Playing in the Snow

Tony and Josh driving Tyler around

Yesterday we went over to my parents house and played with their four-wheeler and sled.  The boys (all three of my boys) had such a great time and so did I.  Tyler just laughed with delight as he was pulled him on the sled from the four-wheeler.

Tyler in all his glory - happy as can be

Josh spent most of the time riding with Tony on the four-wheeler, but we did get him on a sled with Tony and I a couple of times.  He really liked riding on both the four-wheeler and the sled.  I was surprised how well he did.  My dad even got a couple new sleds and one is for older riders and I thought that one was super fun.  Tony drove me around for a while on it and I think that I fell off like 5 or 6 times, but it was totally fun.  I cant wait for it to snow some more so that we can go back.

Tony and Josh riding on the sled

My niece and her friend came over and Tony was so nice to pull them all around for about an hour.  Tyler ended up outside playing for about two hours.  I can't wait to see him up at the cabin with all that snow.  Tyler loves the snow so much, and so do I.  He tells me, "I am so happy it snowed," and I always say "Me too."

Tony and Josh pulling me on the new super fun sled

Later that night we had our ward Adult Christmas Dinner.  It was nice to chat with ward friends and enjoy a meal without noisy children.  Teagan came over and watched the boys and they had a good time.  I really should ask her to babysit more often.  She'll be a senior next year and then off to college.  Wow, that is crazy to think.  Her birthday is on Tuesday and she'll be 17.  My baby sister...time goes by too fast.

Store bought milk

Tonight we had to buy store bought milk.  Since Tony worked at the Dairy we rarely had to buy milk from the store because he always brought it home from work.  Today we ran out of the last of Deseret Dairy milk and had to buy some milk from Costco.  It was a little sad.  We will miss that yummy milk and chocolate milk...and butter...and cheese...but hey now Tony can bring home canned meat...I am a lucky lady.  Okay, they do more then just can meat.  They also do frozen fruit, and beef stew, and canned green beans...so really not too bad at all.
We have had a pretty good week.  Monday was super hard because Tyler, Tony, and I ended up getting the stomach flu that day and it wasn't pretty.  Lucky for us Tyler didn't get it too bad and Tony and I had most of our issues later in the day.  The next day we all felt better.
Tony is still really enjoying his job.  I am really happy about that move for him.  The drive is still long, but he is doing okay with it.  We are thinking about taking the boys to visit his new work next week, so I will have to see what I think about the drive.  We are excited to meet his new work family and see the machines at the Cannery.
The Christmas season is in full swing and it is exciting and fun.  We have our first Christmas party tomorrow at our ward.  They have an annual Adult Christmas dinner.  I am excited to get out without the boys for a couple hours.  Teagan is going to come and babysit.  I hope that Josh is good for her.  He can be kind of a pill these days...okay he can be a big pill these days.  But I still love him...cute as can be!

BYU of U...and the stomach flu

Yesterday was the big game, BYU vs U of U.  We went to Tony's parents to watch the game.  On the way there, Josh threw up all over him self.  We had to pull over and clean him up and then we went over to Tony's parents.  His coat, car seat, and cloths needed washing so we threw them in the washing machine right away.  I cleaned out the car seat and then the car too.  I really hate the smell of curdled milk throw up...it is the worst.  Of course that is mainly what Josh throws up these days, yuck.
We changed him and let him play.  We tried to give him a little protein water, but he threw that up as soon as he drank it.  So it just had to run its course.  He was pretty sad during the whole game and just snuggled right up to Tony and then he would throw up what little he had in his system every hour or so.  Then he had kind of a rough night, but he seems to be doing better today.  Luckily this stomach flu thing is short lived.  I just hope that the rest of us don't get it...only time will tell.
The game was a fun one to watch.  BYU played pretty good and should have won the game.  They ended up loosing by one point.  I think that they definitely played better then the Utes and deserved to win, but thing went the Utes way this time.  I like when they play each other because it seems like no matter how good or bad each team plays that season, they are pretty well matched during that game.  BYU is totally a young team, so we should only see them get better and better.  I look forward to next season.  Even though I graduated from the U, I have always had strong feelings towards BYU (especially football).  It is nice that my in-laws are big BYU fans too, we get to enjoy these types of events together.  Tyler now thinks that we can only watch football at grandma's house.  He's a pretty funny kid!

