The Giver

For our ward's book club, we are reading The Giver by Lois Lowery. The book is only 179 pages long, but is the most beautiful book I have ever read. When I was finishing this book, I was crying so much that I had a hard time reading. After I was done, I cryed for 5 minutes in the bathroom. I don't know how much I want to explain the book, so as not to ruin it for anyone who has not read it. So here is what the back of the book says:

Jonas's world is perfect. Everything is under control. There is no war or fear or pain. There are no choices. Every person is assigned a role in the Community. When Jonas turns twelve, he is singled out to receive special training from The Giver. The Giver alone holds the memories of the true pain and pleasure of life. Now it's time for Jonas to receive the truth. There is no turning back.

The book is simply written and is a quick read, hence the 179 pages. I recommend this book to everyone. I just can't explain how beautiful it is. The only other time I have cried while reading a book was Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I cried even harder when I explained the book to Pat last night. So pretty much I think that everyone needs to read The Giver.

The Many Faces of Mara

Mara is so funny! I will find her doing the weirdest things. She has started to take off her pants at any given moment during the day. I have also found her with her boots on often. And then I found her like this:

You know the little plastic seal that you take off of a gallon of milk. I had left one on the counter and she decided that it was a pair of glasses. She walked around like this for at least 5 minutes:

She will often go through the diaper bag and find her sunglasses. And she wanted to wear them around. She also likes to carry around her purse :)

This picture is from before Christmas and I just found it. She likes to play with the Mr. Potato Head parts. And usually will only try to put on the glasses, but this day she put the ears in her ears and put the pants from Mr. Incredible on her head like a hat!

I love my little girl so much. She is such a special spirit. She is so very busy and is always moving. She makes me tired just watching her run around. She usually doesn't sit still for very long. But tonight was different. She didn't get a nap today because our church schedule has changed to 11-2. Then after church we went to my In-Laws. She was fairly happy all day, and enjoyed playing with her cousins. But tonight, around 6, she started losing it. So I gave her something small to eat while she sat on my lap. She stayed on my lap for at least 15 minutes, because she was so tired. So I put her in her pj's and headed downstairs. She really likes me to sing "Rock-a-bye Baby", so we sat in the dark and I sang to her. It was so nice to have her lie in my arms. I don't get that very often (except for at 5:30 am, Saturday morning). It makes me miss when she was a baby. I could hold her for hours and just watch her. Now she is so big, running around all the time, saying new things everyday. It just amazes me how much things can change. I feel like it was yesterday that she was born. Not to mention, Xander is 4!! I will go off on that another day :)

More Reasons to Love Disney...

I am so excited! There are more photos from Annie Leibovitz. I posted the other 6 in the series in November and now there are more! My brother JD told me about them yesterday. I searched and searched for a copy of them with the captions, but came up short. They are just so beautiful!!

"Where You Never Have to Grow Up"

Gisele Bundchen as Wendy

Mikhail Baryshnikov as Peter Pan

Tina Fey as Tinkerbell

"Where Dreams Run Free"

Jessica Biel as Pocahontas

"Where a Whole New World Awaits"

Jennifer Lopez as Princess Jasmine
Marc Anthony as Aladdin

"Where Your Every Wish is Our Command"

Whoopi Goldberg as The Genie

I'm still here!!

Sorry that I haven't posted much lately. It seems that I haven't been taking that many pictures, and we are in a good routine, so there is not much to blog about. But some things have changed lately.


Pat and I were released as Primary Teachers at the end of last year. We had our Stake Conference the Sunday after, then before the next Sunday we were both extended callings!! I was really hoping to be able to sit, relax and learn during church for awhile before I got another calling. You see, in the 3 years we have been in this ward, I have been able to attend Relief Society 3 times (2 times really, the first time I was chasing Xander around, because he was too young to go in to Nursery) So I was really excited to go to Relief Society. I can still go now, but I have to work!! JK :) I am the new Relief Society Secretary!! I am a little overwhelmed, but I know that I can do it. And the presidency is really great. I am kind of partial, because my mom is the RS President!!! So if I have questions I can always go to her :)


