Les Miserables!

My niece Katie was in the play Les Miserables at Orem High School. She invited Halle to come be in the play with her. Halle loved it so much and had so much fun!

Katie and Halle after one of the shows!

On stage, getting ready to take their bows!

John & Jr. Prom! April, 2011

John had a great time at Jr. Prom! He went with his cousin Jacob and a big group of friends. For their day date they played the amazing race and had to find clues all over town. One of them included riding a public bus to an apartment complex at BYU. It was hilarious to see a bunch of kids from Provo, Utah try to figure out where you can even find a public bus and how to get somewhere in town.

Everyone eventually (one group arrived an hour and a half after everyone else) made it to the party at the Jensen's after. This was followed by Dinner and the dance and then a swim party after the dance. It was a lot of fun!

Here is John getting ready to go pick up his date for Jr. Prom! He borrowed his G-pa's sportscar for the big night!

John & his date


The entire Group!

I'm back! Christmas 2010!

K, so I know, I took a break from blogging. But I am back and just adding a few updates from the year!

Josh & Halle with Santa!

Everyone got "monkey suits" for Christmas Eve!

Halle on Christmas morning!

Jordan and her companion celebrating Christmas in France!

Jordan spent all but 4 months of her mission in Paris or in a suburb of Paris. On Dec 22, she and her companion moved to a small town named Caen in Normandy, where they spent the next 4 months. They arrived in the middle of a huge blizzard that shut down the entire city, didn't know a single person in the town, but still got settled in nice and cozy and had a great day! (She did get a monkey suit, so I don't know why she is not wearing it!)

Soldiers Hollow

We have a new tradition (2 years) of renting out the Soldiers Hollow tubing hill & lodge with 100 of our friends for a private party on the Monday Night before Christmas!

I was so worried this year because we didn't have any snow, I was actually calling Soldier Hollow on Sunday asking what our options were if there was no snow for tubing. Luckily we woke up Monday morning to a HUGE Christmas Storm. It was so fun to be up there with the snow coming down, Christmas music playing over the speakers and so many fun friends & family members to visit with!

Here is Matthew with his cousins Caroline & Justin warming up with

Hot chocolate & doughnuts inside the lodge.

Matthew Cunger, Brittney, Cari Driggs, Halle & Steph!

Caroline, Justin, Jacob, Michael & tough guy Matthew!

Brad, Cindi & Tara!

Gingerbread houses!

Last night we had our annual gingerbread decorating contest at Lisa's house.

Girls vs. Boys.

Here are the girls with their house. They made and decorated the North Pole complete with elves and presents inside! They even decorated one side of the roof with an 80's style pattern, hoping to appeal to the judges!

And here are the boys with their gingerbread "house." The boys declared before the contest began that they felt as though they have been "ripped off" in past years because the judging panel (the mom's) don't always appreciate their designs. Reminder: last year they decorated the death of Osama Bin Laden complete with army men and blood. They tried to explain that would mean world peace, but still lost to the Girls.



So this year, the boys went for full out judge manipulation! They made a decoration in honor of Seour Pearce, who is serving a mission in Paris France, and "sharing the Gospel, and spreading Good will and Peace!" heehee
Notice the church building (where Jordan attends church and the "Called to Serve" (in french) banner at the top.

(Anyone who has been a missionary mom knows that there is no way I wasn't voting for this "house" to win.)




Here are the highlights, you can see the Eiffel Tower, and I loved the missionary tag complete with Jordan behind it with her blond hair!


From the top view you can see the outline of France with the ocean (blue) and Spain, Germany & Italy (Purple) around the edges. Also the brown thing in the corner is a book of mormon.



And here are the boys celebrating their victory!



And here are the judges. We have told everyone we will start accepting bribes for next years contest, beginning....now!

Happy Halloween!

This year Brad, John & Matthew had to go to Las Vegas for a tennis tournment over Halloween! Brad has 4 seniors this year on his team, so he has been out recruiting almost constantly the last couple of months.

So, Josh, Halle & I were alone at home, Josh ended up sick for trick or treating, but we still managed to have a fun night!

After going to New York City this summer, Halle was inspired to be the Statue of Liberty!

Josh was a BYU football player (again). His inspiration is his cousin Tyler! Josh was actually a little bent out of shape that I made him wear his BYU #31 (Tyler's #) uniform again and wasn't willing to buy him an Oklahoma Sooners uniform. Tyler just started dental school @ Oklahoma. I told Josh I would get him a Sooner's t-shirt but if he wanted to dress up like Tyler again, he had to stick with the BYU uniform at least for this year. Maybe next year he can dress up like a dentist!

Brad, John, Keaton Cullimore, Matthew & Kirk Cullimore dressed up like a herd of cow's for Halloween! They showed up for their matches wearing these costumes at the tennis center in Las Vegas!


John & Brad



Here is John at the desk checking into play his semi-final doubles match!

Keaton warming up for doubles!

John warming up!

They took off the costumes for the match and won that match and then won the final match the next day!

My favorite Fall Tradition!

One of my favorite fall traditions is going to look at the leaves up at Sundance. We always drive up between conference sessions on Sunday. It is so pretty up there, I have to remind my kids that not every place in the world looks like a postcard!

Josh, Halle, Tara, John & Matthew

John & Halle

Brad went and put on this orange shirt to really "get into the spirit of the fall season!"

Matthew & Josh were on a bug hunt!

This is looking out as we are driving back down, you can see in the background where we ski all winter!