Day 2 - Thanksgiving Day

We took family pictures in the morning.

The Wagner family. top row: Grandma, Mom, Paula, Tami, Brenda, Carla, Jana, Shauna bottom row:
Kevin, Grandpa, Ted

The Mortensen family top row: Dad, Emily, Kristen bottom row: Todd, Hailee, Nicole, Mom, Deneille, Pat, Ethan, Ernie, Derek, Stacie and Cambria

Just the girls. Mom, Stacie, Nicole, Deneille, Kristen and Emily.

Then we got together at Paulas. The boys played football and we helped get dinner ready. Paula and Carla did such a great job with all the food. It was truly amazing. We went to Carla's church building to eat. The food was so good. All the Wagner traditions from pickled beets to avocado, tomato, cucumber salad. So yummy! (It's funny how so many of my family's traditions revolve around food, but eating Thanksgiving dinner brought back so many memories of my childhood.)

The kids writing letters to Mickelle. Everyone took a minute to write a note to her.

The Wagner talent show.

Ethan, Cambria and Hailee singing "Love is Spoken Here" for the talent show. It was cute.

Playing Family Jeopardy. Every time we get together Paula comes up with a family jepoardy game. It's always really fun.

Day 3 - Castles and Coasters

The next day the young cousins went to the Mesa temple to do baptisms. When they got back we went to a little amusement park called Castles and Coasters. It was a lot of fun. Small enough that we kept running into people and not crowded at all. It had a good variety of rides for little kids and bigger kids and even family rides.

We started off with Go-Carts. Hailee's cousin Cambria loved it, Hailee was a little nervous. Here is a picture of her and Todd trying to catch me. They did pass me later and Hailee was quite pleased to have won the race.

They also had a miniature golf course and Hailee loved it. We played two rounds during the day.
Hailee and Cambria on the Merry-Go-Round. With Cambria's help Hailee wasn't scared of the Merry-Go-Round. It's so good for her to play with older cousins.
That evening we celebrated everyone's birthday that Grandpa and Grandma had missed for the last four years. We ate tacos (another food tradition) and had a pinata. Hailee loved it.

Hailee was more excited about getting this piece of the pinata then getting the candy that fell to the ground. She thought it was a perfect party hat!

Ballet Class

It's been a little while since we've posted and my only excuse is that we've been busy. Todd had two more fly back interviews (with Intel and ConAgra) last week. So far we've heard back from Intel with a job offer so now we have two offers we are excited about and now I get to loose sleep at night until we decided which is the best for our family and Todd's career. We have to let both companies know by Nov. 30 and Dec. 1st so at least my sleepless nights won't last long and we should know where we are going by then. We are both very excited for everything.

Today we had ballet class for Hailee. Usually there are three little girls in her class, but today she was the only one. Hailee of course loved it and I was able to snap a few pictures. I wish I could have gotten more, but I didn't want to be too much of a distraction. Since there weren't any other kids running around the waiting area I got to watch and listen better than I have in the past. It's so cute to see what she is learning and how cute her teacher is with her. Usually she has a couple of girls in her class with her, but today she was all alone. I got a few pictures, but I didn't want to distract the class too much.

Congratulations Todd

Yesterday we found out some good news. Todd got a job offer from AT&T. It’s our first one and we are very excited. He left this morning for Portland to interview with Intel and he flies out Sunday to Omaha to interview with Conagra food. We should also hear more from HP sometime this month. They are still in the process of getting job hiring approval. Needless to say it’s continuing to be a very busy month.

We are very excited about the job offer from AT&T. They have a great Financial Leadership program. We would be in three different places in three years and Todd would get a great jump-start to his career.

Todd is so funny because after his interview last week he said he didn’t feel like he did as good on his presentation as he could have and to hear him tell the story he didn’t think they would be offering him a job at all. In fact every day since his interview he would always check his email and say “I still haven’t gotten a rejection letter from AT&T.” As the week went on and I heard more and more of the comments they were making to him I realized that it didn’t go as bad as he said it did. (Even though he felt that way, it wasn’t really the truth). We are so proud of him.

In other family news there really isn’t a lot going on. While Todd is gone Hailee and I just try to stay out of trouble. Hailee is really getting into Christmas this year. We were at the craft store and she tried convincing me that we needed to buy a Christmas tree right that minute. “Mom Christmas really is coming.” So it is, but I don’t think we need to get a tree right this minute. It will fun decorating the house this year with Hailee. When we go shopping now she says “Oh mom can we get this for Christmas, it is really coming.” She says that for everything we look at to breakfast cereal to Q-tips. It’s really quite entertaining.

Rise and Shout

Rise, all loyal Cougars and hurl your challenge to the foe.
We will fight, day or night, rain or snow.
Loyal, strong, and true
Wear the white and blue.
While we sing, get set to spring.
Come on, Cougars, it's up to you. Oh!

