More Traditions...

COOKIES!!!

Enough said!

Every holiday we decorate cookies with Grandma

The grandkids love to do this

I'm not sure how many cookies acutally get decorated

before someone's fingers or tongue are all over them

Enjoy the pictures...

Merry Christmas!

Another Tradition...

Another tradition in our family at Christmas time is...

READING CHRISTMAS STORIES

I am an avid reader and love the Christmas stories

We read from a variety of books,

How the Grinch Stole Christmas,

The Polar Express

The Gift of the Magi

and many others

My favorite stories to read for Christmas come out of 2 very special books

These books are written from long ago and tell us about the birth of Christ.

The Book of Mormon &

The Bible

The story of Christ in these books always brings the feeling of warmth during this Christmas season.

I love to read about his birth, his life, his sacrifice, and his love for each of us.

If you haven't read the Bible or the Book of Mormon I encourage you to do so this season.

The Spirit that will enter into your heart and your home

will make this holiday season absolutely wonderful.

To each of you that read this blog, may you all find peace and joy this holiday season...

Christmas Traditions

Christmas Traditions are big in my family

and my husband and I continue to carry them on.

The next few posts will be about our traditions as a family.

Some we are starting new this year,

others we have done for our married lives.

The Tradition for today is that of seeing the

CHRISTMAS LIGHTS at TEMPLE SQUARE.

Beginning in July each year the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

starts stringing Christmas lights.

These lights are turned on

the day after Thanksgiving and remain on until the New Year.

Each tree is wrapped in hundreds of lights...

Here are some pictures from Temple Square.

If you have never been there...

IT IS WORTH THE TRIP!!

Quilting Retreat & Ornament Swap

What is bound to happen when quilters get together???

An injury with a rotary cutter....

Hopefully this isn't what happens when you and your favorite quilting bunch get together,

but we had a minor mishap before our retreat even got started.

K (no blogger) was preparing to go to the quilt retreat last weekend

and was cutting fabric, not paying attention, and slipped and cut her finger

She went to the emergency room and had to be seen by a hand surgeon

They talked about possible surgery as they weren't sure if she

had cut tendons, or nerves - but NEVER FAIL - she got

the all clear from the hand surgeon and was still able to come

AND SEW!!!

Here are some pics from our retreat in lovely BEAR LAKE!

The view of the Lake... WOW!!

Someone's cutting...

The gals...

I hate ironing - it is the necessary evil in quilting...

here is P (no blogger) ironing some blocks

One of my projects...

Didn't quite finish... but I LOVE IT!

There is a tutorial for this project on bittybitsandpieces...

I used the pattern "Darcy" by Schnibbles

ORNAMENT SWAP

I also received my Oranment Swap that JoAnne put together

Guess what JoAnne was my partner...

She sent this lovely package with a cute snowman ornament

She didn't even know that I love SNOWMEN!!
Thanks JoAnne...

I will definintely do an ornament swap again next year...

That's all folks.... May everyone have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

My husband ....

On Sunday my husband was willing to assist me with the music in Primary as they just released our choirster and had not called a new choirster. I play the piano for the kids. We put together a turkey with feathers for the kids to "pluck". On the back of each feather was a song that they know. They selected the song "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam". The kids crouch down and then jump any time they say "BEAM". My husband wasn't aware that they did this and it startled him the first time. The video is of him conducting this song. I was laughing so hard that I was crying and could barely see the music to play the piano.

Thanks hunny for being such a good sport...

I LOVE YOU!

Family Photos...

I'm not lost - just had to take a break from blogging for a while.

I am learning what I need to do to take better care of myself.
I've joined Weight Watchers and for the past 2 weeks have had some good progress on the weight loss.
Now I need to step it up a notch and continue to push myself to exercise EVERYDAY!!

So now that I have bored you with that update....
Here are our recent family pictures
WARNING - LOTS OF PHOTOS...

The Happy Couple...

M1

M2 & Dad

How do you smile?

Stud in the making...

Just Bergie Boyz

My Family

What do you see???

The Couple (again)
It was like wedding pictures all over ...

A cute couple of kids....

What can I say....They are good looking boyz!

Good Bye...

Sorry...

Sorry - Life has caught up with me. I will post later this week.

We have had birthdays, weightloss, Halloween, school, and on and on. Not much time to sit at a computer and post.

Keep Smiling!

Getting your Veggies???

Are you getting your veggies??

This weekend I provided my neighbor

with the yummiest of vegetables.

She had watched M1 & M2 for me

so I paid her with these fabulous veggies

Ok - so this isn't exactly a vegetable
and you probably won't find it on the Weight Watcher's plan.

It's a mouth watering, luscious CREAM PUFF
The recipe is simple, but elegant
and all too YUMMY!!