Happy Thanksgiving

We had a lovely Thanksgiving as usual.  We spent the morning at home and then headed to Tony's parents for dinner.  His mom's oven caught on fire, so they had to take it to her sisters house to finish cooking.  It was so weird for that to happen.  The boys played with all the kids and then we ate some yummy food.  Mostly it was Tony's family and his Aunt's family.  It was nice to spend time with extended family that we don't see very often.
After we had some dessert we headed to my parents to visit with them and that side of the family.  It was fun to visit with them as well.  Josh was super tired, so we had to cut that visit short and headed home.  It was a good day and we all had good times.
On Friday Tony and I decided to head to a few stores while they were all having good sales.  We didn't wake up super early or anything, we just got up and ate and then took the boys to Tony's mom's to play.  Turned out about perfect at the stores.  We first went to Target and it wasn't busy at all.  9:00 am seems to be a good time to go.  We got what we wanted and then headed to Sears.  It wasn't too bad there either.  We also got what we wanted and then headed to Ikea.  We were looking for a new TV stand, but decided that the one from Ikea wouldn't work for us.  So then we stopped at Sam's Club and the Walmart.  Walmart was probably the busiest, but really not too bad either.  They had police officers standing around the electronics section of the store.  I though that was interesting.  So it turned out to be a really fun, good day of shopping.  We later found a TV stand on Costco.com that we liked and ordered.  Christmas shopping is pretty much done!

I love the Snow

The view from our back door

It started snowing last night and ended up snowing about 8-9 inches by the time we woke up.  It was so beautiful.  Tyler was so excited when he saw it, he wanted to get changed and go play in it right away.  I made him wait until after breakfast and then Tony and Tyler went and shoveled the sidewalks and driveway.  We don't have a snow blower, so it is kind of a lot of work.  Tyler loved every minute of it.  Yesterday we found a fun kids shovel for $5 at WinCo, so we got it for Tyler and he put it to good use last night and this morning.  Josh and I watched from inside the house.  I am sure Josh would have rather been out in the snow, but it was way too cold.  Like 30 degrees.  Tyler
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 said today, "I'm really happy that it snowed."  It was just so cute.

Tyler "helping" Tony with his very own shovel

Last Tuesday I took the boys to the doctors because Tyler complained that his ear hurt.  The doctor checked and said that he did have an ear infection.  Tyler did a great job at letting her see in his ears and check everything.  I was very glad since it was just me there with the two boys.  Then after she was done with Tyler, I asked if she would check on Josh's ears, just to be safe.  Josh did pretty good too with her looking in his ears, but she said that they looked pretty red.  So both boys are on a antibiotic and taking their medicine really well.  Tyler used to HATE taking meds, but has done so well this go around.  It is nice to see him growing up a little bit.  They both seem to be doing tons better now.  Their runny noses are gone and they are happy campers.  Lets just hope and pray that it can stay that way for a while!

Tony's first week on the job

It has been a little different week for us at the Steenblik household.  Normally Tony would work Monday through Thursday, leaving us Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to enjoy being together as a family.  But this week and for now on Tony will have Mondays off and work Tuesday through Saturday.  Also Tony now doesn't get home until about 5:00 pm.  This will take some getting used to for me as I have been so lucky to have him home generally around 2:30 everyday.  Now I feel like a "real" house wife who has to have dinner cooking when her husband gets home.  I am sure that sounds silly, but it's true.
Tony says that he has really liked it so far.  It is really different from what he was doing at the Dairy and he really likes that.  He gets to work with volunteers and missionaries all day.  The machines at the Cannery aren't hard to learn and Tony is feeling confident that he will master them quickly.  Tony is very mechanically minded, so he is really good at learning machines quickly.  He is definitely the young kid there.  The other guys are all a good 15 years plus older then Tony.  But he doesn't mind.  He likes who he works with and really likes his boss.  Since he drives there so early it only takes him about 45 minutes to get there in the morning and about 55 in the evening.  We still aren't sure if we will stay or move.  We will see how Tony is feeling about the drive in a couple months.  Me and the boys plan to visit him on Wednesday.  That should be fun to check out his new digs.  So for the first week, not too shabby.  This seems to have been a really good move for him and I am excited about the possibilities it will bring.

