2009 Christmas Card

Merry Christmas! We decided not to write a letter this year, but I hope to update this blog soon with some of the year's events.

Our biggest and most suprising news of the year is that S. Nicholson number 7 (child #5) is coming in early July.  We thought we were done, but apparently not. :)

We hope you have all had a wonderful year and that the upcoming one will be even better! God bless!

Today is Simon's Birthday!

Simon turned four today. We have had an exciting birthday week, starting on Tuesday with a trip to the zoo and a party with the grandparents. Then on Friday, Simon got to spend a couple hours with his daycare friends as they had a party for him there as well.

Unfortunately, he was sick today, and so it seemed that it would not be a very happy birthday after all.

But then after church, one of his primary teachers came to see him. When she came to the door with his gift, she said, "I want to see him. I'm not afraid of the flu." :)

She had a birthday hat for him and a bag of toys. He was delighted.

Meanwhile, Scott spent the afternoon on his feet (after a long night of having Simon in our bed with us, feverish and coughing) to make cinnamon rolls for a big family birthday party at Scott's parents. Since Simon was sick, it was not a good idea to take him to the party and risk getting other people sick, and Scott decided that would not be much fun for Simon on his birthday to be at home while everyone else was at his birthday party.

That meant we now had no plans for dinner, and since Scott was tired from baking and Simon would not let me put him down, we asked Simon what he wanted for his birthday dinner and ordered pizza hut.

While we waited for the pizza to arrive, we took a plate full of cinnamon rolls to Simon's daycare provider, Nadege, because today is also her birthday (and we had 54 cinnamon rolls to get rid of, since we were no longer taking them to the party).


Simon also decided that he wanted to give Nadege his new birthday hat.

The pizza was a hit. Sam offered Simon the pepperoni that he had picked off of his pizza, and Simon said, "No, Sam, they are part of the whole thing."


I was so excited that he actually ate dinner, because he refused breakfast and lunch! But he was right, pizza was the right choice!

Soon after dinner, we decided to watch the new DVD movie that Simon got for his birthday, Bolt. Our friends David and Jessica came a few minutes into it, and joined us for the movie and then some exciting games on the Wii.

The best part was that since he had not seen Jessie and David for a week, he clung onto them and gave Mom a break!


Simon lit up during the games and was running around with the kids, having a wonderful time.

It turned out to be an awesome birthday, despite the illness. We are so happy that we have so many awesome friends that we can call family.

One last photo of Simon, happy, but tired and ready to go to bed and snuggle with his new pet snake from the zoo.


Happy Birthday, Simon!

Photoshopped Easter

Instead of going to bed like I should, I decided to play with the photos I took today (actually, now it is yesterday) of the kids. I laughed out loud and made Scott laugh too when I told him I shrunk the kids. Maybe I will post that one at the end. Anyway, after some more playing, I ended up with these, which I think turned out kind of nice.







Here is the funny one.

Amazing Easter Cake

Scott always has the assignment of bringing dessert to family parties. Today he chose to go all out with a carrot cake. See the results below. I don't even like carrot cake, but I decided to try it and it was seriously awesome!



The frosting on the side is textured like a basket.



The nest is made of spun sugar, filled with Cadbury mini eggs.

Egg Dying (or nintendo, your choice)

Friday night we dyed eggs. Scott always really enjoys dying eggs and trying new things (along with some of the old things he learned from his mom). This year he read an idea (on the internet, of course) of putting a bit of vegetable oil in the cup with the dye. When the egg hits the water, spots on the shell get oil on them and those areas will not dye. The result is pretty cool.

Sam, amazingly, did not want to dye eggs, because he preferred to use the time playing Nintendo. (He finally did one egg when we told him there was only one left.)

Our friend Dallin was over, so he had fun coloring eggs with us as well. We were all so excited when he got a call from Hale Theater (during the egg dying) letting him know that he had been cast in the part of Barnaby in Hello Dolly this Summer (the musical in WALL-E). It was so awesome to share that moment with him. Dallin was literally crying, and the rest of us were jumping up and down. He immediately called his mom to let her know (she lives in Arizona. We wish Dallin wasn't spending Easter by himself today while we are with extended family. Love ya, friend!)

Anyway, here are how the eggs turned out.

The rainbow ones are my favorite. Scott's rainbow egg turned out better than mine, of course. The egg on the left was dipped in 3 different dyes containing oil, the oil wiped off really good in between each dunking. I really like the way it looks.

YW Conference

Three mothers and 4 daughters from our ward carpooled to the YW session of conference last Saturday. We had a lot of fun. President Monson's talk on courage was awesome.

Spring Soccer?

I looked out the window this morning and hoped the soccer coach would call, but assumed he wouldn't. So we prepared the treats and bundled ourselves up for an adventure.



Here is Sam, already cold 5 minutes after arriving at the field, so he is wearing the zip-out lining of my coat while dad grabs his coat from home.



I think the kids are a little warmer while running around. Fortunately, not too many of them fell while running, and they didn't even complain very much. We had 7 kids show up and the other team only had 4, so some of our team played on their team. Our best player (who is in our ward), played for them during the first half, and for us during the second half. I think he made all the goals. :)


Ah! Hot chocolate for half-time treat. Good idea, mom. :)

Needless to say, Mom, Dad, and Sam were all pretty frozen by the time we were done!

**************************************

Soccer practice was on Thursday, and it appeared to be a beautiful day if you looked to the East.


...but then look West a bit....

...and a bit more...


The wind was insane! But the storm didn't actually arrive until after we got home, thank goodness!

Fun at the Mayan

A week after Scott's birthday, the kids decided we should celebrate further by going to the Mayan as part of our Family night activities. We had to wait for about a half hour, but the children didn't seem to mind.


Simon in the mouth of a giant concrete serpent.


...with Sam and Spencer up top.


Now Simon wants to go up top. Hold on tight, Sierra!
(I think Mom and Simon were both a bit scared for this one. :)

First Post

I've gotten into this blogging thing, and then I mention blogging to family and friends and they say, "Oh, give me your address!" So I decided we should start our own family blog. (Like AS IF I need something else to do with my time!)

All of our names start with the letter S (Scott, Sarah, Sierra, Spencer, Samuel and Simon), so our initials are all SN, and if you say that out loud, we are the SNs, which kind of sounds like Essence. Forgive my silly attempt to be creative. Actually, Scott figured it out long ago, I'm just stealing the idea from him now. Thanks sweetie :)

So, as long as I am being corny, lets think of some ways Essence applies to us.

• Family is of the essence. That means it is really important. :)
• Our family, though not perfect, has a great essence. In other words, our family's intrinsic characteristics are great!
• Um, I guess that's it for now.
  

Feel free to comment and be creative about how the word essence applies to us!

This is sure to be a new adventure! Welcome to our blog!