SKIING AT BEAVER CREEK . DAYS 1-2 (JAN 2-3) - not posted 

SKIING AT BEAVER CREEK . DAY 3 (JAN 4) - not posted 

SKIING AT BEAVER CREEK . DAY 4 (JAN 5) - not posted 

PAINTED MINES (JAN 20) - not posted but journaled

JANUARY SLICES OF LIFE - not posted

​Madeline just loves our Christmas tree and she spends time every day playing with her favorite ornaments. Her favorites are the silver train, the red truck, and the silver key.

​For Young Women in Excellence Emma decided to put together a memory board of her JOXC running season. So many people were impressed with how fast she became this season.

​Before we headed off to Nationals with Emma, her Kokopelli team met at coach Lisa’s house and did a long, steady hill run up High Drive. Then we stayed after for a pancake breakfast.

​Abby earned money from the board for teaching Mike how to do flip turns in the pool.

​Emma had a winter orchestra concert with the HS orchestra and did a great job. Even though she only gets to practice during the last 30 minutes of class, she has learned so much from this experience of being able to be part of the high school orchestra. 

​We watched Makay today and Madeline was so sweet with her. Since Makay is blind we tried to give her things that she might like to touch. It was a very humbling experience to watch Makay.

​It was so nice to have Andrew come home for Christmas break. Everyone was super excited to see him.

​Andrew went with me to take Madeline to her ballet and tap class and he just loved being able to watch her perform.

​Andrew got out 3 wisdom teeth and was quite the funny one as he was coming out of anesthesia. His face was pretty swollen on his right side.

​Madeline loves to sneak into my bed in the mornings before I have the chance to make the bed. She always says, “This is so cozy.”

​After a week of recovery from getting his wisdom teeth out, I took Andrew to the nail salon with me so that I could pamper him, and he could get a manly pedicure. He actually liked it.

​The day after Christmas Dionne and I did a fun run at Garden of the Gods to work off all the calories we ate from the holidays.

​Abby and Madeline are quite the pair. Abby is so sweet with Madeline and loves to do her hair high ponytails. She always knows how to make Madeline so cute. 

​After a restful night staying at the Aspen Ridge Condominiums, we packed up all of our stuff, loaded the car, and headed over to Keystone for another fun day of skiing. This morning I took the older kids out first while Mike and Madeline had fun venturing around together. Mike put her in a little red wagon and walked over to the River Run Gondola where they both hopped on and headed up to the top of the mountain. They tried the magic carpet up at the top near the Summit House and then headed on over to Kidtopia which was a giant ice playground area. Meanwhile, the older kids and I headed up the Peru Express and then took the catwalk over to the Montezuma Express to get to the Summit House area. Abby and Andrew took the Outpost Gondola to get over to the Outpost lodge while Peter, Emma and I skied down Mozart and then took the Santiago Express to get there. That was a huge mistake as this relatively easy blue was super icy, making it a very difficult and not a very fun run. After meeting up we decided to venture over to the Outback Summit and skied many of the blues on that side of the mountain. We found some great runs and spent a good deal of time over there before heading back to the Outpost Lodge. We got in touch with Mike who told us that they were at Kidtopia. We all headed back on the Outpost Gondola and met up for lunch at the Summit House. We found a nice cozy spot next to the fireplace. It was probably the warmest we have ever been while eating our lunch. It was awesome. After lunch I took Madeline over to the magic carpet but after going down the hill and waiting in line at the bottom to go back up that I decided that maybe I would try taking her down an easy green run instead. I took her down the green Scout run and up the Ranger lift. She did fairly well in keeping the tips of her skis together to control her speed. All I had to tell her was triangle and she would push her skis out. She responded better to triangle than to pie. Since she didn’t really know how to turn, I would put her in between my legs when she needed to turn. She loved getting on the chairlift and riding that back up to the top. We did that run 3 times before she started to melt down. We sat on a bench up at the top and waited for the others to meet us. The girls were pretty tired, so they headed down the gondola with me and Madeline. At the bottom we waited too long for the shuttle to pick us up and take us over to the parking lot to meet the boys. Overall, it was another fun day of skiing!