Happy Anniversary...and a new job!

Today is Tony and my 7 year wedding anniversary.  To celebrate we dropped the kids off at Tony's parents house on Friday afternoon and then started our weekend adventures - without children.  First I must say...THANK YOU, THANK YOU to Tony's parents for taking the boys this weekend.  We knew that they were in good hands and having a wonderful time, so that made it tons easier to leave them for a couple days.
We first went to Shopko and did a little shopping before heading down town to our hotel.
While we were driving, Tony got a call from the manager of the Ogden Cannery where he had interviewed a couple of weeks ago.  We were told that he should find out about the job by the end of last week and we were really hoping that he would get the job in Ogden (otherwise we could have been moving to Mesa, AZ).  While talking to the manager, Tony was offered the job in Ogden and he wants him to start on Tuesday.  They work four ten hour shifts, Tuesday through Friday.  Tony got some more details before he hung up and told me the good news.  WHAT A BLESSING!!!  This is a very exciting opportunity for Tony, and I am so proud of him and how hard he has worked to get where he is.  We have had to be very patient, and it seems like that patience is paying off.  He moved up to level 14 and is now a "Master Production Technician."  It came with a little raise, so that is great for us so we don't feel like things are quite so tight.
So with our good news Tony decided to run by the Dairy and talk to his (old) boss to talk to him about the move.  We went and talked to a couple of his bosses there and they were all very excited for him.  They knew about the move before Tony did.  He told them that he would come in on Monday to get his things and say his good byes.
Then it was off to The Embassy Suites.  We checked in and decided to go straight to the hot tub.  Then we went and got ready to go to dinner.  We ended up at Wingers, where the service sucked, so they gave us our meal free.  Then we went back to the hotel to hang out...and stuff.
We tried to sleep in as much as we could, but by eight we were both wide awake.  So we went down and ate some yummy made to order breakfast that the hotel offered as part of our room.  It was pretty good.  After getting ready we went and did a little shopping.  We went places like the Distribution Center, Costco, RC Willey, and then went to The Red Iguana for lunch.  It was super yummy.  After we went and saw "The Switch" and the dollar theater.  It was an okay movie.  Worth the $1.50 each we spent.  Then we went back to the hotel to hang out and swim until it was dinner time.  We weren't too hungry around dinner time, so we decided to go to Chili's and share a dish.  After a nice dinner we headed to Smith's Marketplace for some ice cream.  We of course found other things there that we liked so that was fun.  Then back to the hotel to swim, eat the ice cream...and stuff.
Then this morning we woke up, ate breakfast, hung out and then got ready to check out and go to church.  We went to Tony's parents and helped get the boys ready and then we all went to Tony's parents ward for sacrament.  We went home after sacrament and Josh took a really good nap and I unpacked.
It was a really nice weekend and I am glad that we were able to do it.  I am glad that we got such good news to start off our nice weekend.  I am so lucky to have married Tony seven years ago.  He is an amazing husband and father.  We have a great marriage and I love him so much.  Here's to an eternity of more anniversaries.

Happy Veterans Day

This morning I called my brother to wish him a Happy Veteran's Day.  I told him that he was my favorite veteran.  He served in the Army reserves for many years and served a year fighting for our freedoms and the freedoms of other nations.  We talked about how both of our grandpa's were veterans and what they did for us in their day.  It was nice to think back on all my family members and Tony's family who have served or currently serving our country.  What amazing people we have in our lives to show us their amazing love for this country.  I too love this country and thank the Lord for the opportunity to live here.

Last night we had our ward "Tasters Table."  I think that it turned out really nice.  My committee members did a great job decorating and their was plenty of food.  We didn't get as many people as I thought that we would, but everyone who came said that they had a good time.  That is one of my favorite activities of the year, but I am glad that it is over.  Now I can start planning for next years activities...well, lets say start thinking about next years activities.

