November 2016 A Harvest of Memories Scraps

November is a very difficult month to endure due to painful memories. We honor my Mother in-law's birthday on November 11th and will never forget the loss of her on that dreadful day of November 19th, 2013. We watched my husband's mother slowly deteriorate from cancer, she died from a tragic fall, and a month later we nearly lost little brother from horrible health issues. November was when little brother became very sick and had to hospitalized weeks later. I am truly grateful for my testimony that families are forever. We will be reunited again with our loved ones who passed on someday. I am also truly thankful to God for answering our pleas in healing my son from his many difficult medical issues he encountered the first few years of his life. He is absolutely amazing and brings us so much joy in our lives! I'm counting my blessings! We have so much to be grateful for! 

In Loving Memory, 2013

Our Family: Life is Beautiful, 2013 

Credits: I used a huge collaboration kit (papers and elements) called"That's Life" from many popular scrapbook artists. "That's Life" was a Digi Scrap Parade freebie.  The templates are by Cindy Schneider from Sweet Shoppe Designs. I used the following fonts: FO-giggles, Lucida Handwriting, and print clearly. 

All Family Thanksgiving, 2015

 
Credits: The layout is by Penny Miscellany, Autumn Day papers, journal card, pie, flowers, and buttons are by Elif Sahin from Sahin Designs, yellow leaf, pine cone, mushroom, pine needles are by Kristin Cronin Barrow from Sweet Shoppe Designs, and acorns are by L Grier.  I used the grumble font. 

Counting My Many Blessings

Before November ends today, I want to share some of my greatest blessings in my life. I have a loving and hard working husband, two beautiful daughters, a cuddly dog, a large supportive family, many wonderful friends, and a baby on the way! We are very excited especially since my daughters will be 14 and 10 years old when the baby arrives! I will have some very eager big sister help with the baby! Life is good when you count your many blessings!

Thanksgiving in Sunny Arizona

On November 20-25, 2012, we spent our lovely Thanksgiving holiday weekend in sunny Arizona with several family members! We had a total of 92 people (family and close friends) at our Thanksgiving feast, which was held at a LDS church in Mesa, Arizona! My girls helped make the cute turkey table decorations. John and I were in charge of making four different jellos.  Our rainbow jello was gobbled up in a matter of minutes!  Below is a photograph of the grandchildren and great grand children that came!

These are John's parents, their children, and spouses. We were entertained by a couple musical numbers and enjoyed each other's company.  The next day was Jessica Free and Micah Hansen's wedding ,which they were sealed in the Mesa Arizona temple. Sadly, I didn't get a picture of the beautiful bride and lucky groom because I forgot to bring my cell phone. Here they are at Thanksgiving dinner though (photo by Joe Free)! They are the cutest couple!  We are so happy for them!

While in Arizona, my husband and girls went swimming in my in-law's pool.  It was very cold due to the temperature being 80 degrees outdoors, brrrr. They still had fun nonetheless!

After the beautiful wedding reception, we went to the Mesa Temple to see the gorgeous Christmas lights. The photo credit is by my niece Becca Free!

We enjoyed spending time with many extended family members. Little sister went to the park to feed ducks, ride a train, etc with cousins, uncle, and aunt. I loved watching a chic flick with the girls (Sabrina with Harrison Ford) while the boys went shooting. We ate tons of great food and stayed up late talking. What wonderful happy memories we will never forget! I love my family!!!

Thanksgiving in Mesa

This year we decided to make a road trip to SUNNY Mesa Arizona to celebrate Thanksgiving with many extended family members!  We left on Tuesday night November 22, 2011 around 8:00 PM.  We made a pit stop to southern Utah to rest for a couple hours.  Then we were back on the road at 5:00 AM on Wednesday morning. We took the Las Vegas and Hoover Dam route down to Arizona!  We sure enjoyed seeing the desert, cactus plants, and flowers along the way!  Here are the many wonderful family members, which we spent the long FUN holiday weekend with! 

The five Free siblings (John, Elizabeth, Matt, Dave, and Joe) out of eight total with their spouses were in Mesa this year.   Oh how fun it would be to have EVERYONE gathered in once place!!! Below are the many grandchildren.

TURKEY DAY NOVEMBER 23, 2011

We spent Thanksgiving with Dave/Kristin, Joe/Dave, Elizabeth/Ben, Grandpa/Grandma Free, Matt/Chiaki, and many nieces, nephews, and a couple furry friends (Bella and Nutmeg).  We had around 45 people at Thanksgiving dinner.

