McCall's Elk and Some Interesting Notes on Tithing Settlement
Tithing settlement was an adventure this year. (Bet you don’t hear that too often.) McCall shot her first elk mid-December. It happened to be the Saturday before we had
tithing settlement. She shot it in the
afternoon and she and Daniel didn’t have the time or manpower (not to slam
Daniel’s muscle power – I’ve seen him throw an entire deer on his back before
and haul it out; but an elk is a different story!) to haul it out on
Saturday. Daniel called up Ian and Dylan
to help him get the ox out of the mire after church on Sunday. They got back five minutes before our tithing
settlement appointment. Daniel threw on
some church clothes and off we went. I
told the bishop not to shake Daniel’s hand – I’m not sure he had time to wash
his hands when he got home! The bishop
gave us his approval for getting the meat out and being full tithe payers and we were set.
Speaking of
being a full tithe payer, I had Jed’s friend, Derek Ballard, over for lunch
and a play date one day. Over lunch
Daniel asked Derek if he was related to Elder Ballard. Derek responded, “I don’t know who that
is.” Daniel, teasingly, asked, “Well,
are you a Mormon?” Derek pondered that
question for a moment and then replied, “No, but I am a full-tithe payer.” Daniel and I got a kick out of that.
McCall turns twelve and has a party
McCall
turned twelve this month and officially went into Young Women’s. Her timing was perfect because two days after
her birthday she was able to go with the YW/YM to do baptisms for the dead. Daniel was able to accompany her and she had a
really good experience. She’s been able
to go since then with one of her friends as well. I’m not going to lie – it’s really great
living half a mile from the temple!
McCall’s
birthday party was an extravaganza of fourteen giggly, happy girls.
We had a mixed up dinner where the girls had
to order from a coded menu.
They never
knew if they were going to be eating their spaghetti with a turkey baster or a fork.
Some of them got cake and ice cream first and
salad last.
The girls had a blast seeing
what everyone else had ordered and then watching them try to eat it.
McCall got some great gifts as well.
...and Daniel and Lindsey have a party too!
The day
after McCall’s birthday party, Daniel and I decided to have a party
ourselves.
We had five couples over for
dinner and a white elephant party.
Our
theme this year was “Best Red and Green.”
I thought I might win the costume contest with a red dress I had saved
from my college days – but, no, I was outdone by my friend Jim who showed up in
a sparkly red sequin get-up.
It was a
great party and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.
A muddy Christmas tree cutting excursion
I should
probably backtrack a bit to our annual Christmas tree cutting expedition.
This year we went with the Richards family.
I’ve never on a Christmas tree cutting
excursion and not been hiking through snow.
This year we hiked through rain and mud.
I’ll take snow – thank you!
After
a few minutes of searching I found the perfect Christmas tree.
It was at the bottom of a ravine surrounded
by a maze of deadfall trees.
When I led
Daniel over to the perfect tree, the first words out of his mouth were, “That’s
a perfect tree.”
The next phrase out of
his mouth was, “How in the world am I going to get it out of there?”
To which I responded, “Daniel – where there’s
a will, there’s a way.
Good luck.”
Remember that muscle power I mentioned
before?
Well, Daniel put it to good use
and got that tree out.
He was a little
sweaty when he was done…and muddy.
It
was worth it I say!
I think it was the
most beautiful tree we’ve ever had.
Wyatt gets a really, really, REALLY bad haircut
We’ve been
trying to grow out Wyatt’s hair.
His
head hasn’t been cooperating.
That kid
had a white boy afro.
Finally, I decided
that I’d had enough and decided to cut his hair.
Unfortunately, it takes quite a while to
whack your way through a white boy afro.
As I was nearing the end of his haircut, Wyatt lost patience and control
of his temper.
He had a mini-meltdown
and I told him that if he didn’t apologize I wasn’t finishing his haircut.
He had some nice ear “fluff muffs” and some
rat tail trim on the back of his neck.
It took him three days to apologize.
Once he did, I gave him a proper haircut.
Wyatt had a Christmas class musical this month
and had a solo part of him rapping part of the poem, “Twas the Night Before
Christmas.”
He was great – I think he
would have gotten more applause if he’d left his ear fluff muffs and neck
scruff – but the kid did apologize, so what do you do?
Santa Lucia and other notable achievements for McCall
McCall also
had a vocal solo this month. A family in
our ward always throws a big Swedish Santa Lucia party each year. Santa Lucia was a Swedish girl who brought
meals to the poor and helped those in need.
