New Beginnings

We had our New Beginnings and I am so happy how it turned out! Our theme was, "Your Happily Ever After" based on Elder Uchtdorf's talk. The idea was to have each of our young women walk away feeling that they, too, can have a real life happily ever after and that it's not just for princesses in fairy tales. We had a table display pictures of the leaders and their families to show "our happily ever after" and that it can be achieved. Along with tools to help us get there such as scriptures, journals, church magazines, and our personal progress books. Our guest speaker was Sister Carleen Tanner. I've talked about her before with her parenting class and it was such a joy to have her there to talk to the girls. She did such an amazing job and we were so happy she could make it. We had the 3 white dresses to show the steps we need to take and that they have already done 2 of them. And now their goal is to make it to the temple and wear the 3rd. We also put together a video of each of the girls' pictures. It started with them as babies, then current pictures, then a few of them from an activity, followed by a picture of the Savior, ending with pictures of temples. The song that played was Happily Ever After. It starts out, "Once upon a time a child was born..." and then ends, "...Let the Savior lead you to happily ever after." As the last words were sung it showed a picture of the Savior and then faded into a picture of the temple. It was absolutely perfect!
And then we served little cupcakes with crowns on top to our little princesses. The cake below was supposed to be a castle cake, but it was so pretty I hated the thought of possibly messing it up. So I turned it into a mini wedding cake... and then nobody even wanted to cut into it. I was so happy about all of it and I so appreciate those that helped out that day.

Number 2!

Tonight Sammy was showing me how much she could wiggle her front tooth. It was loose, but not enough I was really willing to pull it out. I asked if she wanted it out and her eyes lit up as she said, "Yeah!" I told her it might hurt and she replied, "I don't care! I want it out!" So then I asked if she wanted me to pull it out or if she wanted Uncle Bryce to pull it out... He is always telling her he'll pull her teeth out. Her eyes lit up even more and she grinned from ear to ear. So we called Bryce and he came right over. He pulled it out and she didn't even cry. Bryce said, "That's the phone call I was waiting for!" It made Sammy so happy, but I think the fact that Bryce gave her a dollar was even more exciting! How cute is that toothless smile?!

It's a great day!!!

Today my dear, dear friend, Sarah, and her husband adopted this beautiful baby girl! It was a long and bumpy road to get her here, but it's finally official! They were able to go before the judge and make her a part of their family this morning. It was a very sweet experience to be there with them. (I have no idea why all of this is underlined and I'm not savvy enough to fix it... sorry.)

We love you guys SO much and we are so glad you are finally able to have a child! We love you, too, BryLeigh, and we are so excited to see you grow! (You've already grown and changed a bit.)

Fondant!

I've always wanted to try and use fondant! So last week my friend, Sarah, and I decided to experience it together. The cakes were falling apart completely just trying to put a light layer of frosting on them so we set those aside and practiced with a bowl. Later I used the last little cake that was frozen and this is what became of it. It was so much fun just to play around with it. And now I can't wait to try homemade fondant and a much larger cake! I'll be trying to do a three dimensional Mickey, and then a castle cake.

Later, however, I noticed two very tiny little cracks in my fondant. From about two feet away you couldn't even notice them, but if you looked close you could see. So to all my friends who are experienced with fondant how do you fix that? Or what causes the cracks? Am I rolling it too thick or too thin?

Also, I want to use rice crispy treats in place of cake for Mickey's shoes and I was wondering if I can lay fondant over that as well?

Happy Holidays!

We hope that everyone had a great Christmas and is enjoying the New Year! To all of our blogging friends and family here is our letter we sent out about our past year...

Dear Family and Friends,

It’s that time of year again when we sit and ponder this past year. Looking back we can hardly believe it’s nearly gone. We just wanted to take a few minutes to share what we’ve been up to.

