We met at the church then caravaned out to a Christmas tree farm. It was so cold!
Abraham has pretty much abandoned us for his new squeeze, Stacia! It's okay! We still like the Mexican!
At the Christmas tree farm, we went on a hayride, built some fires and had s'mores, and then had a great lesson by Bro. Childs in our bishopric. It was a great time! We had two of these giant trailers filled with people. 
She brought her boyfriend, Jason, to meet us. They met this past summer on a train in Germany. Jess was on the wrong train even! I guess it turned out to be the RIGHT train! The day before they came over to visit us, they got . . .
ENGAGED! He did a great job picking out the ring and she was so excited about it. They're getting married late next October or early November - a year from the time he was baptized. Congrats, you two!
We had to get a cute friend picture in front of our Christmas tree!
They had their Tacoma packed with stuff we'd asked for or that they brought for us. Their old neighbors gave them this shed, which they then brought for me. 
As soon as we got it unloaded, my dad, the project man, started right in on it. He recruited us all to help. 
After some work, things got put together nicely . . .
and now I can put my lawnmower and other odds and ends in there instead of in the small garage. Taking out the trash will be a breeze now!
Here's some of the gang taking a little break after exerting so much energy getting that shed put together.
My dad was already off on the next project - patching up the hole in my ceiling in the game room upstairs. It was just a cosmetic thing. He had to mud it.
Here's a close-up. The next step will be to texture it and paint it the right color. Thanks, Dad!
My brother Adam, flew in that afternoon. Later that evening Nate and Abraham came over for some fun. Here's part of the group watching bits of some of the cool movies the Giant has on his computer.
Thanksgiving dinner today was at our house. We had Maylene, Darrell, Jen, and Shanna Call; my whole family, Adam, The Eric Bushmans, and Bridgette Solomon and her boyfriend Jason. It was a fun group. I forgot to take a picture when we were eating, but here's my after dinner shot. Sorry about this one, mom! I caught you mid-chew!
Eric was excited to play my dad in ping pong - which is also something we played a lot on Wednesday night.
You can see from Eric's shirt that it was a little hot up there! I thought it was supposed to be cold on Thanksgiving!
We also had fun watching little Brandt. I kept trying to get picture or video of him dancing, but I didn't have much luck! He sure is a cutie.
Much of the afternoon was spent on the Wii. Eric brought Rock Band so we all had a good time. 
My dad had to get a picture with the two Wendy Bushmans!
Adam leaves tomorrow morning. It's been fun to have him here for almost a week.
We'll sure miss him! I hope everyone else had a WONDERFUL THANKSGIVING!
I recruited people from our FHE group to come and help out. Adam was in town so he joined the fun as well.
Nate and Nichole were among others that came along to help out. Thanks, guys!
Here's a shot Susannah took of most of the kids during the performance. If you look closely, you can see me in the background running the sound system. I much prefer that to being out front!
Tuesday Adam came up to school to have lunch with Susannah. Our lunch times were way different from each other that day due to our duty schedules. Adam sneaked in my classroom, hid under my desk, and scared the dickens out of me!
They wanted each of those three groups to have a team of 3. Our team was myself, Lindsay, and Amanda. We even made matching t-shirts! This is us pre-olympics.
It was an eating competition. The kids were packed around and there was NO space. You can see in the background of this picture that people were even outside trying to see. The girl in the background outside the window is one of my students!
Here's the winning team right after our victory!
This is our entire first grade team celebrating the win.
I had to get a picture of the backs of our shirts. I thought they were pretty cool.
They did give us prizes for the win. We each got a little Chick-fil-A stuffed animal and 52 certificates for free meals from Chick-fil-A - food for a year! Yikes!
We had to be at Chick-fil-A from 5:00 to 8:00pm. This is the group left winding up the fund raiser.
One of my favorite things of the night was seeing old students who are in middle school. I saw two students from my first year of teaching. Clayton is one of them. I had him get in a picture with one of my current students to show the span of my teaching career! I'm in my 8th year of teaching first grade!
My mom just posted some pictures of it on Facebook and I LOVED this one! Are they not the cutest people in the world?!?!?!
I got November. Susannah helped me do Navajo Tacos. They turned out pretty good. We played Apples to Apples after that for quite a while. We then enjoyed some "Deep Thoughts" by Jack Handy. Before everyone left, we posed for some pictures.
We had to illustrate the sign we have up in our entry way. It was a fun night!