I dyed the dough to be orange and green for the season

My neighbor got a good laugh when I told her I would
bring her some veggies for her help
and I showed up with these.

My husband showed his kid side
{he actually does this often}
When I came home from the grocery store
He helped the kids make "hats" out of the sacks

The kids thought they where robots
and ran around the house
wearing these paperbag hats

I worked on my Christmas Cottages at our Quilt Retreat this weekend.
It was a lot of fun
A nice cozy group of quilters
All working on various projects
My mom's class was pretty full
Many of the women wanted to learn how to hand piece and quilt
what a lost art!

Here are some pics of my Christmas Cottages
They need a little sprucing up!
I have seen others and they are much more festive

I'm off to a conference for work...
When I get back my youngest will be 2
AHHH where did time go??

A celebration for Saturday!!

Fall is here...

This weekend it poured rain,

during soccer,

during grocery shopping,

during running,

and on and on...

Supposedly there is now SNOW in the forecast

{UGH!}

This means that inevitably fall is here and summer is gone.

But I'm not complaining as it is my favorite time of year.

Time for sweaters,

Leaves changing,

Cuddling (this is my favorite),

Good food - PUMPKIN anything is GOOOD!

Quick Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 Spice Cake Mix

1 Small Can Pumpkin Pie Filling

1 Bag Chocolate Chips

Mix all ingredients and form 2" cookie balls,

Place on an ungreased cookie sheet

Bake at 375 for 10-12 min

YUMM-O

This weekend was time for General Conference. I loved every minute of it.

The talks seemed to help encourage me in my everyday life,

they gave me the lift I need...

We all can use a boost every now and then!

I even got in a little time for sewing this past weekend.

I finished a table runner I found when I was pulling out the Halloween decor.

Crazy me all it needed was bound - the binding was even sewn on it already.

I've been working on my Angel Stitchery - can't show too much...

But I think it is coming along nicely....

This is just one of the projects that I have started,

but I dont' want to give away the farm...

The kids of course played and played,

Uncle J decided to teach M2 to pull funny faces...

Isn't he cute???

This little one will celebrate his birthday this next week.,

He will be 2 years old, and yes he can through tantrums!!!

But he has decided that he wants to be potty trained,

Actually he tells us that he needs to go, we put him on,

and Ta Dah... he goes.

I like it this way! We haven't even had to do anything...

I guess when you have 2 older brothers, and a father

you get the hang of it pretty quickly!!

Has anyone ever had someone potty trained so early in life??

Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining!

This weekend is my quilt guild's quilt retreat.

Each October we hold a one day retreat and offer classes, food and fun!

My mom will be teaching this time!

She is an amazing hand piecer and hand quilter...

Yes Mom I'm bragging about you!!!

She has even won a blue ribbon for her quilting.

{Stop Blushing Mom!}

I'm excited to spend sometime away from the boyz and just enjoy some quilting.

TTYL!!!

New Blogs

I have been blog surfing again... {sigh}
I have found some FABULOUS stuff.

I know I'm supposed to be losing weight.
Thus this isn't the blog to be looking at.
But I have always enjoyed cooking and there are some GOOD stuff here

BAKERELLA

Now I have also been looking for a place
to find some quick fixins for the boys
With mom in school and working fulltime
Mac & Cheese and Hotdogs isn't very appetizing anymore.

Thus I stumbled on

Simplify Supper

It is great, a monthplan for dinners

And now that LDS General Conference is right around the corner

I have been looking for some activites

That my little ones (and even the bigger one)

Can do during the talks.

Thus I stumbled on

SugarDoodle

This site is great for many things

It also has links to other great ideas for LDS items.

Another great blog helper is

Leelou Blogs

You can get great layouts from this site.

I recommend that you check often!!

So spend sometime this weekend blog hopping...

Bags, bags & more ...

I haven't been lost lately, just a little busy.

When you are a mom, an employee, and a student, sometimes you forget about just being you. So here are some of the things that have happened recently.

I received my bag from Linda's Bag Swap.

It came from Beth at Highland Hen.

It is perfect!!!!

I am already using it for the Angel Stitching project.

She also sent some fun fabrics that will probably work well for the Christmas Cottage block exchange that I have joined.

Here was the fun!!

NOW a new BAG!

With all the fun bag patterns and blog postings about bags I decided to try another one. (I forgot to take a picture of my bag that I sent to a far away place... Hopefully she will like it!! )

I loved the bag that was posted in Quilts & More.

What a quick bag to make - and so versatile!!

Now I haven't been quilting - want to see why???

Every time I sit down to quilt, I have a helper.

A new Swap!

I have joined the Christmas Cottage Swap.

It looks like it will be fun.

12 Blocks from all over with little Christmas houses.

Such fun!