December hours

Well now it seems I need to catch up. November was pretty snowy. My kids have fun in the snow. I'm allergic to cold and never play in the snow, but I like to take pictures of them playing and Jared snow plowing.



This is how I've been spending my time, or part of my time anyway, in a classroom with my other 36 fellow MSW students. The other half is at the prison in my internship. I am 2 finals away from completing this semester, and I'm already a little sad that I'll be graduated soon. I will really miss this cohort!


CLASS OF 2011

Jared decided to buy a BowFlex one day, he didn't consult with me or anything! I know, shocker. But the funny thing is it didn't come for months and Jared thought it was out of stock and we pretty much forgot about it. Until it just showed up on our porch this week and the invoice hit our account. I guess we won't be renewing our gym membership next year, and hopefully it won't just collect dust.



When Jared decided months ago to buy the BowFlex I made some comment like, "Why don't you put our extra money to good use and buy a hot tub!!!" I have always wanted one, and its my favorite thing to do to relax myself, and being so stressed this past year has made my desire increase for a powerful relaxing coping skill. I did not expect that guy to take me seriously, but he started pricing hot tubs on KSL, and did so for 2 months. Of course, Jared doesn't buy anything unless its a special product at a special price. A couple weeks ago he announced that he found a hot tub perfect for our family in Midway for $1500. I was shocked! It was black Friday, and instead of hitting the stores we all drove through the canyon to Midway. An old lady was selling her hot tub because her husband who has Alzheimers was the only one who ever used it, in fact, he bought it without telling her for $3600 new less than two years ago and she was worried he was going to drown in it because he would get in it at 3 AM in the morning. It was kind of funny. Jared talked her down to $1200 (1/3 the purchase price!), and picked it up a few days later. So Merry Christmas to us.


Cleaning and getting all the water out was the first step. Electrical upgrade was next, which cost more than we thought, but needed to be done anyway.

Then we filled it up, and I was getting excited, and we went to the spa store for chemicals.

Now its heating, as I type! We regulated the chemicals and PH and alkalinity, and we are just waiting for it to get to a lovely 104 degrees. Jared and I had to do some research on spa care and chemical regulation. At first it seemed complicated and I was wondering why I was getting into more work just so I could relax. But I think it will be well worth it. Jared and I promised not to get each other anything but this for Christmas. The BowFlex just happened to come around Christmas time so maybe that too.

Thanks be to our God

THANKSGIVING AT THE BARRETTS. My brother in law Bill made a TurDucken, that is a chicken in a duck in a turkey. It took 12 hours and a lot of work. I was in charge of veggies, easy. We got a puzzle out to give Grandma Rappleye something to do while we cooked, and it ended up distracting half the family and we were late getting dinner on. I forgot my camera, so thankfully Heidi doesn't mind that I copied all her pictures off her blog. It was a fun day and we are very grateful this year for our many blessings.

Jared and I feel so blessed, he has done well in his business this year, and I have had a life changing experience with school and internships. I thank the Lord every day for his abundance of blessings. Working at the prison makes a person so grateful not only for freedom, but for family and resources and the gospel and education. IGNORANCE and WANT are unfortunately a plague in our society that we would like to pretend are not there, and I have seen them up close and personal this past year. I've been doing my best to serve and help, but feel my efforts are so meager against the tower of disadvantage some of these people face. I've turned to the Lord and keep moving forward.

THANKSGIVING ABC's. We are grateful for...
Alan, Atonement
Barretts, Bill
Carpenters, Christmas
Doctors
Exercise, Education
Fiora, Faith, Family
Grandma, Gabe
Holy Ghost, Heather, Heidi, Holly, Home, Health, Holidays
Iron Rod
Jesus, Jared, Jesse, Justin, Joseph
Karli, Kathy Sue, Krystal, Kynsie, Kali, Kelsy
Love, laughter
Mothers, Music
Nature, normal health, nice people
Optimism
Priesthood
Quiet time
Repentence, Rachel
Savanna
Transportation
Utah
Violin lessons
Weston water
Xtra helpings
Yards to play in
Zoo (our family gatherings are like a zoo)

Breakfast in bed

One morning Savanna asked me to make her breakfast in bed. Jared and I aren't too keen on eating in beds, crumbs and whatnot. So I said no, sometimes I'm really not a fun mommy. Savanna asked me again then next week on Saturday, and since I was feeling in a "want to be a good fun mommy" mood, I said I would do it. Weston came in the kitchen and saw the tray of food I was making and asked if he could have breakfast in bed too. Fiora followed suit. So I made all my kids breakfast in bed. To say they loved it is an understatement. Weston thought he'd died and gone to heaven. The next Saturday Weston asked for breakfast in bed again. I said no I'm going to stay in bed. I guess he didn't hear me because he sat in his bed for 30 minutes and finally started yelling and crying "Why isn't anyone making me breakfast in bed!!" That made Jared mad and me not really wanting to validate his pain. He didn't get his wish that morning. But we both agreed that it showed how much he loved it the first time. I scheduled Thanksgiving morning as the day I would do it again, and we got some pictures.