Rise and shout, the Cougars are out
along the trail to fame and glory.
Rise and shout, our cheers will ring out
As you unfold your vict'ry story.
On you go to vanquish the foe
for Alma Mater's sons and daughters.
As we join in song in praise of you our faith is strong.
We'll raise our colors high in the blue
And cheer our Cougars of BYU.

Hailee is in heaven. Dad is home and BYU football was playing at home. The weather was perfect, and if anything we were worried about not bringing sunscreen with us. Luckily we didn't get burned, and we had such a good time. It's so cute to see Todd and Hailee cheering together. My favorite is when the other team is on third down and a couple yards to go, they stomp their feet and cheer so loud. Hailee does exactly what Todd does. Then when BYU scores they sing the fight song together. Hailee has all of the chorus memorized and most of the first bit as well.

She has had a hard time leaving Todd alone since he got home. Just barely I heard her in the hallway outside the bathroom talking to him, "dad, are you coming out soon." Poor Todd can't even use the bathroom in peace. The football game was some good dad time.

This is my favorite picture of the day. It sums up how the game went. If BYU was on the field this is how Hailee and Todd looked. Such serious little BYU fans.

This picture was taken at half-time. It was such a beautiful fall day. The weather was perfect.

Ready

We are so ready for Todd to come home. I know, I am a big wimp, but I hate him being gone. The first night he was gone I was having a hard time getting Hailee to go to sleep, she kept getting up. After not getting much sleep the night before I couldn't figure it out. As soon as Todd called and said that he made it to New Jersey, she went right to sleep. I think she was waiting to see if he was coming home and once she got to talk to him she decided it was okay to go to sleep.

The next night she wanted to sleep in her bed, not mine. When I asked her why she informed me that my bed was too big and she liked her little one. After the night before I let Hailee call Todd when she was going to sleep and she went to bed much easier for me. We also discovered the Superman blanket. Hailee has the hardest time keeping a blanket on all night. She always kicks them off as soon as you put them on here, even if she is asleep. Last night the superman blanket was down so she wanted to use that one. To my surprised she kept it on all night long.

In the morning at about 6:30 a.m. she woke up with a bad dream. What does my little girl have a bad dream about, someone putting ice cream in a cup. She kept saying over and over "You don't drink ice cream...it goes in a bowl, not it a cup. You don't drink it." Over and over again. I guess it makes me feel good that she doesn't have serious fears, just fears about someone putting ice cream in a cup. I finally got her awake enough to realize it was a bad dream and she went back to sleep.

When she woke up all the way a few hours later we were laying down in her room talking. She usually like me to cuddle her and chat before getting up all the way, it's a nice time in the morning for us. Well today she was very thoughtful and then she asked me...

H: Mom what color is this paint
N: The paint in your bedroom
H: Yes
N: It's called chocolate froth
H: Hmmm..... it's kind of boring
N: You don't like the color
H: It's just kind of boring
N: What color would you like
H: (thinking for a minute) I think pink would be a good color
N: Pink
H: Yeah, pink would be nice color.

I guess she is starting to get some opinions of her own when it comes to decorating. We finished the second coat in the bathroom last night, so that probably had something to do with our conversation. We'll have to talk to Todd about the paint color for her room.

Our last funny story of the day was Hailee wanted to do something and I kept telling her no. Of course she kept asking to do it. Finally in frustration I said, "Hailee listen to your mother, I said no." To which she responded "Mom, listen to your child, I said yes." Then she just started laughing. She can be such a tease.

A final picture to end today's post. Our condo complex has some amazing trees. In the spring they get the prettiest blossoms and in the fall they get some beautiful fall colors. I just love the changing of the seasons for spring and fall. This is the tree just outside our big window. We have been enjoying a nice warm fall lately and have been taking advantage of playing outside. Soon enough it will be too cold to play outside. That is always a sad change of the weather for me. The weather man said it would last for the next little while, so I am hoping he is right.

Mom is this Halloween?

Well yesterday after we dropped Todd off at the airport we went to Lisa's house. She invited us to go Trunk-or-treating with her ward. It was so much fun, and nice to have something to do when Todd is gone. Hailee decided she wanted to be a duck this time. The costume was a little small, but she loved it. Half way through the cars Hailee turned to me and asked. "Mom is this Halloween?" When I responded yes she said "oh I like Halloween" She was a cute little trick-or-treater. She caught on really quickly she would go up to the car and say trick-or-treat and then get her candy and say "thank you." I have to say trunk-or-treating is really the way to go. It's so much quicker than the traditional trick or treating, we were done by 6:30. Afterwards we went to the Malt shop with Lisa's family. The girls had a great time playing together, so no one wanted to eat. That is until we mentioned there would be no ice cream if they didn't eat their food. Then they all sat down and ate their hamburgers. I forgot my camera, but Lisa took some pictures, so as soon as I get them from her I will post them.

The picture came out a little blury, but I'm posting it anyway. Hailee is a duck, Alicia is a rocket, and Averi is a hula girl. They were so cute.