Christmas Day

We had such an awesome Christmas. Jesse's dad comes over on Christmas eve and spends the night and enjoys Christmas morning with us. We have done that for a few years now and I am really glad he comes.


Hunter got a power wing scooter from Santa.

Garrett got a new bike.

It was a blizzard on Christmas, but that didn't stop the boys from trying out there stuff! This is Garrett riding his bike.


Yes, he's still in his pajama's!

The boys also got Rockband from Jess and I. I was actually surprised how fun it was! We spent most of Christmas playing it!

My brother Chris, what a nerd!

Jesse singing.

So I am posting this video because it is HILARIOUS! (With my mom's permission) My mom, Dan, Chris and Danielle came to visit Christmas night. Well of course they wanted to join in playing Rockband with us. Now being the good sport my mom is she wanted to sing. We tried to pick a song that she would know, but even this song she wasn't real familiar with. I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to turn the video so sorry you have to watch it sideways.

You may ask yourself why is Ginnie growling while she sings, well that my friends is her "rocker" voice. As you can hear we all couldn't quit laughing! Seriously how many Grandma's do you know that would get up and do this?!?! My mom did say she wants to come back over and redeem herself for this one, but I think it is awesome! Thanks for the laugh mom and being such a good sport! Stay tuned for more video if mom really does come and perform again! :)

I am just so grateful for the Christmas season. I am glad that we can all reflect on Christ and his birth. I am so thankful that I was able to have such an awesome Christmas with my family. Jess and I didn't buy each other anything this year (partly because of him being gone and partly because we didn't really have the money to spend). Jess was really worried about it and I told him as long as I had my family home for Christmas I didn't care! Just being together was the best Christmas present I could have ever asked for! In years past we have kind of gone overboard with presents, and this year we just tried to keep it simple and I am so glad that we did! Isn't it interesting the things we learn as we start to get old! ;) he he

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, and a great New Year!

Christmas Eve

On Christmas eve we always go to my mom's for yummy food, a nativity, and presents. My mom is so great to cook for all of us. Thanks mom, it was delicious!



The kids dressed up in there nativity costumes.


As you can tell Garrett is getting a little big for the nativity costume! When he put it on we decided that 14 would be the age that the kids would get to sit and watch the nativity instead of participate. Garrett was thrilled! He just wished that 13 would have been the cutoff age instead!


Jesse and my brother Nate.

Dad and Nate's baby Nico. He is so cute I could just eat him! (Nico not my dad!) he he

Maleah, Brynna and Stella in the beautiful pj's my mom bought them. Spencer was very excited!

Chris, Dan, Dad and Garrett.

Hunter, Brynna and Stella enjoying his new toy.

Garrett loved his basketball!


Nate and Nico in his new pj's.

Honestly I managed to get the kids smiling why can I not get my husband to!

Visiting Santa

Every year my mom likes to get a picture of all of the grand kids with Santa. Garrett did NOT want to get his picture taken with Santa but after much discussion (and threatening!) he agreed to be in the picture. I did tell him he didn't have to actually sit on Santa's lap just be in the picture.

All of the Snyder grand kids minus may brother's daughter Danielle. (She is 17, need I say more?!)

Eating lunch after visiting Santa!

Jesse really was happy to be here! He just NEVER smiles in pictures!

Garrett and Josh watching a movie on Garrett's ipod.

Hello again!

So I have been a totally lame blogger! Jess was out of town for a month and I have come to find out that my life shuts down when he is gone! The one positive thing about him being away is I am so much more grateful for him to be home. How pathetic am I! It takes my husband being gone for me to really appreciate when he is home! I am really going to try and always remember to be grateful for those that I have in my life! Another thing I learned this month (which is a no brainer) is that I need to be SOOOO careful not to criticize others because you have no idea what trials they could be going through behind closed doors. I just didn't function very well with Jess gone and so some things in life didn't get done and I had people really annoyed at me. They had no idea that I was struggling so I am trying to give them the benefit of the doubt but it just goes to show you that you just never know why someone is being a flake. Again I know this is pathetic that it took me this long to REALLY get this! A huge thanks to all of my family and friends for listening to ALL of the whining! I really think it probably got to the point that they all wanted to stop answering the phone when they saw it was me! But Jess is back and life is back to functioning normally (as normal as my life can function that is) ;)

The night that we picked Jess up from the airport we stopped to see the lights at temple square. It was SOOOO bitter cold we only got one picture! It was so beautiful though I am glad we took the time to stop.