​We let Madeline dictate when we started our Christmas morning. Lucky for us she slept in until 7:00am. I made the kids sit on the top of the stairs like I do every year before coming down so I could get a quick photo. It really doesn’t matter how old you are because Christmas morning in our house is such a party. There were probably too many presents under the tree this year and some fun gifts that Santa left out for the kids that were scattered across the family room. This year from Santa Andrew got a ski backpack with all the safety tools he would need as well as a gift certificate to a 3-day Avalanche course. He also got a really nice suitcase for his mission. Santa brought Peter his Letterman jacket and both Emma and Abby got apple watches. Madeline was so excited to see that Santa brought her a brand-new doll with a doll stroller and a doll blanket to match her own blanket. The kids got a variety of other fun things such as new swim bags, games, extra apple watch bands, little Momiji dolls, stretch Armstrong, mini deck of Uno cards, books, new clothes and shoes, fun socks, stress balls, toys, Legos, sunglasses, and DNA kits. Probably the biggest surprise gift for the kids were their new AWAY suitcases and a surprise trip to Germany. They did not see that one coming. They were beyond excited. Of course, Mike outdid himself again and got me a fun big gift. He got me an American Beauty octagon barrel Henry repeating arms 22-gauge lever action rifle and a 9mm Ruger semi auto handgun. The rifle was absolutely gorgeous. I was so surprised and excited to try them both out. This year for Mike’s big gift I got him a turntable with some classic vinyl’s such as Pearl Jam, Weezer, AC/DC, and Queen. He absolutely loved it and was really surprised that I finally got him a clever and fun gift. We all had fun opening our many gifts, eating cinnamon rolls, and listening to Mike’s new vinyl records. It was a perfect Christmas morning!

​Christmas Eve is always an exciting time and even though most of our kids are older they still enjoy the excitement of it all. Emma made the sugar cookie dough this year and it was so delicious. It was hard to not keeping eating the dough. Madeline loved picking out different cookie cutters and cutting out cookies to put on the pan. The girls got really creative this year with the icing and made some pretty cute cookies. With all the baking that was going on today it was a nice break to stop and let the kids have fun with the Christmas cookies. We had a fabulous dinner of ham, stuffing, deviled eggs, sweet potatoes, jello and rolls. After dinner I handed out everyone’s new Christmas pajamas. Madeline was so excited to put on her new Frozen nightgown. There is just something so fun about new pajamas on Christmas Eve. The kids turned in relatively early after some reading in the scriptures and family prayer. I’m glad that the anticipation and excitement is still there with the older kids. They still get excited for Christmas morning and that is a good thing.

This year Emma decided that she wanted to try the Junior Olympic XC series with the Kokopelli Running Club she has been part of the last 2 years. She took a week off after middle school season ended and started right back up with Kokopelli and some of her friends. Her goals this season was to do well in State so that she would qualify for Regionals and then Nationals. She had a rocky start at the Parker Invitational where she ran her first 4K ever and had to figure out pacing for a longer race. It was at this race we realized that would need spikes for future meets. For the Kokopelli Invitational Emma was more focused and prepared and ran and amazing race, cutting almost 40 seconds from her time the previous race. She ran through mud and snow but that didn’t stop her from running fast. At the JOXC State meet in Lyons, CO Emma didn’t PR, but she still held onto a good time and a great overall place. Emma’s best races of the season were at Regionals in Albuquerque and Nationals in Madison. Mike, Madeline and I drove with Emma to Albuquerque for the Regional meet. The weather and elevation were absolutely perfect. She PR’d by 16 seconds, with a time of 15:31 and an 11th place finish. out of 121 runners. Her team also came in first and they were all awarded with medals for that. The girls were so excited that all of them qualified for the National meet. We took the entire family to support Emma at her National meet in Madison, WI. The weather was extremely cold, with a high of 26F and a real feel of 13F during the race. It truly was an impressive race to watch as somehow her legs just moved faster than she had ever run before despite the cold. She PR’d again but this time by over 30 seconds, with a time of 14:55 and a 29th place finish out of 316 runners. Her pace was a flat 6:00 per mile! Her age group girls team took place once more. All of her hard work throughout the season paid off and we were all so glad we could be there to witness it, along with Aunt Kim, Uncle Al and cousin Haley. 


