Dirty, Filthy Children

This weekend I have come to realize that my children are dirty filthy heathens. (I have been well aware of this for some time, but have not wanted to fully admit it!) They absolutely did not inherit my OCD tendencies. They are perfectly fine to wallow in their own filth, and enjoy it too! Various items are just strewn along their rooms. Wet towels dropped on the floor, better yet even left in the basement. Will's idea of cleaning up his room is to sweep everything under his bed, then later ask me where a certain toy is. Will is also my cyclone kid. He enters a room and in no time flat, every toy that he owns is all over the floor. My girls are no better either. They are pack rats, they try to keep everything, and I mean everything!

What's a mother to do??????

(I would post pictures but my computer is having issues and we have yet to replace it)

Done!

We have officially wrapped up the selling of Girl Scout cookies at our home.

Shawna' sold 400 boxes and Camryn sold 315 boxes!

Way to go girls and a huge thanks to all of our family and friends who support them every year.

So, until early March when I have picked up 715 boxes of Girl Scout cookies that will need to be delivered.......we wont talk about cookies!

There's cookie's in the air!!!

There's cookie's in the air!!!

GIRL SCOUT COOKIES THAT IS!!!

Today kicks off the first day of Girl Scout cookie sales. As I am typing this, both of my girls are out taking orders for cookies! They are each trying to sell 300 boxes +. A goal that they both will easily reach. (As past years have shown!)

So, if you know of anyone looking for cookies, then leave me a comment and we will call you to take your order. Feel free to let family's and friends know. We'd be happy to take orders for the Bountiful/Centerville areas!

Thanks for your support!

Below is some fun cookie facts!

Cookie Fun Facts

• Little Brownie bakes over 4,500,000 Thin Mints Girl Scout Cookies per day during peak baking times.
• We make our own caramel for Samoas®. It‘s cooked the old fashion way in copper kettles to 234 degrees.
• Do-si-dos® and Tagalongs® take 230,000 lbs. of peanut butter per week.
• Peanut butter crème is deposited onto Do-si-do® cookies at the rate of 2800 per minute.
• After exiting the oven, Thin Mints travel 300 feet on a conveyor belt to cool before being coated in the chocolate.
• A rotary die shapes Trefoils. There are 300 identical Trefoil shapes engraved in one rotary die. The die rotates 17 times a minute equaling 5100 cookies a minute.
• Samoas® go through a cooling tunnel at 40-50 degrees before chocolate is applied.
• Do-si-dos® are wrapped at 64 packages per minute!

WEEKLY INGREDIENTS (during peak production):

• Flour: 21 truckloads, 1,050,000 lbs.
• Shortening: 7 truckloads, 300,000 lbs.
• Cocoa: 50,000 lbs.
• Chocolate coating: 500,000 lbs.
• Sugar: 14.5 truckloads, 650,000 lbs.
• Peanut butter: 230,000 lbs.
• Toasted coconut: 75,000 lbs.

MIXING TRIVIA:

• Mixers are machine operated. Ingredients are weighed and released with the push of a button.
• Each batch is 1200-1500 lbs... It takes 10 minutes to mix the dough, which lasts 20-30 minutes and takes 5-7 minutes to bake.

BAKING INFORMATION:

• Each oven approximately 100-280 feet long and has 4 baking zones with very specific jobs…
  1. 1st: prepares the cookies to be baked by softening them.
  2. 2nd: bakes cookies from the bottom up
  3. 3rd: brings the cookies to a flat shape
  4. 4th: gives the cookies their color

It's Christmas time!

I cant believe that another Christmas is here! Where has all the time gone? It seems like we were just celebrating Christmas of 2008! (Which was great by the way!) I would like to post pictures of our adventures over the last few months and current adventures, but my computer seems to be having issues. So, here's a little bit of what's been going on since my last post:

September: the kids started school and all seem to like their teachers. Shawna' is adjusting to Jr. High, it's been a little rough, but she's pulling thru! (Sounds like my new position at the school! LOL)

October: School is in full swing, the kids are doing great. Football is in full swing as well. The Bountiful Braves are doing great this year. Josh and I managed a week long escape to Arizona sans kids! We went down to my friend's wedding in Sedona. Can I just say beautiful?! OMG...the area is beautiful...as was the wedding. Not to mention the resort that we stayed at. Can you say room service! I would go stay there again any day!

We celebrated Halloween: Shawna' dressed up as Medusa (she won best costume at the school dance!), Dallin was a bloody psycho dude, Camryn was a vampire, and Will was a Star Wars Clone Trooper. They had a fun night of trick-or-treating! Tons of candy!!

November: A month to be thankful! We have some many things to be thankful for...and yet we all to often take them for granted! We celebrated Thanksgiving at my sister-n-law Vicki's house. Her family was in town for the holiday. We had a beautiful dinner! It was a wonderful day!

December: Shawna' had her first band concert, she plays the trumpet. The whole band played very well. For cub scouts, we participated in the annual Bountiful Light Parade. We pulled a trailer that the cubs decorated. We even had a fire pit (Yes, with a fire in it!) The trailer was packed full of boys! It was so fun, and cold!! We've had a few Christmas parties, and are enjoying the time together. (Well trying too!) Josh has the week off, so it has been really nice to have him home. He took the kids to the bubble...they wore him out! No that's funny!!

So, that's about it. I am ready for Christmas! Gifts are wrapped and we are counting down the days till Santa comes. The kids are excited...and I'm excited too!

From our family to yours: We wish you a Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year!

What have we been up to???

You may be wondering what we've been doing for the last three months.

Well, let me tell ya...we've been BUSY!

Since school has started, we've had nightly homework and reading, I've been working at the school, we've had soccer games and football games. We've had sickness, a wonderful vacation to Arizona sans kids, we celebrated Colton turning 17, partook in Halloween parties, pumpkin carving, and Trick-or-Treating. We've had Girl Scout meetings and Cub Scout meetings.We've gone to a corn maze. I picked up some extra hours at the school on top of what I was already working. Josh has been to Idaho every other week for work, then he pulled a muscle in his back. (He's ok now)

Did I mention cooking, cleaning, laundry, bills, running a house etc?

Well, that about sums it up...as you can see we've been busy.

Pictures and posts to come.

(Eventually!)

School has begun...

Ahhh....the first day of school....the end of summer frivolities!

The end of having no routine...no schedule...no plans set in stone!

No trips to the park with cousins...no trips to the bubble...no homework...no school!

How I love thee...how I miss thee...how I welcome thee change!

Shawna' will be in 7th grade!

Holy Crap...when did she grow up?!

And where did all this tween drama come from?

Dallin is starting 4th grade in Mrs. Glass's class.

Loves to play football every chance he gets!

Camryn is starting 3rd grade in Mr. Cassler's class.

Loves everything about her class...especially playing hockey in the class on Wednesday's!

Will is officially starting Kindergarten in Ms. Arthur's class!

Loves going to school to learn new things...loves seeing his mom at his school too!

The kids all seem to like school and their teachers. They have great teachers and go to wonderful schools...so that helps too!

Have a great year kids...I can't believe it's time for school...and that your another grade older!

And of course Colton is not pictured...cuz mom...that's so lame! I don't like to take pictures!

The boys get buzzed...

heads that is!

(The photos loaded backwards!)

How about Q-pi style!

He tormented the boys by only shaving some parts of their hair off and telling them that they were done!

Dallin was not having any of that!

During the haircutting process...(and what a process it was!) the boys decided that they didn't want a Mohawk anymore. So Josh did what nay normal dad would do.

Classic!

The boys decided that they wanted to have a Mohawk for a summer hair cut!