Yesterday morning I went into the doctors to have them check out a sore under my chin.  She said that she thought it was a type of Herpes that I had.  So, like a cold sore under my chin...way crazy place for that.  She gave my a prescription to help it and said that it could worsen into a boil.  So far it hasn't started looking like a boil (thank goodness) but it has really been itching today.  I still can't believe it.  Maybe I got it from the stress of the activity and waiting to hear about Tony's job.  I did get a cold sore at least once a transfer on my mission for stress, but always on the lips.  At least I have some medicine to help with any future cold sore break out.  Life is just full of funny stuff that happens to you...it's all about taking it in.

Interesting how life works

We still haven't heard about the job in Ogden.  Tony heard that they will have a decision made by the end of the week, so that is good that we have a more definite time line.  Tony had a phone interview with the manager of the cannery in Mesa.  If Tony doesn't get the Ogden job then he will want to get the Mesa job.  We don't really want to move out of Utah, but that might be what we have to do to get Tony into the position that he needs to be in.  I guess we will find out later this week.  I am having a hard time thinking about selling our house and moving to Mesa, but when you tell the Lord that you are willing to do whatever is necessary, that means that you are willing to move.  That is what we said, so we need to have the faith that whatever job Tony gets offered is where our family is suppose to be.

My ward is having our "Tasters Table" on Wednesday.  I am the Chair of the Activities committee for Relief Society, so I have been busy for the last little while.  I have all the recipes typed, copied, separated, and paper clipped.  On Wednesday morning my committee is coming over to get little gift bags ready to give out to the sister that night.  We are making caramel corn to put in bags with candy corn then a cute tie.  I hope that it all comes together.  This is my favorite activity of the year generally, so I hope I still feel this way now that I am in charge.  It has been a lot of work so far.

Tyler and Josh have been playing really cute together.  The other day (when the weather was wonderful for like a week) Tony found Josh and Tyler playing in the window well.  So cute.  Then last night Josh snuggled up to Tony while he was laying on the couch.  It was really cute too.  I thought that he would have moved when I went to get the camera, but he stayed and gave me a big smile.  I sure do love that kid, even though he screams a loud, high pitched scream ALL DAY LONG...it's loud!

Halloween - better late then never

Tyler as a cow boy with his horse, Pal.

My little Tigger and Cow Boy

We celebrated Halloween on Saturday this year, even though the actual Halloween day was on Sunday.  In the morning we got the boys dressed up and then we went to Macy's where they had some trick-or-treating through out the store with some other fun things.  So we did a little grocery shopping while the boys got some treats.
After we went to my sisters house and parents house to show them the boy's costumes and to trick-or-treat at their house.  My mom gave out little play dough this year and Tyler has already played with his.  It is a good idea if you don't have many trick-or-treaters that come to your house.

"Trick-Or-Treat"

Yummy neighbor candy

After that we went to Tony's parents house to do a little trick-or-treating.  It was fun to show off the boys in their cute costumes.  After we took the boys home and Josh took a little nap.  Then around 5:00 pm we ate some dinner and then started going to a couple of the neighbors houses before the ward Trunk-or-Treat.
We did about 4 houses when it started to rain.  So we ran and got our car to drive over to the church.  We all got out and did a little truck-or-treating, but then it was just too rainy so Tony and Josh waited in the car while I took Tyler around to the rest of the trunks.  I took him around pretty fast and skipped cars that had a line.  I am not about waiting in the rain for a little piece of candy.  After we got most the cars, we ran back to our car.  I tell you what, it was a good year to be a cow boy.  Tyler's hat kept him pretty dry, which is good because I pretty much stole his umbrella.

Waiting at the door - before the rain came

We then drove home.  I found our other umbrella and Tony took the boys to more houses while I stayed to pass out candy to the trick-or-treaters.  Tony just held Josh, but looking back he really should have taken him in the stroller.  It would have been tons easier.  With all the rain we just weren't thinking logically.  After they went up and down the street Tony brought Josh back and then Tyler and Tony went back out.  My sister Sherri came to visit and see the boys.  It was fun to chat with her while the boys were away.  Tony and Tyler weren't gone too much longer when they came back pretty wet and tired.  Well, Tyler was tired.  Tony wanted to keep going.  He probably should have taken Tyler in a stroller too.  They all had a good time and Tyler liked passing out the candy once he got home.  It was a really fun Halloween, even though it rained so much.