Thanksgiving Break

We celebrated Thanksgiving with the Clark side of the family the Sunday before Thanksgiving. Everyone was able to make it that day and it was a great day! 

It was Paul's turn to host the Librarian meeting that week and so he made a couple turkey platters for the refreshments. They looked awesome and he said they were a big hit!

The Murphy-Barth-Allphin movie night was Tuesday night and they decided to show Wicked this year. Everyone was very excited to see Wicked!

The whole night went great. People loved their prizes and the movie. It's always a fun event that his clients love.

Hallee and Wyatt come over to hang out one day.

We had SO many leaves to rake up, and Damon helped us out while Tessa and Rockwell were busy with their cousins. 

We ate Thanksgiving dinner at home this year. We made a more simplified version of a turkey dinner and it was delicious!!

We went to Grandma and Grandpa Ham's that evening for dessert. I made a peanut butter pie and a peppermint dip.

It was fun to hang out with the family and eat yummy dessert.

Matt & Lori came for Thanksgiving and a few of us went up there the next day to celebrate Matt's birthday. We went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner and then Matt opened some gifts from Elena and Lori.

NXR Race in Mesa

The whole cross country team got to go to Mesa, Arizona for the NXR Southwest Regional meet. They rode down in a Le Bus and drove to Lake Powell the first day.

They did a run there, and had dinner, and some of the boys shaved their heads and some dyed their hair pink. Rockwell went with the pink option. :) They were assigned hotel rooms. Jared Searle is a team captain and they had one extra space in their room with Grant and Ryan, so Jared went and kidnapped Rockwell and he got to room with them. He was very happy about that!

The next day they drove to the Grand Canyon and then on to Mesa. They went and ran the course (well, they were supposed to, but the boys just ran a 5k for some reason and didn't follow the course. Rockwell was frustrated by that.) They stayed at a pretty sketchy motel that night. It was funny to see Matt & Lori's reaction when they heard where they stayed. Apparently it's a real rough part of town!

We decided to fly down for the weekend and stay with Matt & Lori since the race was in Mesa. Our flight was supposed to leave just after noon on Thursday, but as we pulled into the airport parking lot we got a notification that the flight was delayed until 7:00. Paul went in and asked some questions, but there were no earlier flights we could get on. We decided to head over to the Provo mall and get some lunch and see a movie. 

I was real tired and decided to rest my eyes in a massage chair while Paul and the kids did some window shopping so I could have a hope of staying awake during the movie. They thought they were very funny taking a picture by me sleeping. :)

Our flight was delayed two more times, and we finally landed in Mesa around 2:00 am. I felt awful having Matt pick us up that late, and I was so frustrated to miss out on a whole day in Mesa. It was disappointing for sure!

We were all excited to see Maizy again. :)

Damon was telling Matt & Lori that he was sad he was missing Dino Day at school. The next thing I knew they had Damon running around in a blow up dinosaur. Haha! Cody used it for Halloween one year and they still had it in a closet. That helped Damon feel better about missing Dino Day!!!

Tessa wanted a turn too. :)

The weather was awesome there! Slightly chilly in the mornings, and then perfect warm weather during the day. The kids and I enjoyed the hot tub and the sunshine.

Elena offered to do Tessa's nails and Tessa was SO excited about that!

Elena is so so so talented and her Christmas nails turned out awesome!

We all headed over to the golf course Saturday morning to watch Rockwell race. 

This was a very big event with a lot of athletes. The Southwest Region includes Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, and Nevada. 

All the boys except Diedrick (who qualified for the Championship race) ran the Medium race.

Rockwell did awesome and finished with a time of 16:49.81!! Best time of the season on his last race, so exciting!!

Timpanogos boys took 1st place as a team!!! They tied Pine View with their top 5 runners, so it came down to their 6th finisher. Timpanogos took it! That was really exciting for them!!

As we were watching all the girls come up and congratulate Rockwell after the race, Matt & Lori told us, "You're in trouble!" Haha. 

It was really fun to have Matt, Lori, and Elena be able to see Rockwell race and have them there cheering him on with us. Elena runs cross country too, so they always have fun talking shop when they see each other.