PARKER INVITATIONAL
PARKER HS
4K - 16:33.79 (7th out of 54)
OCTOBER 12, 2019

This was Emma's first race longer than 1.5 miles and she was pretty nervous.  It does help that she is now on the same team as some of her friends who are in different middle schools and with whom she was competing against during the middle school season.  She loves being able to run with Bethany, Jade and Eliza.  Those four girls are quite the strong group of runners.  We got there quite early so that she could run part of the course with Bethany.  It was so cold when we got there but luckily it warmed up before the 13-14 girls race which started at 11:00am.  Emma's first half of the race was not her best.  She was way behind Jade, who she is normally running right behind, and she was positioned in 12th place.  I was a little worried until I saw her come down the last long stretch of the race.  She had moved into 7th place.  She looked strong and was right on the tail of the girl in 6th.  Clearly, this was a great race to learn how to pace herself for a 4K.  She finished the race in 16:33.79 which is a 6:39/mile pace.  Not too shabby for her first race of the JOXC season.
​

KOKOPELLI INVITATIONAL
FOUNTAIN REGIONAL PARK
​4K - 15:47.75 (7th out of 48)
NOVEMBER 2, 2019

Emma' second meet was at the Kokopelli Invitational down in Fountain. Earlier in the week it had snowed so the kids ran the course during the week in preparation for the race. Luckily some of the snow had melted by race day. Emma ran in cross country spikes for the very first time at this meet. She was definitely more prepared to run a better race than the Parker meet a few weeks prior. Mike, Peter, and I cheered her on for this race. I went to the backside loop and Peter and Mike stayed closer to the start and finish. I was so impressed by how much she improved in this race. You could just see her strength as she was running. It was pretty marvelous to see. She improved by 46 seconds bringing her average pace to 6:21/mile. 

JOXC STATE MEET
LYONS, CO
4K - 15:56.86 (9th out of 68)
NOVEMBER 9, 2019

Mike, Madeline and I headed up to Lyons, CO to cheer on Emma at the JOXC State Meet. Emma was a little nervous for this meet and the weather was a lot warmer than the meet the previous week. She seemed to be more at ease when she was with her teammates. Mike and I divided and conquered the course. I went out further along the course and he stayed closer to the start and finish with Madeline. I could tell on the first loop of the course that this would be a tough course to PR on. Between the hilly switchbacks and the heat, it would be a tough race. She still ended up doing really well and finished only 9 second behind her PR. We couldn't have been prouder of Emma. 

​We decided to take the entire family to Madison, WI to support Emma at JOXC Nationals. It was a relatively quick flight to Chicago where we rented a big fat black SUV and drove to Madison. We got in rather late on Thursday evening. We let the kids sleep in the next morning and Mike and I snuck away for a bit to go running and exploring. We ran from our hotel along the lake and towards the Capital building. The run was beautiful and so easy since we were now running at sea level. The inside of the Capital building was pretty spectacular. It was decorated for the holidays with the biggest Christmas tree I had ever seen. After making our way back to the hotel, the kids were still in their pajamas. After getting everyone ready for the day, Mike dropped Emma and I off at the course so that she could do a run through with her team. While she was running, I stood in a very long line to grab some swag. Emma joined me after her run and we stood in line for a little bit longer. I ended up standing in line for almost 2 hours to grab some shirts and sweatshirts. That was so crazy. While Emma and I were at the course, Mike took the other kids to the Madison Zoo. They had a great time seeing the tigers, lemurs, turtles, birds, iguanas, alligators, and other animals at the zoo. They arrived at the course to pick us up right when we were checking out. We then headed back to the hotel to let Emma shower and change before meeting Kim, Al and Haley at a restaurant for dinner. It was so nice of them to come and support Emma for her big race. 