Pat is now a teacher in Sunday School for the 14 year olds, which is great, because he is going to teach Junior High in 2 years!! Speaking of school, Pat is in one of his last semesters of college. He has 3 semesters left (including this one) He will do his student teaching Spring '09 then graduate that April in the History Education Program :) We are really excited that the end is in sight. He will hopefully start his career job Fall '09, at the same time that Xander goes to Kindergarten :)


Xander is still liking Pre-School, and he asks me almost every Saturday if he is going to go to school. It is hard for him to understand that he goes every-other day. He is really mastering Wii Bowling :) He can be in the other room with the remote and get a strike!! It amazes me how well kids do! He asks almost every day to play the Wii :) He is a very busy 4 year old. It is hard staying inside all the time becuase of the snow. He is usually running around the house because he has so much energy :) He can write his whole name (first, middle and last) and knows all his letters. Now we just need to work on reading!!


Mara is growing like a weed!! Not necessarily physically, but mentally! She is speaking full sentences and communicates better and better every day :) She will even yell for "Naners" (Xander) or want him to "mere" (come here) She will always ask me "Wat doin?" I will tell her, then she usuallys asks "Why?". It makes me laugh that she is already asking why and saying "cause" whenever I ask her why. She really loves Xander and always wants to be near him (even when he is in time-out) I can't believe that my little girl is going to be 2 in April! It has made me think about #3 alot. (Don't worry, there is nothing in the works right now!) I have alot of friends that have kids Mara's age, and are having another one. (Congrats again Amy) So it always makes my mind wander.


But I have made a goal this year that I am going to eat more healthy and excersize. I am trying not to think about a pound goal, but a size goal. More like the size of my fingers. Last summer I started getting dry skin under my wedding ring (because I was wearing it 24/7) I took it off, and haven't been able to wear it since. It makes me sad that it doesn't fit anymore, so instead of getting it sized, I am going to size myself to fit the ring :) So far in the 3 weeks of this new year I have dropped 3.5 pounds! So I am on my way :)


Wow! I didn't mean for this post to be so long. Sorry. I guess I have just had alot on my mind lately. So basically, we are all doing good. I will make sure to take more pictures :)

Pictures of the New Year!

The kids have the game Elefun! It is an elephant that blows butterflies out of its trunk, while kids use nets to catch them. It is a really fun game! So we were playing it the other day and Xander decided to put the nets on his head, so of course Mara had to do the same!

Mara has these Disney Princess toys and likes to stand them up everywhere. I caught her playing with them by the fireplace. When a princess fell over, she would stand it back up and say "Sit down, Rella!" (Rella is the word she uses for Cinderella, ie: every princess) She did this a lot, because they would fall down easily :) She is getting so big and talking so much! It surprises me so much the phrases that come out of her mouth. When I ask her to sit down or come over to me she has started saying "I can't do it"

She really does have a mind of her own!

Just a cute picture of my little tykes!

Dress Ups!

Mara has been loving the dress ups box lately! She has even figured out how to put the skirts on all by herself. Here is a few pictures of her in the process! In the second picture, you can see the layers of the skirts. It is deceiving, she actually had 6 or 7 on! This is her favorite thing to do! I even got a video!

Go! Jazz! Go!

For Christmas I got Pat tickets to a Jazz Game!! (Thanks again Brent! You are the best!) They were for the game last night! So we went to Salt Lake, had dinner at Denny's (I know! Elegant huh?) and went to the game. It was so much fun to be there. It was even better because they WON!!! 99-90 against the Dallas Mavricks. Eventually I would like to go to a game or two every year. But it just isn't in the budget :( Oh well!!

Merry Christmas!!

Wow! I can't believe that Christmas has come and gone already! We have had a lot of fun Christmas parties this past week, so here are some of the highlights.



Last Thursday we had a small family party, because my brother Brent and his family were not going to be with us on Christmas. Xander was able to open up a few gifts and was really excited about it :)

On Saturday, we had our annual Hillam Family Christmas Party. (My mom's side)

Mara and Conli were matching so I had to take pics.

