Quest for the Vest party

One of my favorite parties of the season. Maybe because it's one of the only Christmas parties we go to. But either way, it's always super fun. This year was a "Reindeer games" theme so all gifts for the white elephant exchange were suppose to be a game. I grabbed two old ones from the closest that were still in good condition and had all it's pieces. "Battle of the sexes" wasn't too popular, but "Worst case scenario" game got stolen a couple of times so I hope who ever ended up with it, has fun playing it. 

We scored and got a "mini air hockey table" and a "chutes and ladders" game. We're wrapping both up as Christmas gifts for the boys, so I'm excited.

After all the exchanges, people were just hanging out and chatting, so Hano opened up his game for us to all play. It was a mystery jelly bean game where you spun a dial and had to pick one of two jelly beans that looked the same, but had VERY different flavors. One was a good flavor, the other was disgusting. It was pretty hilarious and we were all just dying laughing as we took turns and hoped we didn't end up with barf or booger or skunk flavored jelly beans. I got grass clippings, canned dog food and then two fruity ones (we played four rounds). The dog food was by far the most disgusting. I couldn't wait to get home and brush my teeth. 

After the party, we headed to Target to look at phones, since I had dropped mine earlier in the day and cracked the screen. The button on top was already breaking and the flash had been acting funny, so it was time for a new one. Plus I was eligible for a reduced price one since I wasn't under contract anymore. The iPhone 5C happened to be on sale for $50.00 (half off), so I couldn't pass it up. It's fun to have a new phone. I told Paul to include it as my birthday gift. It's not a good time of year to be spending lots of excess on yourself, even if it was half off. But I do love my new phone and am happy with it. 

This must have been dog food. It was terrible.

Me rejoicing over getting a fruity one.

I don't remember what terrible flavor Kalli got, but I felt bad for her. Made for a great photo though

Hailey bracing herself for the worst. 

Yup, it was a bad one.

A really bad one.

Here's Tina's bad one. I think she only had one bad one out of four. It was barf though, so she deserved some good ones after that.

Oh and John Nyugen got the "coveted" Christmas Vest. AND he had to wear it the next day to church. ON the stand even since he's in the bishopric. At least he got to put his suit coat over it. He was a good sport about it. 

 FUN night! Glad we could make it this year. 

Yes that's a coyote….

And yes he was just strolling along the fence in my backyard like it was NO BIG DEAL. This picture was taken from INSIDE while I was sitting there, minding my own business, eating my lunch.  I was lucky I got a picture for proof. After I snapped it, he jumped down and headed up the hill. Kind of scary. But it's been so chilly anyway, the kids haven't been outside playing much.

Pancake Breakfast and Paul's 36th Birthday

The day started out quite exciting with breakfast in bed for Paul and a Pancake Breakfast at school for  the kids for meeting their reading goal for this first trimester. I took them this year so that Paul could head to work early in hopes of getting off early to celebrate his birthday.

The excitement continued when I found out mid morning that Brandon had soccer practice at 4 pm across town. It was terribly cold that day and we all froze while we watched him practice for his All Star game.  It ended at 5pm and I headed over to pick up Callie from Cheer practice. On the way there, I got rear ended. Yuck! I haven't ever been in a wreck and neither had the lady that hit into me, so we didn't really know what to do. We exchanged all our info and took pictures of the damage and then headed on our way. The kids were all fine thankfully. Her's too (she had two young girls with her). Ashlyn was pretty scared but she's a sensitive thing and gets shaken up quite easily. All in all it could have been WAY worse. At least the lady was trying to stop and didn't hit me going 50 miles per hour. Plus she was super nice about it and took full responsibility (which is was). Plus she has insurance so that was good to find out too. She is actually going to just pay out of pocket for the damage since no one was hurt and my car doesn't need extensive repair. I'm fine with it. I have her info, so either way my car will get fixed. 

After getting Callie (poor girl had to sit in the cold for 30 minutes) we met up with Paul at The Habit for dinner. We were originally going to go to CPK, but with the car wreck and it being pretty late, we opted for quick. After dinner we came home to have cake and ice cream. 

Paul got a few gifts from me and the kids and money and iTunes GC from our family. Hopefully he had a nice day and it wasn't too ruined with me getting in a wreck. At least we didn't end up in the hospital or anything. 

Carter wanted his own pancake after the kids had theirs. He didn't really eat it, but he had fun flipping them.

He's quite the helper in the kitchen. Always wants to bake with me. Here he is stirring the cocoa for Daddy's birthday cake. And apparently sticking his tongue out at me. Silly boy!

