Do we have to Dad?

So today is haircut day and both Nathan and Luke hate that day. I'm not really sure why they hate it. They get to sit in front of the tv on a Saturday afternoon and watch cartoons while Derek cuts their hair - whats so bad about that?

Commendable Cub

Luke received a Commendable Cub award at school on Friday for Outstanding Citizenship and Effort. Good Job buddy!

Not much time left to plan a party

So Denise is in planning mode for a Potter Extravaganza. She and Megan have started on plans for a week long celebration starting with the Order of the Phoenix movie and ending a week later with the 7th book. The current plan calls for a kick off party before the movie followed by the midnight show. Movie goodie bags from Honeydukes will be a must. During the week we may have some low key activities for the kids and friends to do since it's summer - no big plans yet. We'll end with a big blow out bash and dinner and then head over to Borders for the traditional wait in line all night for the book party.

Day 8

So Denise got the crazy idea that she should do the 14 days of Valentines as a gift for Derek this year. We are now on Day 8. Derek is concerned that Denise has set him up for Valentines Day failure by spending 14 days showering him with love. No worries Derek...you're the best Valentines gift ever! How is that for sappy romance?!?!

Love that Mater!

Megan had last Friday off of school so she and Denise spent the day at Disneyland and California Adventure while everyone else was off to work and school. It was fun for Denise because she could go on the bigger rides for a change since there were no little kids in tow. Although, if the truth be told she is not liking like bigger rides like she used to. Space Mountain...far too fast!

Disneyland is celebrating their "Year of a Million Dreams" for 2007. One of their "dreams" is choosing random guests in the park and giving them special fast pass lanyards that are good for that one day only. It includes fast passes for all the major rides at both parks and they are good for anytime during that day. Those of you that are familiar with regular fast passes know that you have to return at a certain time of day to use them - the special dream ones are good no matter when. When Megan and Denise got off of Buzz Lightyear they were greeted by a cast member and given the lanyards - yeah! The crazy thing is that the park was so uncrowded that they never had to use the fast passes - they walked on nearly every ride.

Not wanting the fast passes to go to waste, Derek and Denise headed back to the park around 7:30pm for date night and using the passes got on every big ride before 9:30pm. They never waited more then 10 minutes for anything and in some cases got to walk right up through the exit to get on rides.

Back to the afternoon though with Megan. The highlight of the day was Mater. Who doesn't love that rusty old tow truck? He is just as adorable in person as he is on he big screen :)

Just moving along

Just a quick note to say that the Baker's are doing well but nothing much more exciting then that to post. Derek is busy with work doing year end stuff and trying to switch over to his new position as domestic controller (he was the international controller) He is excited about learning a new side to the business.

Denise keeps herself occupied with the family, the house, enrichment planning and other pursuits here and there. She has been trying to find time to read and she is currently reading The Infinite Atonement by Tad Callister. Derek is also reading a book by the same author, The Inevitable Apostasy. Both books are good choices if you are looking for something to read.

The kids are doing well in school. The 3 bigger kids are busy with Stake Musical rehearsals, so is Derek. They are enjoying being a part of the production.

Megan has made a recommitment to herself to work harder in piano. The holidays seemed to mess up her practice schedule and it has been hard to get back on track. Emily made the decision to stop taking piano lessons. Derek and Denise had many talks with her and asked her to make it a matter of prayer. We hate the thought of her not continuing on and losing her great teacher but we all feel at peace with her decision. She just felt too over extended with school, activity days, and the stake musical. Perhaps she'll take it back up when she gets a bit older and can work through her stress better.

The boys are as active as ever - do boys ever slow down? Denise can't believe the boy smell that engulfs the car everyday after school when she picks the kids up. Nate and Luke must work up a serious sweat on the playground -stinky! The girls never smelled that bad.

We are hoping to have some major Luke news soon. Give it a few more days and then hopefully we'll have an announcement - we don't want to jump the gun and ruin a good thing. Oh the suspense....

Some Tahoe Pics

Derek and Denise enjoying the village. Some of our group went skiing and a few of us just hung out. We braved the cold and walked around town enjoying hot chocolate and...

cinnamon rolls

Denise designed a shirt for the concert and found a company www.uberprints.com that did the silk screen. You can't see the shirt very well in this picture but it is a guitar with a tree growing out of the top. Under "rooted in the music" it says mraz/tahoe/1.07. Denise had shirts made for our whole group and they were a hit at the concert. A few people approached us asking where we got the shirts and if they could buy one.

Since we're posting video

Now that we know how to post video to our blog we thought we'd share our favorite comedian - Brian Regan. Our whole family loves him. If you are looking for a video to buy go to his site www.brianregan.com and buy his I Walked on the Moon video. Your whole family will laugh.

The Beauty in Ugly

While we were in Tahoe we went and saw Jason Mraz in concert. Here is a video clip from the night we were there. This is a song he wrote for the show Ugly Betty, which we haven't seen but we love the song.