A couple boys from the team designed a new jersey for this race. I loved that they put Mount Timpanogos on the back.

After the race, we watched the BYU vs Arizona State football game and Tessa and Damon swam in the pool and hot tub the rest of the afternoon. 

We had some delicious homemade ice cream and watched Home Alone that night. It was a really fun weekend getaway!! We always love to spend time with Matt, Lori, and Elena!

Tessa Turns 12!!!

 

Our Tessa Bessa is 12 years old!!

It has been 12 years of laughs with this girl. She still cracks us up all the time with her quick wit and perfect timing. I love love love listening to Tessa and Damon laugh their heads off whenever they play together. Rockwell had some friends over the other night and Tessa hung out with them too. Rockwell was telling me how Tessa had his friends laughing so hard and that they all loved having Tessa hang out with them, Rockwell included. 

Tessa still love love loves gymnastics. She's on Gold level this year with Morgan, Lexi and a couple new friends. I met one of her new coaches at Open Gym yesterday and she said, "Oh I love Tessa!! She's always so positive and so sweet. She's always cheering on her teammates and encouraging them. We all just love her!" She also said she works hard at practice and has beautiful form. Her competition season starts in February and we're so excited to watch her perform! Tessa really enjoys being in choir at her school and even wakes up early to go. She loves to sleep in, so you know she really enjoys choir if she's willing to get up early for it! Tessa still loves being in Young Women.

Tessa is starting to say she doesn't enjoy school and can't wait for the breaks. It's certainly not because she's not doing well in school, or that she doesn't have friends there, I think it's just a sign of her age. :( Mr Welch has such positive things to say about her. At a parent teacher conference he was showing me a project they made about something that inspires them. She had put a couple scriptures on hers and he thought that was so impressive. He also showed her reading and math evaluation scores and she's excelling in language arts and a little ahead in math too. She has been working hard the past year and a half to understand math better, and it was so sweet to watch her surprise and joy at seeing her score beyond where it's expected for 6th grade. It was so rewarding to see her feel some pride at her hard work paying off.

 Tessa is such a thoughtful, sweet girl. When she and Damon were walking home from school there was a 1st grader who tripped and fell and hurt her leg. Damon told me that Tessa checked to see if she was okay and offered to give her a piggy back ride to her house. I often see younger girls at school and at gym running up and hugging Tessa when they see her. I remember Mrs Eldredge telling me at a parent teacher conference last year that a trouble Tessa often had in class was that everyone wanted to work with her and sit by her and it was hard for Tessa to be everywhere her friends wanted her to be. She said, "Tessa is very loved!" I was in Tessa's room the other day and told her that her Christmas tree is very beautiful. She said, "Mom, your face is very beautiful." I think people love the way they feel around Tessa. She makes people feel good about themselves, and feel cared about, and makes them laugh. She's the kind of person people want to be around!

Tessa requested crepes for breakfast and loved getting a mouth full of whipped cream!

She wore her cute little Beam Queen tiara all day. :)

She wanted to open presents right after school.

She was really happy with new rollerblades (she and Evie love to rollerblade around the park!), a book, nail glue, What Would Jesus Do bracelets, slippers and 3 Musketeers.

She wanted Pizza Pie Cafe for dinner. 

And she wanted to decorate the house for Christmas that night.

We had dessert at Pizza Pie Cafe, so we just used one of the cupcakes left from her friend party for a picture of her blowing out candles. :) It was a great day for our Tessa Girl!!!

For her friend party this year, she invited Hallee, Morgan, and Emily. They decorated cupcakes to look like turkeys. It was a fun activity, plus it provided their dessert. :)

They opened presents and all her friends were so sweet and generous!

Then I took the girls to Lowe's Xtreme Airsports.

Tessa and Morgan are sure in their element there!! It was a really fun party!

Grandma Clark took Tessa out to lunch and shopping on Black Friday. She got lots of stuff from Bath & Body Works, a sweater, and a couple pairs of pants. Grandma always spoils the kids, and Tessa sure loves eating and shopping with Grandma for her birthday!!