I did a terrible job at getting any good pictures of Paul on HIS birthday. Very sad. But here's his head….blowing out his candles. Love you honey! You're the very best there is! And I'm a lucky girl to have you forever!

FHE

Decorating Gingerbread houses is always a must for December FHE. This year I got a four pack of Snoopy Dog houses to decorate. Seemed like a cute idea since I have four kids. Callie helped Ashlyn, since I bought them before I knew she would be living with us. I didn't read the directions too well (or at all) and told all the kids to put the houses together the WRONG way. Oops. Oh well, they turned out well enough and the kids had fun decorating them, so that was most important. Next year I think I'll go back to regular ole gingerbread houses and perhaps read the instructions first. Yeah…that'd be a good idea.

Wakefield Winter Wonderland

Love this yearly tradition. It's always slightly crazy with lots of kids running around, but hey it's worth it to get to go with super fun friends. 

This year I decided it would be fun to go a bit early while my Dad was still in town from Thanksgiving.  So on December 1st we headed out there to look at the lights. We grabbed a few of our favorite friends that were in town and had a great time together looking at lights and having hot chocolate.

The flash on my camera wasn't working too well for some reason, so my pictures are all pretty dark. But oh well. Better than nothing I guess.

The diagnosis

Well we FINALLY have a diagnosis for Ashlyn. After all these years of searching for a reason why she had such thin hair and why it was itchy and more recently scaly. Thank you Children's Hospital for having amazingly smart doctors. Her doctor guessed what it was even before the skin biopsy results came in. And she was right. It is called Lichen Planopilaris (that's the name I never could have pronounced in my last post about Ashlyn, but one I now know well). It is a type of an autoimmune disease that affects the skin. Mainly where hair is and primarily on the scalp. But it is also why Ashlyn has bumpy red eyebrows and contributes to her rough skin. She is just all around sensitive. It is not hereditary and they don't know the cause of it or why it happens. It is mostly seen in adult women age 30-40 and rarely seen in kids. Ashlyn has a fairly severe case of it, which is probably why I was able to get her in so quickly to the doctor's office. There is no cure, but thankfully there are treatment plans that should help with the scaliness, the redness and the itchiness. I decided to start with a more conservative approach since she is only 10 and on the smaller side for her age. I don't want to bombard her poor body with more medicine than it needs. She will be taking a pill everyday, along with a foam scalp treatment twice a day and a liquid at night to help with the itchiness. She will have monthly appointments for a while (possibly 6 months or so) or until we see stable results. She has to go to a special eye doctor every 6-9 months because one of the side effects of this medicine is that it can affect the retina of her eye. The chances are extremely small, but they will check her eyes frequently just incase. 

Overall, I am relieved and just very grateful that it isn't something worse. Yes it stinks to have a skin condition that won't ever go away. One that will prevent her hair from ever really growing in well. BUT on the flip side, it only affects her skin and she is and will be otherwise healthy. The goal is to calm the skin and scalp and to prevent more hair from falling out.

So that's where we are right now. She just started her treatment and the doctor said it might be 2-3 months before the scaliness goes away, but at least we are getting started. I'll probably do updates from time to time just for my own record keeping. Thanks for the well wishes and prayers. They are all very much appreciated. Feeling very grateful!

Pop Came for Thanksgiving

So very glad that this Thanksgiving didn't turn out like last Thanksgiving…even though we made the most of last year and still had a fun time. This year everyone was well and we had a great time hanging out together and eating lots of yummy food and sitting around the new fire pit in Ty's backyard and just relaxing. The kids are getting older so it's getting easier and easier. And even though my boys are crazy children these days, it was still a really fun day and a great reminder of how grateful I am for everything I have in life. Mostly my family, my health and the gospel. Creature comforts don't hurt either. 

Pop took me and Carter to lunch the day he flew in. Yum. Even Carter was digging the bread Pop got him.

Little girls LOVE Leah. And these little cuties are just about as adorable as they come. 

Hanging out waiting for dinner to be ready.

Carter's Thanksgiving dinner consisted of mostly "cookie letter's". He didn't seem to mind. He's chomping on one here. Too funny! He's missing out on some good stuff though. Maybe next year.

Fried Turkey is by far the yummiest way to enjoy your Thanksgiving Turkey. It was divine!

Yum….gobble gobble!

Hanging around the fire pit. It was so nice and warm and cozy. Loved it. I think all family get togethers will be at Ty and Heathers from now on.

Happy Thanksgiving!