort he is making to grow spiritually, work hard, share the gospel, take a genuine interest in the welfare of others and do his family proud. I thank all of you for your prayers and words of encouragement to him. They have meant a lot to him.