Every year at the beginning of December the elves come to visit, and we celebrate by having our annual North Pole Breakfast. The kids still look forward to this fun tradition even though most of them are all older now. It was tempting to not do the elves this year since Madeline is the only small kid left in our family, but Abby insisted that we do it anyways. This year instead of doing it on the first Saturday of the month we decided to do it for dinner one night while Grandma Anne and Grandpa Franz were visiting. It was fun to share one of our traditions with them. Everyone had a great time stuffing their faces with Mike’s famous buttermilk pancakes, bacon, berries, and powdered donuts. There is never a shortage of powdered donuts during our North Pole breakfast. It is usually one of the only times during the year that we eat this white powdery goodness.

​The kids all love it when Sam Spear comes to town to work, he stays with our family. We all had a great time playing games with Sam and cracking jokes with each other.

​Even though the weather is getting colder, I am still running with my friends from Striders. A few of my favorite workouts were the Bear Creek tempo run, a fun run in Garden of the Gods and a long run on the Santa Fe with Dionne and Caryn.

​It is nice to have a surgeon as a husband because he can fix really tiny things. He was able to fix Abby’s glasses with his small screwdriver and his surgery scopes.

​Peter received an All-State Academic award at his cross-country banquet. He was also recognized as one of the athletes who improved his time the most from the beginning of the season to the end. We are so proud of Peter.

After I did a session at the temple I drove back and picked up Madeline at Michelle’s house and then before heading home I drove back to the temple so that Madeline could see the temple and walk around the temple grounds. She loved being able to see the temple. 

​Abby built the tiniest snowman on our front porch while she was out playing in the snow. It was one of the cutest things we have ever seen.

​Madeline is so precious when she is sleeping. She curls up into a ball, wraps her finger around her blanket, and sucks her thumb. There is nothing cuter.

​After the girls got their nails done, they headed to BJ’s for a nice lunch with Mike. They enjoyed eating their pizukis for dessert. 

​After three snowstorms in October and being annoyed with how long it takes to shovel the snow from the sidewalks and driveway, we finally decided to invest in a snowblower.  When it finally snowed again Mike and Peter were all to eager to head out in the snow to try it out. Peter and his friend Grant even went out and earned money clearing our neighbors’ sidewalks and driveways.

​With the crazy snowstorm that we had the roads were terrible as we headed up to the airport in Denver to pick up Andrew. It took us almost 2 hours to get to the airport. We were just glad that Andrew’s plane was delayed so he wasn’t sitting at the airport waiting for us. The older kids waited up and were excited when we finally arrived at home with Andrew.

​The cold doesn’t stop us from running. Emma joined me on a cold run up through the new part of Cordera. It was pretty windy, but we still had fun running together.

​Andrew loves Japanese food about as much as I love it. We spent lunch together eating Ramen at Menya. The ramen is about as close to the real deal as you can get in the US.

​I sometimes have to shake my head when everyone is on their devices at the same time. The kids were completely mesmerized but whatever it was they were watching on their phones. 

​The day after Thanksgiving we got the Christmas decorations out and started decorating the house. This included setting up the tree and putting up the Christmas tree lights and ribbon in preparation for decorating the tree. On the last day of November after dinner, everyone got their PJ’s on and helped to decorate the tree. Decorating the Christmas tree together after Thanksgiving has become one of our traditions and one in which we look forward to. I made Grandma Candace’s lemon poppyseed bread again this year. We listened to Christmas music, ate yummy bread, and picked out our favorite ornaments to put on the tree. The kids were good about helping Madeline reach the top part of the tree. We let her put the star on the tree again this year and she was finally able to do it by herself. The only help she needed was Mike lifting her up to the top of the tree. She was so proud of herself. 

