Oh, by gosh, by golly: It's time for mistletoe and holly!

Invoking a little yuletide Sinatra is always in style.

The retrospective begins...NOW...

The first week of December is always chock-full to a ridiculous degree: my 40th birthday (anguish! dang those zeroes!), and, as always, The Nutcracker. Our 2nd year running at the International Ballet's production at the University of Denver, stellar every time. The gals always make a night of it, and almost as entertaining as the show itself, bookended by Noodles & Company and Bonnie Brae ice cream, is watching the boys fenagle themselves out of attending.

Our greatest aspirations of cutting down a tree are foiled again (who's got a spare day to jog up to the mountains, what with swim meets, basketball practices, the oddly scheduled birthday party?), but the tree lot by Chili's will do in a pinch. Reminiscent of my childhood tree-trimming, our background symphony was provided courtesy of Monday Night Football, which always gives me a feeling of security and a sense that all is well with the world. I wish I could say I was kidding.
It's just one of the happiest nights of the year. Our newest ornaments represented the Star Wars, vintage Barbie, holiday Barbie, and Alice in Wonderland collections. Glad tidings, indeed!

Budget cuts made it necessary to eliminate the choir program for the 6th grade, to Eve's great disappointment, but the 4th graders got a clear shot, and Ty's been loving the experience. The holiday concert was a joy to watch and observe, and certainly involved about 1/100 of the usual spectators. More glad tidings.

Apparently, singing for Clear Sky was as far as Ty was willing to go...Shane and Evie, far left, brought their sterling talents and matchless stage presence to the nativity for the Foothills Ward Christmas party, regaling the precious plastic baby Jesu with angelic ministrations...

No, I can't get enough of crouching princesses in front of Christmas trees, if you were wondering.

This year I'm room mom for 3 classrooms - the 6th graders got a breakfast and rousing game of whiteboard Pictionary for their holiday send-off...is Castle Rock Middle School ready for these scorching beauties next Fall?

The 4th graders received the same treatment, and their breakfast was crazy over-the-top. One of the things I've come to expect is that no matter how many e-mails and fliers you deliver to parents, 9 out of 10 of them will not respond, leading you to believe that you need to procure $40 worth of food on your own, only to find that they send in $40 worth of food apiece the morning of the party...I'm learning to be grateful for their particular brand of ill-communicated generosity. I really am.

Pictionary. I tried to mix it up a bit, but they manhandled my little suggestions in mere seconds. Only 'eggnog' slowed 'em up a bit.

The kindies got the real production, which their age, attention span and parental involvement both necessitate and make possible...they got a Polar Express extravaganza: tickets punched by a conductor as they followed the taped train track to listen, on board, to the story while sipping hot chocolate.

They got to make tree decorations, play "Conductor Says" and decorate Twinkie trains...the preciousness of this age group always kills me. I hate to think it's my last go-round. But it is. It IS.

Mama can only do so much, so I missed much of Shaney's 2nd grade bash. Luckily, they just munched and socialized, but I did get this great shot of Shane's group writing projects for the holiday: their own version of the 12 Days of Christmas.

Dressed in White

The happiest of all days...I truly enjoy every day of being a mom to this amazing crew of people. Some days are better than others, however. And this firmly falls under the category of "Payoff Days", when, somehow, you've managed to prepare another soul, as much as you have any part in it, to be baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and to begin the covenant-keeping relationship you hope he will always enjoy with his Savior Jesus Christ.
Shane was just gang-busters for this experience, and, like every milestone he's experienced since birth, the time I'm personally contributing to prep him has exponentially decreased with each successive child. With Shane, it has never mattered, from weaning to walking to talking, and on to this great moment. He excels, I think, precisely because I'm not in there mucking with his own natural, God-given abilities to think things through, consider events and consequences, and do what he feels is right.

Shane woke up bright and early on the morning of November 7th ready to fast, waltzed into Sacrament Meeting and became the first Crawford child EVER to bear a public testimony (and did I love that his special testimony included Joseph Smith? Did I love that I don't think he was just reciting what he was 'supposed to', but that our recent trip to SLC impressed something on his heart?), and that he was just a model of composure at his baptism? A friend told me that as he sat to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost that he felt the brethren's hands on his head and then closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and just waited. It was also good that he didn't try to tackle anyone after the blessing was given.

Here he is with the Crawfords, Kulwickis and Prusses - one thing I think he really doesn't appreciate is how blessed he is to have so many family members attending such a special day, that the entire program was brought about by the talents and efforts of these special people. But he will.

Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered

All Hallow's Eve. How amazing is THAT view from the back deck?

Nothing worse than a holiday that falls on the Sabbath. But I'll tellya what: the kids were only mildly disappointed, and were actually a joy that night as they watched movies and jostled over who got to answer the door and dispense treats...
The necessary ordeal of carving.

I doubt Gracie will ever be a gut-grabber - she's an artist by temperament, and would rather paint than hack.

Daddy doing the honors...now that I think of it, we just tossed those perfectly good seeds: no roasting, no spring planting. Dangit.

Nicely done. And though I love the lighting in the kitchen for everyday living, it sure wasn't flattering for picture-taking. But, then, they're pumpkins. What more could I expect?

OK, OK! Fine! We're wickedly, naughty, horrible people! We let them dress up and trick or treat! Only the houses at the end of the cul-de-sac, however, and they were back within 10 minutes. What an awesome weather weekend - 70s during the day, and, although they had to layer with shirts underneath the costumes, no coats required! Bonus!

Alice. Pulling an "Eat me." In the Wonderland sense, of course.

Eight, not a moment too late

Shane Roman Crawford. What can I say that hasn't already been said?

Eight years ago this angel of a boy came to us, and he has been, ever since, the life of every party, the spark in every conversation, the squeaky wheel, the bull in the china shop, the apple of our eye.
This fall, Shaney joined Eve in year-round swimming, which, if you can believe it, does NOT wear him out. If anything, he comes out of his thrice-weekly practices more hyped up than before he went in the water. Which is somewhat, well, beyond belief. And slightly disappointing.
He was able to attend the Great Pumpkin Meet in Longmont on his birthday, and just tore it up. Daddy will take the honors for getting him to a 7 a.m. warm-up at a venue 1 1/2 hours from the house...

The traditional apple bob following the meet is always a kick to watch, and I was somewhat stupefied: a kid of Shane's athleticism, determination, love of food and plain old big mouth didn't do him much good - he was one of the last to get his apple, and that was only after he followed the suggestion of cornering it against the pool wall.

The boys chose a trip to Elitch's as our family party this year, and our only open day was the evening of the 30th, Shane's birthday, and, naturally, a travel swim meet day, but, as is our way, we just shoe-horned it in. No pictures, but Shane's now tall enough to ride all the big kid rides with Dad, Eve and Ty, and they were beyond stoked to enjoy the full spectrum of crazy. We love going to Denver's oldest amusement park during the Fall weekends - probably not a bit less crowded, but significantly cooler temps, and the place is all creeped out for Halloween, complete with cobwebs, fog machines, and roving staff members in various horror-inducing costumes.

Shane scored an AWESOME body sled for our snow-cruising pleasure, as well as a plethora of Lego kits - lots of Star Wars for this kid. It's always a mixture of elation and frustration as he puts them together, but I just get warm fuzzies from watching him - that's what a childhood should look like, creating, experimenting, developing. Thrilled beyond measure that we get to watch him go through it.

Perfect Ten

Ten years ago I gave birth to a beautiful, blue-eyed, 10-pound boy...which was just as ridiculously painful as it sounds. But he grew on me.

And what a huge year it's been for Tysie - this year he's again excelling in all things math, and has added to his already brimming schedule regular practice times with the Clear Sky choir and is representing the heck out of his fourth-grade class, in addition to two kindie classes, as a Student Council representative.
Here, as he awaits his gifts expectantly, dad psyches him out with his hoodie instead. Oh, the madcap hilarity of a Crawford birthday!
The real goods. Which is all he really cares about these days: football and baseball, but not necessarily in that order. He's given up soccer (I hate to say it, but flippin' YAHOO!), granting us a blessed few fall weekends of stress-free enjoyment, but I just KNOW that next year he'll be demanding the gridiron. I don't mind it. Goodness knows, if there's one thing I truly enjoy, it's football. But, oh, those blessed few fall weekends of stress-free enjoyment! How I lament thy loss!

No need to call Social Services - he had a real cake at the birthday party. Pictures at eleven.

To sum up: we absolutely adore Ty. He's my main man, my angel boy, someone I'm endlessly proud of and can't wait to see at the end of every school day. One-sixth of my greatest blessings.

So there.