After stuffing our faces, we gathered in a large living area and sang a couple hymns and Christmas songs with the family.  Anna put hair wraps in the girl's hair.  We are so grateful for our wonderful loving family!  

WHITE FRIDAY AND IRON CHEF FAMILY COOK OFF

Instead of "Black Friday"shopping, several family members got up early and went to the Mesa Temple.  The youth did baptisms while the adults did endowments and sealings.  By the way, it was big sister's first time doing baptisms for the dead.  It was a beautiful experience for me because I brought down some names of my ancestors.  I felt like we accomplished a lot of temple work because of the effort of many family members!

As for our Iron Chef Family Cook off, we divided into three groups. The secret ingredients were the following: bell peppers, mango, Italian sausage, butternut squash, zucchini, yellow squash, and chocolate chips.  We had to use all the ingredients by making an appetizer, entree, and dessert. 

John and I were on Team Smith.  We met at Jeff and Melinda Smiths (our niece and nephew).  

We made the following:  Bow-tie vegetable sausage with alfredo sauce, butternut squash/ sausage potatoes, mango salsa, and strawberry cheese cake crepes with melted chocolate. 

 
My niece Aisling made a YouTube of all our delicious food!!!

BABY SHOWER AND DESERT FUN

On Saturday November 26, 2011, we went to a baby shower at Brett and Aisling's house for Keli Silva who is having a boy in February.  We played some games, ate some finger foods, and awwwwwed over her new baby things!

While the girls were at the baby shower, the men and boys had a blast in the desert shooting guns and riding mini bikes.

SUSHI YUM

On Saturday night, we went to Sekai Sushi with Matt, Chiaki, Dave, Kristin, Joe, Diana, Elizabeth, and Ben. Since Matt and Chiaki are sushi experts, they ordered for us!  The sushi was AMAZING!  I tried octopus for the first time! We had a fun time talking with each other and trying out sushi.  The eel was my favorite!  After dinner, we got some  Mesa Frozen Yogurt for dessert!  We shared a lot of stories, smiles, and laughter!  What a fabulous group date!

A LONG ROAD TRIP HOME

We went to sacrament meeting with Dave's family, changed our clothes, packed the car, and went home.  We took the Flagstaff route home.  It was a long 12 hour drive home due to slow traffic near car accidents and many potty breaks!  We were so happy to be able to spend Thanksgiving with the Arizona Free families!  We cannot wait to visit them again in the future!

Gobble ‘Till You Wobble!

November 24-26, 2010

"Real abundance is found when we join hands with those we LOVE." ~ Author Unknown.

"Gratitude is the beginning of wisdom. Stated differently, true wisdom cannot be obtained unless it is built on a foundation of true humility and gratitude." --Gordon B. Hinckley

During month of November, I reflected on the many BLESSINGS I have in my life. I am so grateful for my FAMILY. We truly enjoy spending time together with our many extended family members, friends, etc. In fact, Thanksgiving this year, we were in Northern Utah with the Silva Familiy (my niece Heather a southern Belle from Georgia and nephews James and Justin). Late afternoon Wednesday, we made a stop over to Matt and Chikai's house who invited us over for dinner. Jopes and Elizabeth's family and Justin were there too. Chiaki spoiled us with making homemade mouth watering teriyaki chicken, Asian salad, egg rolls, pot stickers, pumpkin spice cake, and raspberry roll cake. What a way to start our holiday binge! YUM! We played a quick round of Farkle- a fun dice game, which my niece Anna kicked our butts! Then we headed out the door with Justin to James and Heather's house.



Heather and little sister snuggling on the couch!



Big sister is holding James and Heather's dog Roxy! She is such a cute doggie!



"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow." ~ Melody Beattie

On Turkey day, we divided up the food assignments, which helped us prepare our Thanksgiving feast smoothly. John and I brought pies, frog eye salad, sweet potato fixings, cranberry sauce, and rolls. Justin made green bean casserole and stuffing. James made the most absolutely delicious, savory, and moist turkey that I have ever tasted! It was probably due the the fact that the men brined the turkey the night before and baked it with bacon strips all over the bird! Heather and James also made the gravy, mashed potatoes, and southern cheesy potatoes. The guys watched a couple football games while the food was cooking.

Look at all that GOODNESS!