Katie (3) loves her baby dolls, Barbie dolls, her “big, soft blanket”, her stuffed bunny (named Coralie) dressing up, and anything else that is girly and sparkly. She is constantly singing around the house. Mostly it’s random songs she makes up that go along with whatever activity she is doing at the time. Other times it’s her favorite primary song, Follow the Prophet. We love her little voice and hope she never stops singing or talking. She loves doing anything with her sisters and loves that she can go across the street to a friend’s house, too. She is growing so much right before our eyes and brings such joy to our home everyday. Andy says she gets away with whatever she wants because she is too darn cute for mommy to say no (it’s true). And we can hardly believe she will be in primary in a few short weeks.

Ashley’s (5) favorite thing is still her Diamond Castle movie. You would’ve thought it was the end of the world when a sister broke the DVD. She loves her Barbie dolls, ponies, her monkey (named Monk), and dresses. She is always wearing a dress or skirt and it’s quite the battle to get her to wear pants sometimes… even if it’s snowing. She LOVES babies! Anytime she is near one she is constantly touching and kissing him/her. She is so smart and says things that catch us off guard. Mommy tried to encourage her to play with Katie one day and said, “Go play with your best friend.” Her response was, “She is not my best friend, she is my sister.” Mommy told her, “Brigetta is my best friend and she’s my sister.” Without missing a beat Ashley said, “Yeah, but you don’t live with her.” She can’t wait to go to school and Mommy (secretly) is, too.

Sammy (7) is a big 1st grader this year! She loves her teacher and is doing very well in school. She loves reading and doing math, but mostly she gets excited to eat in the lunch room. She loves when mom comes to help in the classroom every week. This year she learned to tie her own shoes, ride a 2 wheeled bike, and most recently she lost her first tooth! (Her cousin who is 11 days older than her lost the same tooth 4 days later and it made for a cute picture.) She loves playing with her cousins and friends and enjoys every minute with them. She is already quite the fashion girl and has to have things “her way”. In the morning she doesn’t want any help with getting ready for school. She likes to babysit and asks regularly if she can be in charge wile mommy is busy. Only a few more years and she can do it alone. (Mommy is definitely counting down!)

Alanya has continued to enjoy running and accomplished her first full marathon in St. George! It was one of the hardest things she’s ever done and had some major stumbling blocks along the way. She finished strong in just barely under her goal time and hopes that maybe someday she can conquer another one. (It’s still a little early to commit Andy to her training.) She is so grateful that she had such an amazing support group and that she was able to run with 2 sisters-in-law. She has loved every moment of her calling in the Young Women presidency… if she had it her way she would stay there till the day she dies. It keeps her busy, but she loves all the young women and the amazing ladies she works with on a daily basis. She tries hard to enjoy her moments at home with the girls and has recently taken on another cute face twice a week. Our neighbor has been such a joy to have over and we all love the play time together.

Andy has been with St. Luke’s now for nearly 4 years. It keeps him busy and he’s gone long hours, but he likes the challenges it brings. He enjoys the summer months when he can go play tennis or golf. Unfortunately, this year they were few and far in between. In the off season he likes to play indoor soccer and dodge ball over at the church. He is glad that Alanya’s marathon is over and that there isn’t another race in the near future. It seems he spent this year’s Saturdays or weeknights at home during training, or traveling for yet another race. He handles his calling of the Cub Scout Master very well, especially considering he doesn’t even have a BOY! He keeps his hope high for one someday, but adores his little girls and loves that they still welcome him home with lots of hugs and kisses. He enjoys spending time with them and even took Sammy to a BSU game. He’s trying hard to convince one of them that football is fun!

We love you all and hope you have a wonderful Christmas and New Year!

Love the Wyne family,
Andy, Alanya, Samantha, Ashley, and Katlyn

Look Who's 7 today!

I know this is a little past due, but my Sammy is 7 years old! She is growing up way too fast and she reminds me of that every single day. We celebrated with our family the day before her birthday and she was so excited as you can see. All year she asked for only one thing... an ipod! I was not about to spend a lot of money on something she was likely going to lose within the first few months. So, we gave her my old one... sort of as a trial period. If she can take care of it then maybe we'll think about getting her a new one. I told her right away that it will be used as leverage and if she is being disobedient or unkind I have the right to take it away. So far it's worked well, but we're barely a week into things. And of course she picked out a cake to match her wish!