But with joy wend your way

Fall break! How fabulous for us! Week one in Denver included delights such as Gunther Toody's and Monkey Bizness bounce house, the leisure pool, Chuck E. Cheese, Toys 'R Us with Grandma K, a birthday party for the fellas, and our virgin experience with Jump Street in Littleton. We then hit the road just across the border - is there a less expensive and more poignant long-weekend spot than SLC, Utah?
The slideshow contains specific highlights, but Day One of glorious weather consisted of the Conference Center (Grace provided the soundtrack for the tour, consisting solely of "A long time ago in a beautiful place..."), the North and South visitors' centers, the Seagull Monument, the temple steps, the Joseph Smith building, Beehive House, flagship Deseret Book store and Church History Museum, which took every second of our 7-hour day. We wrapped up nicely with In-N-Out and crashing at the home of our dearest friends, the Roses (read: those who have seen the good, the bad, and the ugly, and still welcome us into their home).

Following the JSB film which graphically depicted the Prophet Joseph's life and death, Eve and I left the theater, arms around each other's waists. A well-meaning and adorable senior missionary asked Eve what she thought. She beamed a smile at him and instantaneously burst into sobs, burying her head into my shoulder, and before I could even blink another sweet sister missionary from Cambodia came over simply said: "Oh, she cry? Oh! She feel the Spirit!", at which point, we all dissolved into mass hysteria.

After leaving the building, Eve watched Shane and Grace balance along the planter walls and shook her head in disbelief, "They just don't even get why we're here on this trip!"
But she does. As does Ty, though in a less dramatic way ("They had to leave Nauvoo? Where where the police to protect them?"). And so, obviously, worth it.

Day Two brought us to BYU's Bookstore and Los Hermanos for lunch, then back up to Salt Lake for This is the Place monument and Heritage Park. The segue into the westward Exodus is always my favorite, and I could hold forth on Brigham Young for many a day, but suffice it to say the monument and views are amazing. Heritage Park could do with a Web site update: it doesn't help my family when, at 2 p.m., we arrive to find that every historic cabin and building in the park has just closed for the day, when the Internet clearly informed us they would be open until dusk. Every bit as hard as crossing the plains. :)

Am I the only one who thinks Utah County is ridiculously overcrowded? That dinner at Texas Roadhouse was epic, though...

Day Three: super cloudy, rainy and all of 50 degrees. I scored at Rod Works (yahoo!) in Orem, and we headed to the stadium in full downpour - they've got quite the deal going at LaVell Edwards Stadium: no umbrellas allowed, but willing to sell us the $5 BYU rain poncho, which, of course, you've got no choice but to accept. The weather cleared nicely from game time 'til we all filed out of the stadium (luckeeeeee!), but those fellas were killin' us: they didn't exactly try to win, but did doing their best not to be beaten by Wyoming. Kinda.

Again, worth it to show the kids the full home game experience, as well as the obligatory ride around Provo: Those are the dorms! That's where mommy used to live! That's where daddy used to live! That was mommy and daddy's first apartment! Our second apartment! This building didn't used to be here! And you can't leave without eating at Brick Oven, 'natch.

Trekking home, alternating sleeping with videos and mom and dad's gleeful nonstop Pearl Jam radio-listening on Sirius...the car improbably behaved on the trip home through Wyoming, which more than offset the less-than-stellar scenery (though I get a kick out of Evanston, home of 'Pyro City')...

many thanks again to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who always offer the history of the restored gospel of Christ in a professional, enlightening, and spiritual way, as well as the Roses, hosts and hostesses extraordinaire - one for the books, and I'm more than sure, one that will be redone many a time.

Livin' in a Rancher's Paradise

I sometimes get lucky: chaperoning field trips is just one of my favorite pasttimes. I've been on trips from mind-numbingly boring to riveting, ill-advised to serendipitous, poorly planned and abominably executed to...well, wondrous, like this one. Clear Sky's 2nd grade field trip just south of Castle Rock to the historic Lowell Ranch just may well be favorite outing yet.
What a great place, just can't say enough about it. Tons to see, tons to do, tons to learn...here, Shaner's showing his gentler side with some kind of white fluffy animal: what do you think? Duck? Rabbit? Seriously. Can't remember to save my life.

The International (or perhaps merely local Clear Sky Elementary) sign for silence...he's Bison proud, I keep telling you people. Can't I get a buy-in?

During a presentation regarding cows and their multiple stomachs, feed is passed around. Other children, with normal family backgrounds, look at the feed, and some even gingerly run it through their fingers. My boy goes for immersion. 'Cause that's how we roll 'round here.

For a purely city kid, Shane can readily identify every naturally grown food item brought to his attention. It's kind of stupefying.

Essential Shane: a jaw full of...something. In this case, spaghetti squash. And you can bet your sweet bippy he's never going to be served that at home. Enjoy while you can, brothah.