Jan- Week 3 & 4- Ribbon Cutting, NFBDP, Mailbox

Monday, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, McKenna had a fun play date with her cousins Whitney and Katie since they were all off school!  

Tuesday (and Thursday), I hosted and taught Ben's preschool.  I taught about the letter "Pp" but didn't take any pictures.  The best part was how funny the boys thought the tongue twister "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers" was. :)  

Wednesday, after picking up McKenna, we went to Library Story Time and McKenna got to be a helper.  They read books that were all about being sick.  So she got to pretend she was a patient with a sick tummy and the "doctor" kept pulling weird things out.  :) 

Thursday night, we had a lovely family dinner with my siblings and mom at my siblings' apartment.  

Friday, we went to Brigham City to support Dan's brother, the new General Manager, at the grand opening ribbon cutting ceremony for the new hotel, a Hampton Inn.  

Other family members who came to support and the actual ribbon cutting! 

Then we headed up to Mantua for a relaxing afternoon of napping and watching Star Wars.  

We ate dinner with Dan's parents and three of his siblings at our favorite Mexican restaurant in Brigham City.  We arranged to do a babysitter swap with Dan's sister and we each got to do a session in the Brigham City Temple.  So beautiful!  After the temple, we played Farkle with the family who were staying overnight.  

Whenever Anna saw Ellie crawling, she had to too.  :)  

Saturday morning it was our turn to babysit.  We just kinda hung out, watched movies, and played games.  Then Gma and Gpa took the big girls on their morning walk.  You could tell they were pretty cold, but they loved going with them and "earning" a trip to the candy store afterwards.  

Once Dan's sister got back, we fed the kids lunch then headed back to Brigham City to meet up with Dan's brother's family for some bowling!  

Everyone had lots of fun!  I know the scores are hard to see, but McKenna won for the kids, and Jake won for the grown ups.  Yes, I came in last place. :) 

Monday, the 26th, was the Nelson Family Birthday party celebrating the January Birthdays.  Ben's getting pretty good at blowing out the candles.  :) 

Benny wanted me to take a picture of a piece of cheese he made look like a "saw."  Ok, bud. :)  

Also, two funny things he's said recently: As he was running back and forth from my room to the family room getting Duplo blocks to build a tower, he said all huffing and puffing out of breath, "Thanks for the yummy breakfast mom!  Now I have all this energy!"  And then after watching the snail racing movie Turbo, he said, "That movie was so funny it cracked the brains right out of me."  

Wednesday, we went out for one last restaurant dinner with my mom and siblings before she went back to Chile.  She chose Red Lobster and then we went to Cold Stone for ice cream afterwards.  A very delicious night, indeed!!

Just a cute little rock collector. :) 

McKenna playing school.  She definitely loves to be the teacher.  And I love that they (sometimes) let Anna play too. :)  

Saturday night, my sister babysat while we had a fun family meeting and dinner with Dan's parents and siblings.  We walked home and were sitting on the couch talking to my sister when within 20 mins of being home, we heard a loud crunch sound outside.  Dan went to check things out and saw that our mailbox had been pushed/bent/twisted down to the ground, and then run over!!  Dang hooligans!  I mean, we definitely could use a new mailbox, but we were hoping someone would take it out in a snowstorm, tell us, and then help pay for a new one. :)  Oh well!  Dan did his best to bend it back upright, and unflatten the mailbox pancake until we have time to buy and instal a new one.  We also kind of hope the metal did some damage to the vandal's car or tires.  And come to find out at church the next day, that 3 other mailboxes on our street had been vandalized as well.