Been Away

Derek and Denise have been away on vacation and the kids have been at Grammy Bakers so that's the reason for no updated posts. The kids had a lot of fun hanging out with Grammy and Mandi. We're thankful that we have both families so close. It is nice for the kids to be able to spend time with grandparents, aunts , uncles, and cousins.

Derek and Denise had fun on their trip to Tahoe. We'll post pics as soon as we get them downloaded. We went with a few friends & Denise spent some time before the trip making goodie boxes for each of the cars going up. Megan at one point commented that she thought Denise liked putting together all the fun stuff more then the trip itself - there may be some truth to that. Each car had the following goodie box.

Inside the box was this cd complete with travel tunes to make the 8+ hour drive seem not so long. It was full of travel themed type songs.

The box also contained pajamas for everyone. Denise enjoyed working on the pj's but was especially thrilled with how her personalized ribbons turned out that were tied around the pajamas. She now wants to make ribbons for everything - hopefully she escape this phase quickly before she puts ribbons on everything.

Are you kidding me?!?!

Can this really be California? We are freezing! Denise was reading the paper this morning and saw an article titled..."The big chill descends on O.C. as mercury drops to 26 degrees" the article included a picture of a frozen fountain from someones yard. Denise decided to investigate our own fountain and sure enough the little birdies that frequent the fountain now have an ice skating rink. Since the ice looks just like water we have included a rock in the pictures so that you can see that is sits on top of the ice and doesn't sink to the bottom.

Signs of a successful marriage

We have hit a milestone in our marriage. We have now been married so many years that our wedding gifts are heading to small appliance heaven. This little toaster has seen us through our days as a newly married couple to our present situation as parents of four hungry kids that can never eat toast at the same time because the toaster is too small. We'll miss you little Toastmaster but Target here we come!

Happy New Year

Derek hauled beds downstairs so we could have a family slumber party for New Years Eve. It was a nice quiet night at home. Derek and Megan spent the earlier part of the evening at a youth fireside that Megan loved. She was glad that she went - it was a great experience. We spent the rest of the evening lounging around until midnight and then watched the ball drop in Times Square. Here's to a happy 2007!

RIP

We're reluctant to post these pictures because this was a fairly traumatic episode for our family but we'd like to keep this updated about our lives as much as we can. You may notice from some of our Christmas pictures that we have a hamster cage. Megan decided to buy the other kids a hamster for Christmas. She and Denise went out shopping for one and came home with an adorable little hamster. The kids were thrilled on Christmas morning when they saw little Hammy. To make a long and very tragic story short - Hammy died on the 27th. It was in the evening when Denise went to play with her and found her dead. Derek sat the family down and broke the news to the kids and the flood gates were opened. Derek headed to the backyard and dug Hammy a grave while Denise worked on the headstone. We held a brief, heartfelt funeral for little Hammy and buried her under one of our trees in the backyard. The kids cried themselves to sleep and a few of them woke up the next morning and continued to cry. We had to be in San Diego the next day for Denise's brothers wedding so we were glad that tears had been dried just a bit into the trip. Megan had a friend come along to help babysit while Derek and Denise were in the temple. Halfway through the trip a suggestion was made to Megan to quite talking about Harry Potter to her friend (she had been going on and on and on and on). Luke piped up with, "Why don't you tell her about our hamster." Thanks Luke! The tears began yet again. But all was well when we finally made it to the San Diego Temple.
Rest in piece Hammy - we miss you!

Congrats USC

The football teams from USC and Michigan were visiting Disneyland when we were there. Luke wanted to get autographs from the players and Nate wanted to get pictures so we hunted down some players. These guys were super nice and were happy to pose for some pictures and autographs. We're glad that USC won the game - Go Trojans!

A Very Mickey Christmas

Santa delivered Disneyland passes to us for Christmas so we headed off to "the happiest place on earth" the day after Chirstmas. We braved the crowds and had a fun day. The kids also got Disney Dollars in their stockings so Luke used his money to buy an autograph book. Emily already has an autograph book so the two of them had fun running around the park getting autographs from different Disney folks. Nate got a surprise while the kids were getting an autograph from Goofy. Goofy got up to hug the kids and Nate jumped in Goofy's seat. Goofy wasn't going to let Nate get away with it so he planted himself right on top of Nate. More autographs...
Denise loves this picture of Luke because it conveys how he is at Disneyland. He wants to go on the big rides with the big kids but he is still so scared of most rides. This was on the rocket ride at California Adventure. He is trying to smile and act like it is fun for him but his nervousness is showing through.

Merry Christmas!

The traditional Christmas morning picture taken before going downstairs to see what Santa brought.The Christmas morning disaster. It stayed this way for two days because we left for Denise's parents house soon after opening presents and didn't get home until late Christmas night and the day after Christmas we were at Disneyland.
I loved this picture of the mess with our All is Calm All is Bright sign in the background

Where's the glitter when you need it?

Luke had gotten some reindeer food from school to sprinkle on the ground on Christmas Eve but of course Denise put it away so it wouldn't be out cluttering the counter and we couldn't find it on Christmas Eve. Luckily, this is a tradition we have done for a few years and Denise is skilled in the fine art of reindeer cuisine. Oatmeal & cranberries were mixed up (we were out of glitter - which is essential so the reindeer can see the sparkle on the ground and know to come partake of the food) We hoped the reindeer would see the food even though we were out of glitter but just to be sure they would get something to eat we left some apples on the plate for Santa so the reindeer could eat those instead.