GO UTES!

Jesse is out of town so I got to take the boys and go enjoy the Holy War football game between the Utes and BYU. Football is not my favorite sport (especially in the cold!) but the boys wanted me to take them. The game didn't start until 4:00, but we decided to go and enjoy all of the fun. (mainly because Jesse had promised the boys HE would take them to enjoy all the fun!) We went up to Salt Lake for the Ute walk at 1:00. What happens with this is you stand along the road by the stadium, amongst the drunkest people in America, and the team gets off the bus and the crowd cheers and you get to see the team up close. Garrett and Hunter loved it! Then we got food and walked around enjoying all of the fun things the radio stations put on and did a little shopping. Final it was time for the big game! Honestly it was a little bit of a culture shock for me! I have been around plenty of drunk people in my life, but I have NEVER seen anything like this! The Ute fans were SO drunk and dare I say just rude to the poor BYU fans that dared come to the game! One of my biggest fears was, if all these people have driven together, who is driving them home and can I go first so that one of them don't kill me and my kids?!?!? :) After getting over my shock, it was a fun game. Poor Garrett had to spend most of it explaining to me what was happening! We even stormed the field after the game was over! (again thanks to Jesse for doing this with the kids on a regular basis causing our kids to expect it!) ;) We got to meet some of the team and even managed to make it off the field alive (barely)! I am glad that we have Utes season tickets so that Jess and the boys can have that father/son bonding time, and I am glad that I got to share it with Garrett and Hunter. Let's face it when you have boys you have to do things that they enjoy right! I don't think that will ever include pedicures, and lunch, but that's ok! Thanks Garrett and Hunter for letting me go with you, and also thanks to Jesse's friend Shane and his wife. They have seats behind us and were nice enough to make sure the boys and I were taken care of.

Garrett and Hunter with red hair. Bo was even excited for the big game with his red stripe!

Garrett and Hunter painted the truck windows!

Garrett was even nice enough to put red stripes in my hair! I was a little afraid they were never going to come out but mine came out better than the boys! Garrett was passing the sacrament on Sunday with his hair still a little red (in our ward of BYU fans)!

Me and the boys before the game.

This was Garrett's attempt to take a picture of the final score. In case you can't make it out, the Utes won 48 to 24. Boy are my kids excited to go to school today and rub it in!

Halloween

So I am finally getting around to posting my Halloween pics.

Can you tell by this picture why it took me so long?!? I was sooo sick on Halloween! This wonderful picture was taken by my dad. Thanks for that dad!

Hunter the mummy!

Hunter and Grandpa Kelly (Jesse's dad)

Garrett and his loot! This was at the end of the night and I didn't even know what Garrett was dressed up as. He and his friends came home after school and grabbed stuff out of the Halloween box and left! The sad truth of the matter is he's not supposed to eat half of this junk with his braces!

Happy Birthday Jess!