This was definitely not my best work. I didn't have time to let the cake chill and then the whole thing split right in half. Whoops! She was still very pleased with it, though.

On her actual birthday we decided to through a pizza party. She invited a bunch of her friends over and we had pizza (thank goodness for Monday night deals) and then they watched Despicable Me. Afterwards they had cake that looked like pizza, and ice cream. Then she opened presents and the kids were all ready to go home and crash! It was the easiest, low maintenance party and a huge hit with the kids!

This year Sammy has changed a ton! She is doing very well in school and loves to read and do math. A few of her favorite things at school are recess and eating lunch in the cafeteria. She LOVES her teacher, Mrs. Massimino and comes home smiling on a daily basis. She lost her first tooth this year and has also learned to tie her shoes. Some of her favorite things are Bratz dolls, drawing/coloring, playing the Wii (mostly Just Dance), playing with her friends, listening to her ipod, and bossing her sisters around. She loves to babysit when I need to get things done around the house. She tells me weekly that she wants a baby brother, but would be fine if she had another little sister, too. She is so great about getting up and ready for school. I don't ever have to fight her to go to school and that is such a blessing. (Last year it was quite the regular battle.) She can be very helpful around the house and loves to do extra especially when she can earn some money. We love her dearly and she has brought such joy into our home. Happy Birthday, Samantha!

"Achmed the dead terrorist"

This is for you, Becky! Last night Sarah called a few of our girlfriends and we all went out to dinner to celebrate my birthday. We had a great time and Achmed was the funniest topic of the evening. Becky had never heard of him so I told her to look on youtube and type in Achmed the dead terrorist. She asked, "How do you spell Achmed?" I couldn't resist... "A-C-Flem." We were laughing so hard we were crying. Thanks for the fun girls night out! So, Becky, please pause the music to the right and enjoy a good laugh.

***This does have some swearing so please don't watch it if it's going to be offensive.

Christmas Food Court Flash Mob

My SIL had this posted on her blog. I thought it was pretty amazing! So pause the music to the right and get ready to get into the Christmas spirit!

Thanksgiving 2010

Most years Andy and I travel to Utah for Thanksgiving to spend the holiday with his family. This year was no different... except we went down for the whole week to get first pick for bedrooms. We continued tradition with a few of the grand kids included this year. It's always fun to hear the different things others are thankful for as we make fun of each other for crying over silly things and telling Mindy or Lisa they have to go last next year. So this is for my family and friends that couldn't be at the table.

I know this will sound incredibly silly but I am so thankful for all the races I was involved in with my family. For years I felt like I couldn't be involved because I was either pregnant, nursing, or I was not up to par with everyone else. By the time I was ready to run they had moved on to more mileage than I felt I could endure. Since last year I was part of a relay race of 185 miles, three half marathons, and one full marathon... all of which I did with at least one family member. The marathon was truly amazing to me for many reasons. It was one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life and when things went horribly wrong my sisters-in-law were there to help me get my head back in the game. They encouraged me to do what I had trained for and said, "Here take some of my gum. And here's some energy beans." I couldn't have even completed the training without there support. Many, many times I would call and say, "Guess what I ran today? I had to call and tell you so you could be my cheerleader."

Through all of the races and training I was able to endure pieces of a trial Andy and I have struggled with. It helped me to not worry so much and keep my mind off things that I didn't have control over. Just over a year ago I lost a baby. I was not that far along and it didn't really hit me till about a month after the fact. I heard the news that my sister was pregnant with twins and her due date was only a week apart from mine. Her pregnancy was rocky and it seemed the family's prayers were focused on her. Then I received news from friend after friend that they were expecting. For a solid week I cried and lay on the couch feeling sorry for myself. I would talk to others who had miscarried before and asked what to do. For a long time I blamed myself since I had done a race the week before I miscarried, and to this day it is one of the most intense races I've ever done. (A few months later I am pretty sure I miscarried again, but I can't be positive since I didn't ever take a pregnancy test. It was just like the first one and I hit another low.) It wasn't until Emily called me and asked if I wanted to run the marathon with her and Amy that I finally picked myself up and tried to move on. It was very difficult when Andy and I had never had problems in the past in that area and I wanted another baby so badly. It was something that we had talked about for almost a year and never thought we would have complications. I don't know if our family is complete or if Heavenly Father has another plan for us. However, being part of something with people that I love was by far the best thing to help me gain a different perspective on my trial.