For dessert, I would like to thank Mrs. Marie Callender for the hassle free tasty key lime and pumpkin frozen pies! BRAVO! I did however managed to make an easy Jello pudding chocolate cream pie with a crushed Skor topping.



I would like to share the GREAT frog eye salad recipe that I made for my Thanksgiving meal. While living in a foster home many years ago, my foster Mom Pam showed me how to make this amazing salad. It is a Sleaper family tradition, to have frog eye salad as a side dish every Thanksgiving and I try to continue on that tradition in my household.



Credits: Papers and elements are by Kaye Winiecki, pink dragon fly is by Natalie Braxton @ The Lilypad. I used lima bean and Segoe Script for my fonts.

After stuffing our faces with great food, we watched some TV and waited impatiently for midnight black Friday! At 11:45 PM, we headed over to our first stop Walmart! To be honest, I have never experienced shopping in the middle of the night on BLACK FRIDAY! In the past, I didn't think it was worth the hassle and lack of sleep! However, Heather convinced me otherwise that there were some great door-busters that I could not resist such as unbelievable DVD prices $2.00-$13.00 pajamas, $4.00 each, and a massive 30 piece cookware set that included: pots/pans with lids, measuring spoons/cups, scrapper, turner, pizza cutter, two small knives, a cookie sheet, as well as other kitchen gadgets for $24.00, WOW! In fact, my nephew Justin got the following: a five quart crockpot, a mixer, a ninja, a 30 piece kitchen/pot set, 40 piece tupperware, ashop vac vaccum, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and Pillsbury dough-boy fleece pants all for $114 bucks! Heather and James got a lot of great things too!

My nephew Justin saved us a spot in line for check out while the rest of us continued to fill the cart! There were literally hundreds of people in the store!



We left Walmart at 12:45 AM. We spent a total of one hour to shop and check out! Look at that heaping cart of amazing door-buster deals!



Next, Heather and I went to Kohls at 3:00 AM and didn't find anything worth the two hour wait to check out. There were some amazing deals but the cons out weighed the pros of buying the stuff. Our last stop was Target at 4:00AM. I was able to cross out many things on my Christmas list and spent under $100.00 total for the night! Woohooo!!! To my surprise, There were many crazies like me who came out dressed in their pajama's and slippers to stand outside the store at freezing cold temperatures, enduring through the crazy maze mob of many eager shoppers in the stores, being cart-less, and patiently waiting for hours at the cashier line! Was it worth the lack of sleep, time, and effort? Hmmmm, well after seeing the guys in their new fuzzy fleece pajamas, it was not only worth it, but priceless!!!

James is wearing Mountain Dew, Justin got Pillsbury Dough-boy on, and John is loving his Hot Tabasco pajama bottoms.



The crazy fools with over-exaggerated "granny pants"! PRICELESS!!! LOL!

An Easy Thanksgiving Craft for the Kids!

November 9, 2010

This week for Activity Day (my church calling), we talked about the history of how Thanksgiving became a national holiday by reading from this website, Thanksgiving on the Net the girls took a quiz on it, ate oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, then we made some Thanksgiving name cards. In addition, we did a small service activity by dropping off some cookies to a couple people in our neighborhood. The girls did it door bell ditching style and left the plate of cookies with a note signed by them all. It was a lot of fun and the girls seemed to enjoy the activity very much!

I would like to share how I made the cute Thanksgiving name cards! They could work as a small Thanksgiving card too where the kids could write down reasons why they are grateful for mom, sister, brother, sister, grandparents, and so forth.



You need the following items below:



1. Brown felt ($.25 cents at Walmart)
2. Red and yellow construction paper
3. Feathers from a craft store
4. Small googly eyes ($1.00 at Walmart)
5. Card-stock paper (I used cream)
6. Craft glue, scissors, and markers






First, we cut out several card-stock cards 4X6 inches and folded them in half. Then, we made our own pattern of the turkey's body (brown felt), beak a triangle shape (yellow paper), and wavy waddle (red paper). Next you glue the eye balls, beak, and waddle onto the turkey's body. Then you pick out some feathers. It could be as puffy and colorful as you desire. I liked to cut the stem out on the bottom of the feather before I glue. Then, lightly glue them on the card-stock and glue the turkey body on top of the feather layers. Last but not least, you may write names or Happy Thanksgiving on the cards! So simple and the kids will have a lot of fun! :D