Nearsighted

Fiora is nearsighted. I was sitting up at the pulpit in church to lead the singing and when my family walked in, Savanna looked at me and waved, Weston looked at me and waved, Fiora looked, then squinted at me, then waved. I thought, that's funny, the other kids didn't squint. So when I sat by her in church I asked her to read the hymn numbers. She got them all wrong. So it was off to the eye doctor. After a brief, overpriced exam, and a huffy letter to the corporate office, we went to Wal-mart to get some glasses. She picked the $9 frames, which was nice of her. She looks so grown up now, and not she can see the blades of grass and hymnal numbers in church.

Dinosaur museum

I had a busy week as usual last week and came home Friday thinking, "I don't do enough fun stuff with my kids. Soon they will be too old to want to do fun stuff. I want to take them to the dinosaur museum tomorrow!" I told Jared my idea, he has principles that go against spending over 5 dollars on anything for a kid, but I was resolved in my determination to do something fun and educational with my children that they are going to grow out of in a few years. So on Saturday we were off!

The kids loved seeing all the dino bones and trying to pronounce all the names, but by far and yon their favorite part of the museum was the water/sand exhibit. They spent an hour making islands with trees and dinosaurs, dams, pathways, and dino burial grounds.

We had to leave the exhibits halfway through to have lunch, sandwiches I made and brought so as to not waste more money, and then we walked back through to where we left off. Of course, we ended in the paleontologist exhibit where the kids get to dig/brush out dinosaur bones from the ground. They liked that, but then we went back through the exhibits so they could spend another 30 minutes in the sand/water!





Can you believe Jared chose fishing over this exitement?!? We spent 4 hours there, it was worth every penny. And the kids thanked me more than once for taking them.

Various costumes

Its becoming a tradition for Savanna to be dissatisfied with her costume each halloween. In fact I almost always get a grumpy picture of her after her first costume attempt. I've learned to live with it. She has good ideas but has a hard time making that idea translate to something she's really satisfied with. She really wanted to be a Kyoshi warrior this year so we did our best to find an outfit that resembled that and I did her hair like Mulan, but she did not like it.

Fiora on the other hand is satisfied with just about anything. She wanted to be Nuay from The Last Airbender so we made a costume for her. But the day of her school parade she changed her mind and wanted to be Frankenstein's bride. So we scrambled to find a suitible ragged dress and veil and ratted her hair.


Then on halloween she changed her mind yet again and decided to be a bear. A BEAR. She was the cutest bear I've ever seen, but I did not see that coming.



Back to Savanna, she ripped out her hair, and had me do a french braid and went off to school and was a Kyoshi warrior for her school parade. But nobody knew what she was dressed up as, and this added to her disgruntled state.



So on Saturday we decided we really needed some face paint to make her look like a real warrior. Unfortunately she didn't like the way I did her face paint. Not that I was surprised. More grumpy pictures.


Weston was completely satisfied with his Aang costume, thankfully, and we had to put the finishing touches on that costume by buzzing his hair.




Savanna was forced to go with the facepaint to a little halloween recital our family put together Saturday. But as soon as we got home she washed her face and changed her outfit. She was inspired by my sister Krystal's outfit "The Red Queen" from Alice in Wonderland. She found a red dress, red cape, ratted her own hair, and voila, she was the red queen. All I had to do was her lipstick and put a few bobby pins in. Great job Savanna!





No matter what they were wearing, they had a great time running around the neighborhood trick or treating, we were glad the rain and wind stopped so we could take our time and get lots of candy! Happy Halloweeeeeeeen! (Whew that its over)

My sisters Karli and Heidi ran a half marathon that morning in costumes. They are awesome!
Jesse and Kesly.
I dressed up.
I was a fisherperson. The ninja is my brother Joseph.
One more picture of the Avatar.