I am also very grateful to Andy this year. He has stood by me through all of my training... with very little complaint. He has let me cry on his chest many, many times this year. When I am extremely moody because I start thinking about our baby he'll just give me a hug and knows why I'm hurting. He tries to help me look on the bright side of things when I forget. He reminds me that we have 3 beautiful little girls that are happy and healthy. (He used to say, "You keep killing off the boys." That stopped pretty quick once I couldn't hold back the tears anymore.) And when we are traveling he points out all the good things about the ages of our kids. They really are at such fun ages and I get to enjoy each of them. They are my final things I'm grateful for this year. Each of them are different in their own ways and I love them all so much! Sammy is my little helper all the time. She is learning and growing so fast it's hard to think she's in first grade. Ashley is still my little molly. She is always wanting to give hugs and kisses no matter what. And Katie is so fun! She goes around the house making up songs and sings to herself ALL THE TIME. I love her little voice and I hope she never stops.

Something's MISSING!

Sunday morning Sammy came in to get her hair done and said, "Mom, look. My tooth is getting more wiggly." It was a little more loose than it had been but still was set in her mouth. I told her that if she kept wiggling it, it would come out soon. When we walked into the chapel she again asked me to look. That time she pushed her tongue against the tooth and it pushed all the way forward. She wanted to go show Bryce and he encouraged her to pull it out. So she and I walked to the bathroom, I got a piece of toilet paper, and held onto the tooth. It fell out! I didn't even have to pull. She was so excited!!! She was telling everyone that she lost her first tooth. (I forgot to take a picture on Sunday, so these were taken later.) Sammy said, "Mom, I think the Tooth Fairy might bring me a dollar." Is that inflation or what? I thought the Tooth Fairy only brought a quarter. And now Sammy is trying to wiggle her other teeth to see how many will fall out so she can get more money. In her words, "I'm saving up to buy a Bratz doll." That's a lot of teeth darling!
What a cute little smile!!!

Quadruplet Babies Laughing

Halloween!

This month has gone by so fast with Halloween festivities! On Wednesday I put on another Wanda Witch Party for the Young Women in our ward. They had a great time... but I'll try and post about that later. And for Halloween this year we decided to do something different. So Friday we headed down to Utah and celebrated with Adam and Cindy. We started off the weekend by going to THRILLER! It was a lot of fun!!! If you ever get a chance to go don't let it pass you by. One of my favorite dances was Frankenstein. It was amazing to watch the girl being flopped around the floor like a rag doll. The guy who did the Ghostbusters was pretty fun to watch, too.
Andy was being silly and it took a few tries before he would just smile for the camera!

Saturday morning Cindy and I ran another race. SHOCKER--- I know!

We met up with Emily, Sarah, and some of their friends from Saratoga Springs. This was Sarah's first half marathon and we all wanted to support her. Cindy wanted to try and finish under 2 hours and we were cheering her on!

This was at the end... Cindy finished in 1:57!!! And Sarah finished in 2:01!!! We are so proud of both of you. Awesome job, girls!!!

It was so hot during the race. It was super cold at the beginning and I wasn't sure I would be warm enough. I wore 2 long sleeve shirts plus all my crap for my costume. Somehow I managed to unzip my dress, unpin my stupid necklaces, take off my gloves, and take off my top shirt... while running! Cindy thought it was pretty funny. I tried hard to keep up with Cindy but she was hauling butt. After awhile I slowed way down. I ended up walking a ton of the race, but I really didn't care. However, I feel pretty good about my time. I didn't train for this race AT ALL! I ran once since my marathon and it was only 4 miles. When I finished the clock showed 2:07. My legs are killing me today and I think I may have pulled a muscle in my left leg. I think it's Carma laughing in my face because I didn't train. (My wig looked awful at the end because it was all over the place even though I tried to pin it down.)

