Christmas pictures

Christmas was so nice this year! The kids let us sleep in until almost 8:30! We then got up and opened gifts. I didn't take as many pictures as I thought I did-which is odd since I got a brand new camera! Thank you my sweet hubby Steve-you truly spoil me. After putting away most of the gifts we packed up the car and headed out of town in an attempt to beat the storm-It only snowed for about the first 50 minutes. We got to my parents house and soon everyone was there. It was so nice to see everyone. The only ones not there were Gary and Debbie-but we did get to talk to Deb on the phone. Rick and Tara brought over their cute new puppy and most of the kids swarmed around him. We all got new board games for Christmas so we tried them out and had so much fun. As always there was plenty of food and we ate ourselves silly. The kids had a blast spending time together and they all got along so well-even sharing their new toys amazingly well. We had planned to take pictures of all the kids together but Makayla ended up with an awful rash and we decided to wait until the spots were gone at her insistence. Poor thing...maybe in a few weeks when Peyton is blessed. I hope that you all had a very wonderful Christmas and had time to reflect on our Savior and the 'reason for the season'. Love to you all!

Morgan-the daredevil!

Yesterday I took the day off of work. The kids and I made about 5 dozen sugar cookies, two pans of brownies & banana bars. It took a long time to do it all and then ofcourse even longer to clean up after. The kids got bored and went outside to play in the fresh snow. I went out to check on them and found this!It is hard to tell from the picture so I will explain it. We have a large dog house next to the house with a ladder leaned against it and with a piece of plywood on top of that. Steve made this little shelter for our dog. Anyway I found Morgan on top of the shelter with Koby's snowboard trying to slide down the slope! Thankfully she was not hurt.

Our little nativity

For family home evening this week-Steve read Luke 2. Koby was Joseph and Morgan was Mary. I got assigned to be the angel. Here are pictures of our very cute Mary and Joseph.

(Don't you love seeing the tv in the background!)

Peyton

Here are some very cute pictures of my newest niece. Matt and Mindy are already wrapped around her tiny little finger.

Holiday fun

I decided to try and take our yearly family photo by ourself. We have a timer on our camera but after a while I was so frustrated that I just called Matt and asked him to come over and take a few pictures for us. As you can tell from the many pictures, we had many different problems, from weird smiles, to blocking each others head, to having someone move. Thanks Matt for helping us out!
Two weekends ago we went to a party in Ogden. On the way home we stopped at the SLC temple and walked around the grounds. It was so pretty!
Under our tree there are several large gifts-the biggest is Morgan's favorite. She likes to stand behind it and pretend like she is taking our order. She usually offers cheesburgers or chicken-though once I think she had rice.
Steve keeps telling people that I am camera happy but it's hard not to take pictures when your husband and kids are so adorable!

Happy Holidays to ya'll.

Deep thoughts...by Becky Z

A couple of days ago as the kids and I were getting into the car, Morgan spotted a strip of paper on our lawn. She ran and picked it up and gave it to me. I thought to myself, Boy can this girl find treasures-she loves to collect leaves, sticks, rocks and now she is collecting garbage in the yard. There were only a few words on that paper but they have triggered some very deep thinking on my part. The paper said, "They all knew I was in over my head..."

Most people would just crumble up the paper and chuck it-and I did that but then I started thinking about every aspect of my life and what that quote could apply to. My marriage-nope-things are good there and I am very happy! My kids-yeah probably-I try really hard to be a good mom but there are so many parenting things that I am clueless about. But still I love my kids and they seem to be happy and well adjusted so maybe just up to my neck but not over my head. My job-no way-I can do it all in my sleep. My church calling-possibly-I have a new calling to teach relief society but I have done it before and I am not too worried. I know that as long as I prepare the Lord will help me out. Relationships, friendships, anything else I could think of seemed pretty good.

So maybe the quote couldn't apply to my life at all...maybe it was just the wind that blew someone's trash onto our yard. But I still think that everything happens for a reason and maybe this happened so I could analyze my life and realize just how great things are. Most likely. So now I want to just mention a few of the blessings that I have in my life.

Steve-what an amazing husband! He shows me everyday how much he loves me. How lucky am I? I get to spend eternity with the man I love!

Koby & Morgan-both of my children are loving and good. They bring joy and love into every day. They fill our lives with laughter and I am blessed to be their mother.
My parents and siblings (and their spouses). I am blessed to have such a loving family that are always willing to help each other. I am also blessed to have great in-laws. The Zabriskie's are awesome.