Don't ask about Megan's hat in the picture. It is a beautiful disco ball of a hat that she got at a friends Bat Mitzvah and we think she wears it just to make Denise crazy. We should have left the hat out with the reindeer food - there is no way the reindeer could have missed the moonlight reflecting off the hat and maybe they would have eaten it too!

Christmas Eve

The tradition of dressing up for the nativity lives on even though the number of young kids present at Grammy's has dwindled a bit. Next year some adults might need to get in to costume. We love Nate's angelic stance and face in the second picture - tell us you're not grinning looking at it?!?!
As always the kids had fun playing with cousins. Devon and Allie were here with their kids. It is always nice when the kids can play with cousins they don't see very often.

Flippin' Sweet Pictures

Nate drew these pictures the other day and they seemed so Napoleon Dynamite. We thought we'd share his artwork.

Sweet Countdown

The kids enjoyed continuing our Christmas tradition of counting done the days til Christmas with advent calendars. Each of the kids had their own calendar and looked forward to opening door number 24 the day before Christmas. The girls opened their doors to enjoy the sweet surprise inside - chocolate candy. The boys on the other hand were not as lucky. They opened door 24 and found it empty, both calendars - empty. What are the chances?

So maybe California isn't that cold

Denise liked this picture that her sister took (it reminded her of Luke's leaf picture) so she decided to add it to the blog.

I guess we, here in California, need to stop complaining about the cold. From the pictures we see from Denise's sister it is looking pretty frigid in Utah. You all need to gather around a warm fire and get those toes toasty.

Rock On!

After we visited the train we went to our Bishop's house to spend the rest of the evening up there. The highlight of the evening was rockin' out with Guitar Hero. Our family, the Smith's and the Bishop's family had a great time pretending to be rock stars. It was hilarious to watch people playing the game. If you are looking for a fun game - this is it!

Derek taking on the Bishop. Although Derek was good he was no match for our hard rocking Bishop. Bishop Chamberlin ripped it up on his guitar.

Denise loves this picture of Derek and Luke. Check out the look of concentration. Don't mess with these two when they have a guitar in their hand. Luke, future rock star?

The Lollipop Express

We spent Monday night together as a family (minus Megan who was at a party) visiting the backyard of a couple from church. They have a train set up in their backyard and they invite people to come visit during the holiday season. One of the train compartments carries lollipops for the kids so every child leaves with a little treat.

It was a pretty cold night - cold for us Californians, anyway. We were not dressed very well for the weather and froze a bit but other then that we had a great time. Denise is going to always have to live in a warm climate or learn to wear closed toed shoes - flip flops are painful when the weather is 45 degrees or below.

Smile!

Christmas came early for Megan. On Monday she went to the orthodontist and her braces came off. She was so excited she could hardly contain herself. She has had them on for three years and is happy to finally have them off.Once they came off she couldn't quit smiling or rubbing her teeth with her tongue. Anyone who has had braces removed remembers that feeling of running your tongue over smooth teeth once all the metal is gone. Her retainers are in and she is grinning from ear to ear.

Christmas with auntie Jill and Uncle Jeff

We spent Sunday afternoon with Denise's family in San Clemente for an extended family Christmas. We enjoyed a nice afternoon with everyone. The kids got to open their gifts from Jeff and Jill and they were thrilled with what the received.

Megan got a digital scrapbooking program for her new laptop. Megan has been saving all her babysitting money since she has started babysitting and a few weeks ago finally had enough to buy her own laptop computer. She is still waiting for it to be delivered and is getting anxious especially now that she has the scrapbook program for it.

Emily got ChatNow, think cell phone/walkie talkie. She loves it and is talking on it constantly with her siblings.

Nathan got an iPod shuffle which he is thrilled about. He really wanted to get songs on it so Derek stayed up late Sunday to make sure there was music downloaded on it for when Nate woke up. He walks around the house singing Jack Johnson.

Luke got a Cars PS2 game and a cool steering wheel controller. He is excited. He loves playing Play Station with the big kids and I think getting a PS game made him feel pretty special and like one of the big kids.

We are grateful to have family close and that we were able to spend time together celebrating the holiday.

I've tried to add pictures to this post 3 times but it's not working - I'll try again later.

Emily's Christmas Concert

Emily had her Christmas concert at school on Friday and Derek, Denise, Megan and Luke were able to be there - Nate was in school. The choir sang some really great songs and had fun choreography to go with it. Emily did great! The pictures we took of her on the stage didn't come out - we were too far away but we managed to get a shot of her, Dad, and Luke right after the performance.

Luke's chance to sing

Luke had been feeling bad that he wasn't part of our church musical program but today he got his chance to sing at his school Christmas concert. All the kindergarten classes joined together for a musical extravaganza. Here are some pictures from the concert but I am also going to try and get some video up of his musical debut.