Victoria turned 11 on December 22nd! The Friday before her birthday, we took her friend Ellie to Old Chicago for pizza, then went to a movie- "The Tale of Desperaux."
Tori's actual birthday was spent in Utah at the Melville's house, where she had reindeer cupcakes. She got a PSP, piggy bank, a picture frame, jump rope, a purse, plenty of stuff to keep a kid busy!
Victoria had her Cantabella Choir concert this weekend. They were lucky to be able to perform at Denver University in the Newsom center. What a beautiful place!
The choirs looked and sounded very professional. It was quite impressive!
These three girls are friends, we all are in the same ward- Victoria, Lindsey, and Ellie.
For Thanksgiving we had Scott's cousin Michael and his fiance Jen down from Fort Collins. All the food turned out great, and it was nice to have family close enough to come!
Scott and Tori hit the ski slopes the next day at Loveland.
We had fun shopping for our tree, and listened to good Christmas music while we decorated. (not the junk like the song "A Very Special Christmas"- what is that mess?)
My elementary choir, the Strasburg Singers, performed at the town's Festival of Lights. I have almost 40 fourth and fifth graders in the choir!
Scott and some of his buddies: Travis, Brett, John and Chris went to the Authier Farm to go pheasant hunting.
Look at all that wide open space on the farm! The guys had fun- I think I'm now up to 13 pheasants in the freezer. Any recipe ideas?
Victoria has read Twilight and New Moon, and is in love with the books. I had bought midnight Twilight tickets for me and some friends, forgetting that Scott was going to be hunting. So I bought a ticket for Victoria, too. I didn't tell her until I woke her up. It took a minute for her to comprehend what I was telling her!
Victoria and I are on Team Jacob- we want Jacob imprinting on us! We loved the movie, and she saw it again the next night with a friend, two times in the first 24 hours!
Go Jacob!
Halloween is one of our family's favorite holidays!
We had some mutant, half-breed pumpkins growing in our garden that smelled strangely like cucumbers or watermelon when we cut them open...
For four years now, we have had a Halloween party at our house, we invite our friends who live out on 40 acres who don't have neighbors. Our garage gets converted into a dining hall/karaoke room. We even showed "Thriller" with our projector (Happy 25th Anniversary, Michael!). Everyone gets goes Trick-or-Treating in groups around the neighborhood. We had 52 people including us!
I make my white chicken chili, homemade macaroni and cheese, and rolls. We go through a lot of candy, and I know almost every trick-or-treater from school.
These are Victoria's good friends Ellie and Kayla. Victoria was an Egyptian.
Scott and his buddies went hunting near Craig, Colorado. Scott shot a 3x4 buck by noon on opening day! 
It took two days to haul everybody's meat out- they need a rest!
Mom, can I have a backpack like that?
Victoria has always had a very good singing voice, and wants to be on American Idol or start a band. So this year she tried out for a children's choir in Denver called "Young Voices of Colorado." She and two friends from the ward, Lindsey and Ellie, all made it into the same choir, Cantabella. The directors of these choirs are well respected in the music field, and are very good at getting these kids to sound amazing! These girls sing in 2 and 3 parts, well!
This weekend was their overnight camp in the mountains near Bailey, CO. They get to bond with eachother, play games, and learn their music. 
This is Lindsey and Ellie, the two friends from the ward.
The concert dates are Sunday, December 7th at 4:00 pm and May 2nd at Denver University. You all are invited to come!
On Sunday Scott turned the big three-two! 
We had a big get together at our house with about 30 people! Scott worked hard on the back yard this summer, now we have a deck, patio 
and grass so we can accomodate a lot of people. We cooked all day, and the food turned out great!
Scott and I got to go rock out with other people stuck in the 90's at the Foo Fighters concert. It was at Red Rocks Ampitheater, and it was cold, but we loved it!
Victoria and I drove down to Colorado Springs to see our friends the Gonzales family. One of Victoria's very best friends is Salena.
It was Salena's sister's birthday party, and they took us to a gymnastics gym full of trampolines, and ropes to swing on. The kids were running and jumping nonstop!
In this video, Victoria has a harness on which are attached to bungee chords. She learned how to do flips! Sorry it's sideways- I don't know how to turn it!
The photographer brought a camera for Tori to take pictures with!
While I was home, I spent an afternoon with my friend Cathy Butler Marlor and her son Tucker.%5B1%5D.JPG)
I also got to spend time with Kirsten Rash, Mark Noyce, Brett Skidmore, and Aaron McIntyre, we all grew up together. I miss them!This is our silly dog, Charlie. 
This Spring, Charlie figured out how to jump our 6 foot fence. We patched up the fence, gave him a shock collar, he still jumped. The vet was always calling us, "Your neighbor has Charlie." One neighbor threatened to shoot him. We tied him up while we were planning to build a kennel, and he almost hung himself twice, our neighbor saved him once. Charlie's whole goal in life was to get out and go play around the neighborhood.
We miss Charlie, my running partner, but are glad he's happy and free! We will still get to see him when we go visit South Dakota.
There's one member of our family who doesn't miss the dog- Our cat Lucy!
For three summers now, I have gone to Colorado State University in Fort Collins to work on a master's degree. My friend Jodie from in my program rented a house in Estes Park this summer, so we stayed there most of the trip. As we commuted, we saw elk, deer, and big horn sheep!
This is the amazing house we stayed in up on the side of the mountain.
Here is the view from the front porch!
Scott and Victoria came up to visit one weekend.
One day we went to Rocky Mountain National park, and walked up to some lakes. It started raining and hailing on us! We were about a mile or so from the car, so we just kind of gave up and just enjoyed the rain.
My master's degree will be in music education with a Kodaly Emphasis. The class I took was Level III of Kodaly, the last one you need to earn the certificate. We studied conducting, choir, folk song research, methodology, and sight singing (solfege- hence the do re mi handsigns we are all doing). For 12 days, we go from 8:00 am-4:00 pm to class all day. The seven of us have been together for three summers. Some of us will be presenting together at the Colorado Music Educator's Conference in January!
Laura came out to Denver this week to visit! Dave was finishing up some online classes, so it was a good time for her.
We went downtown to the 16th Street Mall and ate at the Cheesecake Factory. Only a 5 minute wait! Are you jealous, Utah people?
I play on a softball team with Scott for his work. We needed girls so Laura played with us. She hit the ball every time she batted, and she caught 2 fly balls in the outfield! She hasn't played since Young Womens'. Everyone on the team was so impressed, they probably couldn't believe we were from the same family.
We met up with Kylee and Wendy Hallows from our home ward in Layton. They were out visiting their brother Jeremy. 
It was fun to have Laura come visit!!!
Well, guns are pretty much a part of our daily lives out here in Strasburg. Go NRA!
Our friend Travis Harris works for the division of Fisheries and Wildlife, and set up a clay pigeon shoot for our group of friends. I am pretty much the worst shot of the whole group, but what do you expect from a girl who'd never tasted venison, pheasant, elk, antelope, bear, and wild turkey until she moved out here?
Exercising our right to bear arms- me, Christa, Shawn, Keri, and Stephanie.
Some of Scott's good buddies John and Kreg.
We had a fun evening, and then we ate out at Outback Steakhouse. Thanks Travis!