I am so grateful for my health. Thankful for my job-in times when the ecomomy is so shaky and the number of unemployed is growing it is a relief to know that both Steve and I have jobs that will provide for our family.I am blessed to have the gospel in my life-it provides guidence, peace and happiness. I am grateful to our Savior Jesus Christ-for the life he lived and for the sacrafice of his death.

Most especially I am grateful for my Heavenly Father and for the blessings he gives me each day. I feel like a spoiled child that often takes things for granted and doesn't say thank you nearly enough.

A quote comes to my mind, "My cup runeth over." That is truly how I feel. I am over my head with blessings!

Happy birthday bro!

Just a quick shout out to Rick-Happy Birthday! I hope that you have a great day and that you are feeling better. We love you very much! Thanks for being such a great example to me. I really look up to you-you are my hero! Throughout your trials this year you have showed me what faith really is and have inspired me to want to live a better life. Our prayers and love are with you.

Christmas prep

On Tuesday we had a free night so we got out our Christmas decor and prepared our home for the holidays. We had a lot of fun. First we assembled the tree-I guess it's not the same thing as going into the mountains to cut down the perfect tree but it does save money to reuse the same tree each year and we know we will always get the perfect tree and I love that we don't have to worry about it dying. While we put the tree together Morgan got all of the decorations lined up on the piano bench. She is not OCD at all!

My favorite part of setting up was putting the nativity together. I carefully unwrapped each piece and talked to Morgan about each one as she carefully carried them across the room to hand them to Koby who set them up this year.

I have to say that our tree would never win the most beautiful and I know it doesn't look polished or sophisticated or even symetrical, but I love it! Every year we each pick out a new ornament-so we end up with Dora, scooby doo, basketball themed ornaments and many other random odds and ends. It is so fun to try and remember who picked which ornament, why and when. We also have many homemade ornaments that Koby has made at school over the years. So to me not only is our tree beautiful but it is also meaningful. So what if I am not Martha Stewart...I think I am more than happy with just being Becky Zabriskie.

December already???

I cannot believe that Christmas is only 24 days away or that there is only 4.5 more weeks left in 2008.

I think that because this year has been so difficult, it made me feel more grateful than usual this Thanksgiving. I have really been feeling so blessed. We have a great life and I am feeling overwhelmed with all the love that I have in my life. I could easily make a list of all the great things in my life but I would forget someone or the post would be enormous. So instead I will just try to share my love and gratitude by the way I live my life.

Thanksgiving was great! Steve got up early and played football while the kids and I slept in! We had dinner with Steve's family this year. The food and the company were both great. It was nice to visit and relax though it was tough to have our first Thanksgiving without Steve's mom. I took along my camera and then didn't take a single picture-and to make that even worse I then left my camera there and didn't have it with me for the entire weekend! Oh well you will all just have to imagine it.

On Friday morning I got up at 4:30 and made it to my first shopping stop by 4:50 (YES that is AM). I got a lot of good deals and a huge jump start on my holiday shopping. I also did witness, for the first time, an actual fight at Walmart. It was so crazy! I also saw a man on an ambulance stretcher holding an ice pack on his head. All of my other stops were pretty mild in comparision. People were friendly and helpful as we all tried to find the stuff on our lists. I was back home and in bed by the time Steve got up to leave for work at 7am.

That afternoon we loaded up the car and drove over the river and through the woods to my parents house. It was nice to see everyone for a few days. Jen and her family were there, and ofcourse Rick and Tara are just a few minutes away. The kids all got to help milk the cows and feed calves. On Saturday Koby, Rick and Papa went into the mountains to get a Christmas tree for Rick and Tara. They had a great time together. We got to spend quite a bit of time together and as always it's so fun to be with family-we did miss Matt and Mindy and Peyton! (funny story-Morgan was telling Jen about Peyton and she said, "Peyton is our baby but we will share her with Matt and Mindy.")

Last week Koby, Morgan and I got into the spirit of sharing by passing around a cold. We are all still coughing and sniffing-can't wait for that to be over! We have stocked our shelves with Nyquil, dayquil and cough drops.

We are getting ready for the holidays by having our first Christmas party tonight and another one at the end of the week. We hope to put up our tree and decorations this week. Morgan loves to point out all of the Christmas lights-I think she will love going to temple square this year. Koby helped Morgan make a wish list for Santa-so I think we are all set. Steve ofcourse will wait until the week of Christmas to get his shopping done but he would hate to ruin tradition by starting early...just kidding honey! I love that you are so different from me-what a great balance we make.