​It was so wonderful having Andrew home from college for Thanksgiving. We all missed him so much and were so excited to spend a few days with him over Thanksgiving break. He flew in the day before Thanksgiving and Mike and I drove up to the airport to get him. The weather was pretty bad, and it took us almost 2 hours just to get to the airport. Luckily, his flight was delayed so everything worked out. Since we ended up getting home fairly late, only the older kids were still up. On Thanksgiving Day, Madeline was all too eager to head down to Andrew’s room and wake him up. It was so sweet, and Andrew was so excited to see her. We spent the day cooking, baking, and having fun being together. Everyone pitched in and help in some way or another. Mike and the girls were happy to help with the cooking, and Andrew and Peter were happy to help entertain Madeline. We introduced Madeline to prepping the turkey, but she was not at all excited to butter the turkey. She did not like greasy hands and she actually got pretty upset at us and had a small temper tantrum. So, we washed her hands and let her help us stuff the turkey, She seemed to like that better. Her favorite thing of the day let her go play elsewhere until it was time to roll out the dough for the rolls. She grabbed her own cutting board and rolling pin and had a blast rolling out her own dough. This was definitely more up her alley.  To carry us through lunch we decided to make a cheese tray for everyone to enjoy. Let’s just say it was gone pretty quickly. That was a definite winner this year. Of course, Thanksgiving dinner is always the best and one in which we all look forward to every year.  It is not only a time to eat lots and lots of food without feeling guilty, but a time to be grateful for each other and the many blessings that we have enjoyed throughout the year. 
 

After such a fantastic cross-country season, Peter decided to continue his training with some of his other teammates so that he could compete at Nike Cross Regionals in Casa Grande, AZ. He was extremely motivated at first, but then we were hit with a few really bad snowstorms which halted some of his training outside. Then he begged me to sign him up for swim club so that he could start swimming in prep for his HS season in February. Both of those became distractions which made it hard to the train the way he did during his HS cross-country season. Still, he managed to make it to the practices that his coach offered and did as much running as he could with his teammates on the off days to get prepared to run the same course he ran in September where he PR'd and broke 17 minutes. This time it was just Peter and I who traveled to Arizona for the race. We stayed at the Marriott in Chandler where some of the other runners from his team were staying. Sean, Josh, Peter, Hayden, Rodrigo, Dan, and Lauren all ran. They ran the same course from Desert Twilight but ran in the morning instead of the night. The weather was actually not too hot, but the sun was pretty bright. Even though Peter didn't PR at this race, he still ran extremely well, finishing the 5K in 17:01.50. Afterwards we all celebrated by going to eat at In-N-Out before heading to the airport to fly back to Colorado. 

​As we were all trying to come up with what our family costume would be this year Mike had the great idea to buy something that we could wear throughout the year. We settled on a New Jersey mob family all dressed in Adidas track suits. Mike and I bought big gold chain necklaces with a big letter W on them for us and the girls wore black beanie caps. For Madeline, we found her the cutest little track suit and gave her a plastic bat. We had a great time showing up for our ward trunk or treat. Mike was totally in character, accent and all. The trunk or treat was probably the lamest one we have ever been to, but the kids still had fun getting candy. We had to do it inside since it was so cold outside. On actual Halloween night, Abby went with her friends and dressed up as a 20’s girl. Each of her friends dressed from one of the eras. Emma went with her friends and dressed up as the red M&M. Her other friends were different colored M&Ms. Peter manned the house for a bit while Mike and I took Madeline out trick or treating. We only went down 2 streets since it was freezing outside. We ended up dressing her up in a 50's poodle skirt since it seemed more kid appropriate. She had so much fun this year knocking on doors to get candy. There were a few blow up props in our neighbors' yard that scared her, but she was definitely braver this year. 