We then took the girls up to Grandma and Grandpa Wyne's house. And then we finished the night with trick-or-treating. The girls had a lot of fun and it was perfect. We did one loop around Adam and Cindy's little neighborhood and Katie kept saying, "Are we going home now? My hands are fweezing." They were on quite the sugar high and ran around in the basement for a long time. Hopefully they'll calm down by tomorrow. Thanks for an amazing weekend Adam and Cindy. We love you!!!

Fasting for Shelby

My niece, Shelby, was in an accident awhile back. You can read about it here. Later Sarah took her to Primary Children's Hospital down in SLC and saw a specialist. They learned that she had a piece of glass stuck in her brain. She had surgery on Friday and there was a family fast for her. Andy and I talked to the girls about what was going to happen and that we needed to keep her in our prayers. We told Sammy that she could fast for one meal if she wanted but that we understand if she didn't want to. That's a lot for a little six year old to skip a meal. She first told us she would just pray for her, and we said that was fine. Friday morning Sammy came in to me (no school that day) and said, "Mom, I think I want to skip breakfast and fast for Shelby." I told her that would be great. Maybe an hour or two later she came back in to me and said, "Mommy, I think I want to skip lunch, too. I really want to fast for Shelby. I just want her to be okay." I had to hold back my tears as I hugged her. I was so proud of my little girl. She fasted all day long and didn't complain even once. I know that her prayers were heard and that her faith was strengthened. All of our prayers were answered and Shelby's surgery was a success. It turned out that there were 3 pieces of glass they extracted, but they were able to do it without opening her skull. That was such a blessing and she is now home and doing very well. You can read about the details here. She'll go back on Wednesday for a follow up appointment. I just had to share the amazing love my daughter has for her little cousin. We love you Shelby and we are so glad you are okay.

Wanda Witch Party 2010

We had our annual Wanda Witch Halloween Party this last Friday. We had a really good turn out and things went pretty well overall. This year instead of doing traditional clues we decided to give names of an intersection and a distance they had to go... but didn't tell them which direction. It turned out to be harder for them than I thought, so that was a plus. If we ever do this party again we'll go that route for clues. It was much easier to get out my Garmin running watch than to figure out a poem or something similar.

There were so many great costumes this year it made it really hard to decide on the winner. The slide show below is only missing one couple that was late and I didn't have a chance to take a picture. And I really wish I had a group picture... whoops! There were a total of 20 couples!!!

I can't reveal most of the challenges, yet, in case some of my YW check out my blog. We are going to do this next week for our combined activity. But one of them I knew for sure they wouldn't stand a chance doing. The clue led them to a friend's house, they picked a paper bag with a secret ingredient, and then had to play a short version of Zilch, a dice game. If they made the goal they didn't have to put the ingredient in, but if they busted then they had to add it to a milk shake. After everyone rolled the dice then they could reveal what was in their bag. Megan mixed it up and then it had to be completely consumed, but it didn't matter who or how many people had to drink it. The items were chocolate syrup, strawberry syrup, chow mein noodles, 2 hard boiled eggs, spam, Wasabi horseradish, minced clams, and the worst of all... sardines in tomato sauce!!! Disgusting!!! I couldn't believe we actually had a few girls drink the revolting shake!

In the end the Scarlet Spiders joined the Grand Witches Council. Congratulations! A big thanks goes out to all the couples who participated and made the night enjoyable... and gave positive feedback. ;) Of course I had to show our costumes. I was Cyndi Lauper and Andy was my 80's rock star. (He put his hand up and pulled on my wig... dang it!) I wish we had more pictures because I don't think I will ever get Andy to put those pants on in public ever again! It was totally worth it, though. I even had "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" playing with speakers attached to my belt (thanks Becky). Underneath my awesome white rimmed sunglasses was amazingly bright blue eyeshadow up to my brow. Maybe for Halloween I can talk Andy into dressing up again... maybe.