She’s just as big of a Christmas figure in Sweden
as Santa Claus. All of the family’s
daughters have grown up and gone off to college, so they asked McCall to be
their Lucia this year. McCall worked
diligently to learn “Silent Night” in Swedish.
She dressed in a white gown with a red sash and wore a crown of candles
on her head. She looked beautiful and
did an excellent job with her singing part.
I was really proud of her.
Other than
turning twelve, shooting her first elk, and being Santa Lucia, McCall also made
wood toys to give away to charity, went caroling for cans of food to give to
the Family Crisis
Center (both of those activities were with the
Girl Scouts) and finished reading the Book of Mormon for the first time. What a month!
Lindsey goes up against the School Board
A huge
focus of the month for me (other than the birth of our Savior – of course!) was
writing proposals and going to meetings with the Madison School District School
Board. Trying to get Madison’s
calendar to more closely align with BYU-I’s calendar has a direct benefit for
our family – more vacation time to spend together as a family. Daniel can’t ask for time off of work; he has
to take his vacation time when the university is out. Unfortunately, many of the times that Daniel
is out on a semester break, Madison
is in session…and vice versa. It kills
me. I had two main objectives. 1) Push the start date for school back one
week and 2) align Madison’s and BYU-I’s Spring Breaks. I spent quite a few hours writing proposals,
researching calendar dates, talking to board members and attending
meetings. In the end, the board passed
pushing the start date of school back one week but didn’t pass aligning Spring
Break. I don’t agree with that decision
– and I have research to back it up!
I’ve decided to run for the School Board – I’m not kidding.
Christmas, the flu and a sweet day of skiing
The
Christmas holidays this year won’t go down in history as our best.
We drove all the way down to
SLC
to celebrate Christmas with all of my siblings, only to have to turn around and
retreat eight hours after we had arrived when Daniel, McCall and Quin got a
case of the stomach flu.
They, in turn
passed it to Jed, Kai and I just in time to suffer through a hazy blur
Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
Only
Wyatt and Carson escaped unscathed.
Daniel was a champ and pulled off all the Christmas preparations while I
laid nearby in a stupor of sickness.
The
next day I felt better so I took McCall, Kai, Wyatt and Jed – along with three
neighbor kids – to Jackson Hole Mountain Resort to go skiing.
Daniel was kind enough to stay home with
Carson and Quin.
We had a great day
skiing and eating French fries at the Cowboy Café.
The kids
got most of what they asked for from Santa.
McCall got lots of jewelry and some new ski gloves.
Kai got the Lego Harry Potter boardgame and a
new bow and arrow that he can shoot in the house.
Wyatt got a Lego Ninjago set.
Jed got nineteen foam swords so that he can
have sword battles with Kai, Wyatt, Ian and whoever else happens to be naïve
enough to wander into our house.
Carson
got a “little fairy thing where the fairies slide down and then they hop, hop,
hop back up” (it’s a Littlest Pet Shop fairy rollercoaster).
Carson
also got a Barbie guitar and has been entertaining us with lively renditions of
“Girls Just Want to Have Fun” at least a dozen times times a day.
Quin got some Sing-a-ma-Jigs and insists on
sleeping with them at night.
I wake up,
more often than not, to the sound of Quin playing with her little
Sing-a-ma-Jigs in her crib.
Daniel the Destroyer of Ducks
Daniel
spent much of December hunting ducks.
McCall
and Kai love to go along and Daniel has taken them both quite a few times.
When I asked Daniel how many ducks he’s shot
this year he said, “At least a hundred…”
I wish I liked duck meat more.
I’m going to make Ian and his roommates take some and help us whittle
down our supply.
Dewey family Christmas party
At the end
of the month, we headed down to
Logan
to celebrate Christmas with our Dewey family.
We always have fun when we all get together.
I was in charge of the Christmas craft this
year.
I helped the kids make different
“symbols” of Christmas to coincide with the story “Teach the Children.”
Uncle Steve and Aunt Susan used that story
years ago – thanks for the great idea!
The
kids were also able to go to the Fun Zone with all the dads and run around with
cousins all weekend.
Daniel’s dad took
Kai duck hunting and, even with the freezing cold temperatures, they had a
great day of decoy hunting.
Daniel, Kai
and his dad also spent a fun day pheasant hunting.
New Year's Eve extravaganza
We got back
home in time to celebrate New Year’s.
We
had an appetizer dinner, watched a movie, shot silly string all over the deck
(thanks Abby and Tom) and had a confetti-popper shoot out.
2012 was a great year – I can’t wait to party
in 2013 as well.
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