Happy Birthday to ME!

It happens every year. The Christmas lights are taken down and life is getting back to usual and then BANG! It is my birthday. I feel a little bad for Matt because he has to come up with something for my birthday right after he finishes my Christmas. On the other hand it is kind of nice because whatever I wanted and didn’t get for Christmas is up for grabs for the birthday.


This year my birthday wasn’t a big thing. Matt was still sick with his crazy cold, it was freezing outside, and my birthday was on a Wednesday. What can you really do with that?

The day before the big day I asked my parents to come and help us pick up my Christmas present. We added an elliptical machine to our home gym, and it wasn’t going to fit in the Corolla for the ride home. So my parents were wonderful and pulled their trailer down for us. We picked the little guy up and brought him home. Then the men carried it down the stairs and got it all set up. I must say – I like my elliptical.

After we set it all up we went out to dinner and had a good time talking. It was nice.

Then it was my real birthday. My poor sick husband wished me happy birthday and then I went off to work. It has been crazy stressful at work lately, and my birthday was no exception – so I decided to take some cupcakes in for everyone. I hadn’t had time to cook them, so I ran over to Target on my lunch break and picked some up. They were actually really really good. I almost went back after work and got more.

After work Matt met me at the door and said we were going to go to dinner and a movie. He was still crazy sick, so I talked him in to just dinner. We went out to Layton to Outback (had a gift card) and had a yummy dinner of steak. Matt was nice and didn’t have them sing to me (Last year I had to sit on the saddle at Lonestar). Then we went home and relaxed the rest of the night. Matt gave me some nice silver necklaces. It was a good birthday.

Then the day after my friend Dawn invited me to go with her and her little girl to see Tangled. I was excited to see it, and it was a really good movie.

I would say that it was a good birthday. I guess 25 isn’t going to be so bad.

Since I didn't take any pictures on my birthday, here pictures of my first few birthdays.

Happy New Year!

Well – it happened. 2010 crept away and 2011 arrived. Matt and I were happy to be able to celebrate the changing of the years with his aunt Amy’s family.

We met them after work at the Greenery at the mouth of Ogden Canyon. We both had gift cards that expired on 12/31/2010, so it was a great day to use them! The other Clarks had spent the day skiing, so they were ready for some food. I had to work on New Year’s Eve, and Matt was still sick with his cold, so I am sure we were not too exciting of a group at dinner. But the food was good. We had some yummy Mormon Muffins and I had a huge baked potato. Yummy!

After dinner we went to Amy and Greg’s house and played some games. First we played with their new Christmas toy – an arcade style basketball game. I hate to admit that Matt beat me a couple times before I got the hang of the game and beat him.

We watched the ball drop on the internet at 10:00 with their boys and celebrated the New Year EST with them before they went to bed. Then we decided to play some more games and stay up until the real midnight.

I have a bunch of games at my house and we never play them, because most of them need more than 2 players so we were happy to be able to play with them. The first game we played was Curses. I had never played it before, but I have heard it was fun. I was excited when my Grandma gave it to me for Christmas, and happy to have a chance to play it. It is a crazy game – and would probably be even more fun with more people. As it was, Matt was a rhyming drill sergeant, Amy had to speak like a trucker and a witch, Greg had to bow every time someone clapped, and I had to clap whenever anyone mentioned food. It was fun. When that game ended we moved on to other games.

Then – before we knew it – it was New Years and we had a toast to 2011.

Here is hoping that the year is a great one!

Birthday Party!

December 28th was my oldest nephew Kohl’s 10th Birthday. We were lucky enough to have him and his family in town – so we decided to party. The plan was made to go to Boondocks in Kaysville. I had to work that day, so the party did start without me (but I have seen pictures – looked like fun!). They started with pizza and drinks (in teeny tiny cups). Then they moved on to the having fun part. A lot of the “grown-ups” (note the quotes) decided to play laser tag. Matt was able to attend the entire party and was part of the group that had fun running around in the dark shooting at people.

I got to the party a little late, had some pizza that was saved for me and then moved out to the arcade to help watch the little kids have fun. I ended up shepherding my niece Cora around. She is just a cute little thing. She had such a good time going around and around on the mini merry-go-round. We also had fun with a game where you were supposed to throw balls at the screen. They were little plastic balls like they used to have in ball houses (do they still have those?) and there were a lot of them, so we could all throw and she could still play. It was fun.

