Monster Truck Rally

Well, you know you are definitely in the south when you have an opportunity to attend the "Monster Truck Rally". Steve saw an advertisement for it coming to Knoxville and decided to take Christian one saturday. Unfortunately, it was my weekend to work so I could not attend with them (Thank God!). But they seem to have had a really good time and took lots of pictures of the trucks but when it came to all the action the battery died in the camera. So, all we have are the pictures of the trucks. Christian's favorite truck was the "Destroyer". They even had a "Lawnmower Race". What fun!!!!

Spacewood Derby

This year instead of having a Pinewood Derby in Scouts, our ward decided to do a Spacewood Derby. Needless to say, Steve really got into this and made a very competetive racing rocket. You might be asking yourself how this rocket works. Well, it runs on rubber bands and a propeller in the front. What you do is attach 2 or 3 rubberbands to the inside of the propeller then twist the rubber bands around and around really tight (but not too tight). There is an anchor on the top part of the rocket where you attach it to another anchor that is on a fishing line. When you are ready to race you just let go of the propeller and let it fly. Christian is the one that decided that he wanted a bee and he helped with the painting and naming of the rocket. They named it "Stinger". Steve had a really good time with this creation and the rocket turned out really great. Yet, we were all still very surprised when Christian came in first place at the Derby!YEAH!!!

SNOW DAY #2

So, we were driving back from North Carolina (where we were visiting the Prouses for the Super Bowl weekend) and as we got closer to Knoxville it started snowing. Anyways, as we were driving through downtown knoxville on I-40, Christian looks and says "Wow. There's a blizzard out there. I wish we lived here!". Well, I made his day when I responded with, "Sweetie, this is Knoxville and you do live here!" The snow did not last long but school was out for the day and for the next two days due to the snow and right afterwards we had a bout of extremely cold weather. The wind chill factor got down to the single digits. So, of course Christian had a few days to have fun in the little snow that we got. Steve shoveled some snow into a pile and made a neat little ramp for Christian to slide over. Here are some pictures. Of course, I was MIA due to working 12 hour shifts and needing my beauty sleep.

SNOW DAY!!!

Yeah! It actually snowed in Knoxville. We only got a dusting but it shut down the city for the day. The funny thing was, the kids actually thought it was enough to do some sledding. Although, in my opinion, we can still see grass through the snow, there really isn't much to sled on. But that did not matter to the kids. Snow is snow and they were ready to sled. Christian was the only with a real snow board. The rest of the boys had beach boogie boards. We have a huge hill in the back yard and several boys from the neighborhood came over and decided to slide down our hill with Christian. The only problem was that our house was at the bottom of the hill. So, the boys would slide down and slam right into the back of our house. I was afraid that they would seriously hurt themselves so I came up with a solution. I blew up an old air mattress that was used for camping and set it up so when they came down the hill they would run into the air mattress instead of our home. It worked out great. Of course, the snow was gone before noon due to the fact that the sun was shiny and we only got a dusting of snow. You wouldn't believe how everyone was reacting around us. The roads were all terrible and people were running off into the ditches due to the icy parts. You would have thought we had had a huge blizzard or something. Gosh, these Southerners!!!!

Christmas 2008

I am finally off work and have some free time for myself. I decided to spend sometime updating my blog. I hope everyone's Christmas was great. I can't believe it is already over with. I am still trying to put away all my christmas decorations. Anyways, we had a good Christmas. My brother, Jason, and his wife, Sunshine came down with their 3 year old son, Camden and stayed with us throughout the Christmas holiday. It was nice having family around and we had a lot of fun. Camden is so awesome. I forgot how 3 year olds are. It was quite entertaining to watch him. Of course, Christian wasn't enjoying much of his little cousin being underfoot all the time so he spent most of his holiday week playing with the neighbor's kid, Hayden, and stayed over at his house a lot. Oh well, at least I enjoyed having my little brother and his family around and that's what counts in the end.

Jackson taking a peek at one of Christian's present.

Jackson enjoying his favorite new toy, a squeaky, stretchy elephant.

Christian pulling out his slim jim (one of his favorites)

Camden, opening one his gifts. Isn't he cute!!!

Camden, coming down our stairs for the first time Christmas morning to see what Santa brought him.
Christian's creativity coming out. As you can see the above and below pictures, he has made up two different looking roofs.

Camden's favorite part of making gingerbread houses was being able to eat all the candy.

Christian's Santa Letter

The following is a letter to Santa Claus that Christian wrote in class last week.

Dear Santa

I want a 1. XBOX 360, 2. one thousand dollars, 3. all the games in the world, 4. a cool looking sled, 5. and a big pen. Ps. about number three of all the games in the world I don't want the girly games.

Love Christian Yoder


Well, there it is. I have been bugging Christian for things that he wants for Christmas and I finally have it. Will he get all that he asked for? Definitely not! Maybe I can handle the big pen request.

Happy Birthday Denise!

Denise's Birthday Cake!! Today is one of my best friend's birthday, Denise Vancena. Several years ago, we started a birthday club. We would take each other out on our birthdays. This is the first year in a long time that I have not gotten together with the girls to go out. Here are some pictures of last year's birthday outing with Denise. First we surprised Denise when we showed up at her house in a rented Hummer. We went to Benihanas for dinner than headed downstairs to the Karoake bar for some singing and dancing. I think we all had a blast and it was fun to just let down our hair and go crazy (in front of total strangers!).