0 Photo Highlights of November 2009

• Annual mommy retreat: Wolf Creek, Utah. This year we did very little scrapbooking and more relaxing. We soaked in the hot tub, played cards, read books, and even did a little shopping in Ogden. (We found the ‘great’ Target top that looked good on all of us. I think we each got one or two.) Between naps we watched the entire LONG movie of ‘The Pride and the Prejudice’ or as Laura calls it, ‘the dancing lady show’.

• First snow to play in.

• Hanging inside more.

• putting up the Christmas decorations.

• Staffords visit for Maren & my Birthday Weekend which nicely fell on the release of the second Twilight movie, ‘New Moon’. We have a nice lunch at the ‘Olive Garden’ before and then did a little Christmas shopping after. When we got home the men (and when I say men, I mean Mike) had prepared a yummy BBQ Ribs dinner complete with flowers and ice cream cake.

1 A bit more from Bear Lake retreat

Scrapbooking is a high-tech crafting! We had a laptop, color printer, sewing machine, & TWO cricuts (they are the best!).

Martha - Maren - Abby - Sarah

We each were in charge of one meal...and we ended up with duplicates of a lot of things. You would like we were related or something!

4 Bear Lake Scrappers!

I think I failed to explain properly about where I was last weekend. I was at the "Second Annual Mommy Scrapbooking Retreat"! My sisters, Maren & Abby (Ellen couldn't come this year), my Mother, & I spent Thursday night through Sunday morning getting away from our normal life at a condo in Bear Lake. If was a great weekend full of relaxation, silliness, & of course scrapbooking.

QUOTED FROM ABBY'S BLOG:

Driving home from our wonderful retreat, Sarah and I realized we'd better jot down some notes to remind us about all the highlights of the weekend. Because I happened to have the notebook and was in the passenger seat I have the detailed, if a bit unreadable, notes. Here is a pretty good picture of our weekend:

The quote: "HEY!!! HELP MEEE!!!!" (must be said as if the parrot lady)

Highlights:

• Dollar scrapbook 'Happy Bear-lake' Gift exchange
  
• The only men allowed: Josh and Michael B
  
• Perfect weather, all sunshine and crisp fall air
  
• Scrapbook construction zone, watch out for stray scissors
  
• The amazingly blue color of the lake, seen from rocks on the shore
  
• 2 momma and 2 curious yearling deer right outside our car window
  
• 24 cans of soda, 4 spray butters, 2 vidalia salad dressing bottles, at least 24 packs of cider mix, hot chocolate, cookies, popcorn, and half of our children's halloween candy
  
• Pasta, Pasta, Pasta!
  
• Going to the convenience store because there obviously wasn't enough food
  
• Downloading Josh Groban's 'Noel' CD, thanks Sarah!
  
• Abby is apparently the only one who can skip rocks
  
• the absolute stupidest movie ever made, and yet we still quote it. and no, it was not Napoleon Dynamite (Sons of Provo)
  
• Pill-popping (Ibuprofren) due to Mom's sciatic nerve pain, Maren's headache, Sarah's feet, and Abby's dratted head cold
  
• The never ending Phase 10 game of all time
  
• We were so 'coo' in the 'poo' (interpretation: so cool in the pool)
  
• The sprinkler splash, abby's backflop, Mom canonballs, and of course the dolphin dive
• 'Kick your trash'
  
• $2.50 to die for deserts at the Motor Cafe
  
• "Chirp-Chirp" cricket swarm!
  
• 3, 259,451 tiny bits of paper all over the floor
  
• 'Hey, it's daylight savings time, that means it's really only 2 in morning!'
  
• 20 extra pounds to bring home to the treadmills
• 4 anxious husbands, 7 wild girls, and 4 messy houses waiting
• And of course: 59 layouts and a mini book completed in one weekend!

"In"s of this year:

• Joshie Poo and Buble' baby
• scallops, scallops, scallops
  
• funky photo corners
  
• big fuzzy jammies
  
• blog excerpts and lots more journaling
  
• 30 sharpie markers
  

"Out" from last year:

• Snow, no blizzard this year
  
• Ellen we missed you!
  
• Sarah working
  
• Complicated meals, hello frozen lasagna
  
• Olive garden on the way, we had quite enough pasta
  
• Titles on every page
  
• Babies, everyone was weaned this year

Improvements for next year:

• All photos in hand at least 1 week before the trip to avoid last minute developing disasters!
  
• A photo/layout swap
  
• Playing tennis at the local courts
  
• Walk the Nature Trail
  
• Everyone healthy, watch out Sarah, next year's your year to be sick.
  
• More CD variety
  
• Yellowstone?!