Then it was time to go bowling. I wasn’t paying attention when they were dividing up the lanes and putting names in – but someone decided that I merited bumpers on the lane. I wish I could say that I didn’t need them – but I think I took advantage of them a few times. Bowling was a lot of fun. I took a few breaks to take Cora back to the carousel. We had a little mishap where my nephew Dax took a run down a lane (not one we were bowling on) and of course took a spill because those things are slippery! No one was fast enough to get a picture, but it was funny. Then when bowling was over, we had some cupcakes (made by my sister – super yummy!) and sang “Happy Birthday” and opened presents. Then we played the arcade games more and cashed in the tickets for the kids. It seemed like most of the kids came out with quite a bunch of loot from the prize desk. Overall I think it was a fun party!

Another Merry Christmas

Christmas time seems to go by so fast! One minute I am not in the Christmas mood and I don’t want to put the tree up yet, and the next minute it is over. Our season was cut a little short this year too because Matt caught a lovely cold the week of Christmas and just couldn’t go out and do Christmassy things.


Luckily I caught him before he got sick and took him to Temple Square with me to see the Christmas lights. There wasn’t any snow to speak of, and it wasn’t too cold either – which is nice compared to the past few years when we have been there. We parked out by the Library and took Trax in to Temple Square. It was crowded, but it was nice. There was a gathering of Santa Clauses downtown that day – I think they were doing a bar crawl – but it was fun to see them all walking down the street singing Christmas songs. I liked it!

We had the Haun Family Christmas party where my nieces and nephew as well as my cousin’s kids were lucky enough to get a chance to speak to Santa! They were cute- still really shy or just downright scared when it comes to the jolly old guy, but I really liked seeing that-brings back good Santa Claus memories.

Then before we knew it, it was Christmas Eve! I was lucky enough to be able to work most of Christmas Eve (note the sarcasm) so we were kind of late to our Christmas kick off. We were also kind of late because we had to load so many presents into my little Corolla! We were filled up like Santa’s sleigh. Christmas Eve started at my sister Chrystie’s house. My Brother and his family were in town from St. Louis and it was nice to have a chance to talk to them also. We ate pizza and junk food and just spent time together. It was fun watching my nieces and nephews jumping on my Brother in law. I also liked how my baby niece Cora kept calling my brother “Pizza Guy”. She woke up from her nap and he was there, and pizza was there, and that made sense to her. She was still calling him pizza guy days later.

After spending some time there, we went to Matt’s Grandparent’s house to spend the night. We are really glad they let us crash there so we can start our really early morning a little less early. But morning came and we rushed over to Matt’s sister’s house to watch her kids open presents. They were super patient and even waited until we had some breakfast before they opened the gifts. I don’t think I ever had that kind of waiting power. While we were waiting for everyone I had fun playing balloon volleyball with the kids. I also loved when my nephew Cameron came downstairs all dressed – then he figured out it was Christmas morning – and we next saw him come down in his pajamas again. So cute! My niece Cailey was adorable and every time she got something she was excited about she would turn to the person who gave it to her and yell “You did not get this for me!” Cute.

After presents there we drove from Bluffdale to North Salt Lake for the second half of breakfast and presents. It was wonderful chaos when we got to the house. There was wrapping paper and presents everywhere! The kids were just finishing opening their presents when we arrived, and that was seven kids opening presents from parents, aunts, uncles, and grandparents – so there were lots of gifts. Lucky kids!

We took time to open all our gifts and then clean up the mountain of paper. The kids had a chance to play with their toys. My nephew Dax is in love with Dinosaurs, so he received several that morning. He was trying to carry them all around at once. My other nephew Drake was carrying around a little stick we gave him in his pants as a sword. Very cute (my little brother used to do that too – but I think he had an actual sword).

After my sister’s house we took a drive back up to our house. I was suffering from Matt’s cold on Christmas so I was happy to take a 20 minute break and recover before we went back out for more fun! The next place for fun was my Grandma’s house in Layton. We got there and it was already bouncing with fun. My oldest niece and nephew had pulled out the piano rolls and were pumping away at the player piano. The piano has apparently lost the volume control – so not much conversation was going on, but it brought back memories of when we would do that at Grandma’s when we were kids. We had some yummy soup and some other treats. Some of my cousins and my aunt and uncle showed up and we had some small conversation when the piano would take a break. (my nephew also found the accordion – but that stayed downstairs).

After Grandma’s house we went back down to Matt’s Grandma and Grandpa’s house. This is where we wrapped up Christmas. We had some dinner and watched the kids play with their favorite toys from the day. We played some Jenga and Don’t Break the Ice. But before long we were all tired from having such a good day and it was time to go home!

Another Merry Christmas.