Today was Jesse's 33rd birthday! I went to Salt Lake and met Jess for a birthday lunch. (the perks of being home and having everyone in school!)
Jess can't stand not knowing what his present is so every year he manages to get it out of one of the kids what I have gotten him! He is so sneaky about it too! He tricks them in to telling him by asking random, seemingly innocent questions! Well this year I prepared the kids for the types of questions he may ask, and we managed to keep it a secret! But he almost got it out of Hunter. He went in to work late today and enjoyed a morning at home with us. He offered to take Hunter and his friend to school for me (I should have know he had ulterior motives!) Well apparently he was asking Hunter those "innocent" questions of his (ie. can I wear it, is it bigger than a notebook, do you have one. etc.) Well Hunter held strong! Then when I went to meet him for lunch he said (so innocently) "Hunter told me what you got me for my birthday, I know it's clothes". (this is his way of getting me to give something away!) Well I knew that Hunter hadn't because if Jess would have really know that I had gotten him a new IPOD he wouldn't have been able to hide his excitement! So I just ignored him. Well when I got home I decided to teach him a lesson! I got the kids in on it and we pulled a sweatshirt out of Jesse's closet and wrapped it up, then we hid his real present! Jesse is like most men in America and doesn't want clothes for his birthday! When he stuck his hand in the bag and felt clothes he just looked at me and said "clothes, really?!?!" We had him going until he pulled one of his old sweatshirts out of the bag! We had a good laugh and gave him his real present! He was SOOOO excited! He has really been needing a new IPod. I also need to mention that Jess is the hardest person to shop for on the planet! I think I have managed to give him a total of two things over the years that he hasn't returned! (And the IPod counts as one of those two!)


Can you see the look of disgust in this picture as he opens his "present"!


And the joy in this picture when he realizes not only did we not give him clothes but he got the IPod he has been wanting for so long!
Jesse's dad came over and we had dinner, and pie. I didn't manage to take anymore pictures of the night.

Happy Birthday Babe! I hope you learned your lesson! :)

Carving Pumpkins

Tonight for Family home evening we carved pumpkins. We do this every year (along with most of the world!) and have a lot of fun doing it. Jesse crowns himself the "winner" every year! Well this year we decided to make it official and called our neighbor's Shawn and Michelle to come over and judge. They were good sports about coming over and going along with our craziness! We are a VERY competitive family, but it really is all in fun.

Jesse carving his masterpiece.

Hunter working very hard on his!

Look, it's Garrett! He didn't even cover his face for the picture!

Jesse, Garrett and Hunter. Hunter is standing by his pumpkin (the skull) Jesse's is on top of the straw (gargoyle), Garrett has his arm around his (headless horseman) and mine is next to Garrett's (witch).

Don't mind this AWFUL picture of me. I am fighting a horrible head cold!

I know your just dying to know who won! Well Hunter took 1st, Jess took 2nd, and Garrett and I were after them! We may be a little nutty but hey we have fun with it!

Happy Halloween!

Scout Auction

Today was our wards Scout Auction. All of the scouts were supposed to make a cake to be auctioned off to help raise money for Friends of Scouting. We had dinner and an auction. It was a lot of fun.

The boys loved frosting the cakes.

Garrett's friends came over to uh... "help".

The finished product. Hunter's was a football.

And Garrett's was a lion.

After dinner and the auction they had a pie eating contest for the boys.

(don't worry they were mini pies!)

Garrett and Hunter eating there pies.

Here is a shot of the group. The boys all loved this!

Garrett took 1st.

Hunter wasn't near as quick as those older boys, but he had fun anyway!

Fun at the Pumpkin Patch

Angie and I took the kids on our yearly trip to the Red Barn here in Santaquin to get pumpkins. We have done this for the last few years. We had a great time trying to get 6 kids to pick the perfect pumpkin!

Josh, Garrett, Brynna, Hunter, Maleah and Jonah


Jonah was REALLY enjoying the wagon ride.


Aren't they cute?!?! Garrett really loves Jonah, actually ALL the kids really love Jonah, but Garrett is so cute with him! Jonah only managed to throw that pumpkin of his oh about 10 times. (he kept calling it a ball!)


I was trying to capture the enthusiasm in these two! They are too cool for everything we do anymore! But they are good sports to go along.



I have great memories of getting together with my cousins, and hope that through all of this that mine and Angie's kids will have good memories of there cousins as well! (even if half the time they drive each other crazy!) :)