Oh, and funniest story of the night...

Shuck's came as Little Red Riding Hood and the wolf. While at my mom's house for one of the challenges my girls asked Valerie if she would tell the story. At the end Ashley looked at Darren and said, "Is Grandma naked?" Valerie was a little stunned and confused and then it clicked that Ashley noticed Darren was wearing "Grandma's pajamas". She quickly said, "Oh, no. Brother Shuck got these out of Grandma's drawer. Grandma is still wearing her pajamas." Ashley is my little thinker.

It's official!

Okay, so I know I've been a slacker at blogging... but I have reasons. If you noticed my countdown to the right you might have seen, "Today is the day" for my full marathon. It's official, I have joined that small 1% of people who will ever run a full marathon. Am I Kenya? Heck no! Did I finish better than average for first timers? Yes I did! And considering all the things that did not go as planned I am proud enough of myself.

The race was about to start for all the runners and within 2 minutes or less I lost my running pack. It was holding all my energy beans and gum... or my lifeline essentials. I tried to hold it together and failed miserably. I lost control and began to cry. Amy grabbed my face and said, "Focus! You are going to be fine! You have no choice but to run without it." Emily gave me her back-up pack of energy beans and both gave me some gum. I dried my eyes and tried to shake it off. Although, it did mess with my head.

I crossed the start line and realized I forgot to start my garmin watch to keep me on track. I stopped and allowed it to locate the GPS. (I was so mad I was wasting time!) It located and I put my headphones in to find that my new iPod was not working at all!!! Boy was I ticked!!! Thank goodness I had a thought the night before to put a back-up iPod in my pocket... not my running pack. I thought that maybe I would want to toss my pack near the end but forget I had my iPod inside, so I stuck it in my pocket. However, I didn't know how much battery power it had since I never charge it before the run.

I was off and decided that I should preserve the battery life of my iPod and just try and talk to people running my same pace. I immediately found a girl I met the night before at the expo and was able to talk to her for about 10 or 11 miles. After that it was one girl here and another girl there, but only for a few miles. I made sure to drink 1-2 cups of Gatorade at the aid stations and dump 1-2 cups of water on my I was still thirsty I would drink a little more water. And I forced myself to eat the cliff bars.

Between about miles 17 and 22 I was running a pace of 9:16 and feeling great. I thought, "I can totally run this the rest of the way." And then... my iPod DIED!!! That's right, my back-up died when I had 4 miles left. Fortunately I saw Adam and Sarah at mile 23 waving my bright, hot pink poster! It was enough to get me through the rest of the race. If you want to see a blurb click here. (I am wearing a green tank top, black shorts, and a pink visor. And I swear I'm not ignoring Adam... you just can't hear my voice very well.) This was actually my favorite part of the race. It was so fun so see my poster along with a cheering section. Thanks so much for coming to support us Adam and Sarah!!!

I sprinted across the finish line and wandered for about an hour trying to find my crowd. NONE of them saw me cross! I was pretty upset at first, but now I'm just bummed. Once I found the rest of the group Amy, Emily, and I went to get our picture taken together. I saw this girl limping horribly. I said, "Oh, sweetie, you look like you're in a lot of pain." She looked up and I was thrilled to see my friend, Devry Krahenbuhl, whom I haven't seen in years! It made everything else worthwhile.

Today is the first day since the race that I feel mostly back to normal. Saturday and Sunday were the worst! Every part of my body hurt... from my head down to my pinkie toenail! After all that I still get asked, "Do you think you'll ever run another one?" And my answer is the same, "Ask me in 2 weeks. (Ha, ha.) In all seriousness, I might do another one just to see how well I could do if everything went as planned." But I only had two goals this time around. The first being to finish and the second is to do it under 5 hours. I finished, and in 4:53:07! And I'm so sorry I don't have any pics uploaded. If you would like to see the professional ones click here. There is also one of Amy, Emily, and I together, but for some reason it didn't make it to my photos. And if you are still reading I owe you a big thank you along with a candy bar!

Thanks to all my supporters! I was thinking of all of you while I was achieving my goal!