Xander and Mara have been having fun lately making funny faces. My sister was able to catch some good ones!

We were lucky enough to have the Man in Red come to the party and give the kids an early present. Mara freaked out and wouldn't sit on his lap. She cried and cried, but she did say "Thank You" and give him a high five!! Xander did great, as always. He loves Santa!

On Sunday the kids were wearing their new outfits from Mana. So I had to get some pics of them together. Here are the best ones.

Sunday night, we went to Pat's parents house and had a family get together. It was nice to have (almost) everyone there. I didn't get any really good ones of the family, but I did sneak in and find the boys (JR, Doug, Morri and Pat) playing Foosball!!

Christmas Morning!

Mara got a Newborn Cabbage Patch Kid from Santa and Xander got a way cool Baby Jaguar and the new Cars Mater-national video game for the Wii. They both got alot of fun things from all of our family. Thank you! Xander for sure had a Lightning McQueen Christmas! LOL

My mom got Mara a baby stroller. She loves it so much! When we opened it we put her new doll in it for her. She walked out of the room and went into the kitchen with it. When she came back in the room, the baby doll was gone and her bear was in the stroller!!! She is so funny! This has been the story for the past few days. She hasn't gotten attached to the baby yet, so bear rides in the stroller a lot!

My family has a tradition, that after we are done opening all the presents, all the kids hide under the wrapping paper. The my dad would video tape the mess and say "Where are all the kids?" then we would all jump up and throw the paper everywhere!! This is one of my favorite things about Christmas. So of course we do it with the grand kids :)

Here is our "mess". I promise, the kids are under there!!!!

Christmas project

Last year as a Christmas gift for my mother in-law I bought some ball ornaments and wrote the names of all the people in the family on them. I had used glitter glue and they looked really cute! This year was the first year they were going to go on her tree. When she got them out, most of the names had fallen off!! So I got them from her to fix. I went and bought some new glitter glue and re-did all 27 balls. The next morning I checked them and the names were falling off again!! So I went to the craft store again, this time I bought some glitter. I thought that maybe I could use some regular glue to paint the names then sprinkle them with glitter. Needless to say, that didn't really work. It looked pretty bad! Sooo, for the third attempt at fixing the balls, I decided that I would just use regular craft paint and just paint them all.

And Tah Dah!! It worked :)

I am so glad that it worked out and that they are all done. I am giving them back to her tomorrow! She is going to love them :)

Reading Bug!

This may seem weird to some people, but I am so proud of myself because I have read 4 books in the past 6 weeks!! This is an amazing thing for me! I am not really a reader. In the past few years I have read all of the Harry Potter books when they have come out. But besides that, nothing! But a few months ago our ward book club was reading "Twilight" by Stephenie Meyer.

I had heard so much about it, so I gave it a try! And loved it enough to read "New Moon" and "Eclipse" (they are all in the same series) It is a fun read.

For our club we read, "Gilead" by Marilynne Robinson (but I didn't finish it)

Then "Rebecca" by Daphne Du Maurier. (That one took me a few weeks to read)

After our discussion, we had a few weeks before we were going to get the next book. So that is when I read "Eclipse". Then the inner geek hiding inside of me came out and I read "Death in Winter" by Michael Jan Friedman.

Yes I am a Star Trek Fan! I love The Next Generation! It has been a long time since I have read a Star Trek book. Pat found this one for me and said that I needed to buy it because it was about Picard and Crusher! I really liked the book, because they are together at the end :) I am happy to say that I finished it in about 8 days! (That is way fast for me) We then got our new book on Sunday.

"The Goose Girl" by Shannon Hale

I just finished this book yesterday! And loved every page of it! I can't believe that I read it in 5 days! Shannon Hale has written two other books that have the same characters from "Goose" so I am totally going to get those too :) Now since I have about 2 1/2 weeks until our group meets I have started to read another Star Trek book.

"A Time to be Born" by John Vornholt.

This book is the first in a series of 8 or 9 books. So I think that I will be reading these in between book group books.

Thanks for reading my reading list! LOL I am just so excited! I have caught the reading bug :)