It was fun to watch Emma sing with the Silver Tones at the choir concert tonight. Emma enjoys singing but hasn't loved the teacher that is in charge of Silver Tones this year. She really misses playing her saxophone so we will probably try and switch her to band next semester. 

I love running with Dionne and Caryn and the rest of our Striders friends. Today we did short hill repeats at Red Rocks. The weather was warm enough that I took my long sleeve shirt off halfway through the workout. 

We love having lunch with Mike every once in a while in the middle of his workday. Since he works so close to home it's easy to meet up for lunch. One of our favorite places to go is Ted's Montana Grill. Madeline just loves being with her daddy.

I can't believe that we already got snow since it is only the beginning of October. The first snowfall is always so much fun.

Peter is our kid that can literally sleep anywhere and can fall asleep easily. It is not uncommon for him to fall asleep on the floor after school. 

Everyone's favorite chair in the house is the big oversized chair next to the fireplace. Emma usually can be found studying or relaxing in this chair.

After spending one summer painting and updating the girls' room, I'm sorry to say the walls remained empty for almost over a year. I had ordered the coolest vinyl lettering for their wall and it sat in their closet for a long time before I finally got my act together to put it up. The vinyl says Be.You.tiful. The girls loved it. 

​This is the time of year that I usually spend a lot of time working on the small book but this year I decided to forgo the small book and just work on the big book. I must admit it has been exhilarating to think about finally finishing a big book.

​Andrew is really good about keeping in touch with us while he is at college. He loves to Facetime me during the day and he always asks how Madeline is doing and if he can see her. Sometimes on the rare occasion that he calls when the older kids are home they love to chat with Andrew too.

​Abby had such a great time at High Trials this year. This weeklong field trip is for the 6th graders and they spend the week outdoors learning different things and bonding with their friends.

JAZZ AND ORCHESTRA CONCERT
OCTOBER 21, 2019

​

​Emma and Peter both had concerts tonight. It is rare for the Jazz Band Concert to be at the same time as the Orchestra concert. They both did a great job, It was nice to be able to see both of them perform.

​Everyday Madeline picks something new that she wants to play with. It usually involves one of the bins of toys in the basement. Her favorite toys to play with lately have been the geo tracks and trains. She usually needs a little help putting together a fun train track and then we play together.

​Peter came home from the Jazz Concert and wanted to say goodnight to Madeline before she got in bed. She was so excited to see him, and he was equally excited to see her. It just warmed my heart to see them together.

​We got our 2nd snowstorm for the month. It was a lighter snow than the first storm and I couldn’t resist a night picture. Everything just looked so peaceful.

​Since it was a snow day, the girls took advantage of being lazy and cuddled in bed with me.

​The Holley’s stopped by on their drive out east. It was so great to have dinner with them and catch up before they moved away from Colorado. We will miss having them relatively close.

​We just can’t seem to catch a break with all the snow this month.  I think this was the first year it snowed three times in the month of October. By the time this snowstorm rolled around we were all kind of over it.

​Ever since Mike and I had the cheese and charcuterie platter up at Beaver Creek, we have been so excited to try and recreate it at home. Our own creation did not disappoint. 

​Andrew and some of his friends from BYU-I spent Halloween at Fat Cats bowling and playing arcade games together. They all dressed up for the occasion. 

​There is never a dull moment with Madeline. This month she had plenty of opportunities to play in the snow as we got a ton of snow during the month of October. She loved wearing her brand-new silver coat outside and drinking hot chocolate inside when she was done being in the cold. Watching Madeline play is always such a treat. She is so creative and imaginative. She loves playing with her Little Einstein toys, her Little People figures, the eraser animals, and her stuffed animals. We continued to work on potty training and Madeline had fun picking out a new pair of underwear every day.  She leaned towards her Frozen underwear or something with pink in it. She truly is a lover of the color pink.