I Asked Mike,"What's Our Destination?"...

...as we tried to gather children and supplies for the snowshoeing excursion I insisted we take the family for New Years Eve morning. I was thinking a quickie to Yellow Fork, but he thought Millcreek would be better. So, according to plan...

Hoping to get an early start after breakfast New Year's Eve, we loaded the Yakima and prodded children to move, find socks, stop bickering...stuff like that.  I don't know if it was the inertia of lounging around for days, but getting everyone into their snow gear, packing food, kids, dog and equipment... and getting to the mountains was like turning the Titanic around. Slow and cumbersome. I think it took us about 2 hours to get up there, including that time we had to turn around and come back to get Mike's cell phone, so we wouldn't miss the appliance repair guy who was supposed to come and fix our oven (we ended up missing him anyway, we were out of range). 

Life with the Melton's. 

Even the dog, historically hyper for any adventure, was reluctant this time. What can you say? He's middle-aged now, and when we stepped out into the very nippy morning air, he acted like he just wanted to get back in the car, and go home...along with about half the kids.

But we did what you do...

press on.                

It paid off.

We were rewarded with the stunning beauty of the forest in winter. The kids and dog warmed up (literally) to the idea as we went along.

Heading up the trail, into the woods.

 Later, we reaching a bend in the trail with a view where I thought we could take some good pictures. Then I promptly dropped the camera in the snow. I may have ruined it.

(Our camera was already hanging by a thread. This may be the incident which forces us to buy a new one.)

 Here's our blurry family.

I eventually got it relatively dry for this shot, taken by a friendly lady passing by.

 I took this one last photo before it died. Maybe permanently.

It was so cold that the air was filled with those  super tiny water crystals, making everything sparkly. It was LOVELY. I hope the kids will look back on these outings fondly. Even if we had to drag them occasionally.

Sunday night at Family Home Evening we made a list and talked about the miracles our family and friends have experienced this year. The hand of the Lord in our lives. Then we pulled out the folded up sheets of paper we have kept our New Year's resolutions on for the past 3 years running, and made new goals. (It is so fun to look back at past years' resolutions side by side with the new ones...especially for the kids. You can really see them growing up. Some of the old  ones are pretty funny, like: "shower every other day" - I won't mention which of the kids wrote that one a few years ago. ha ha ha...)

New Year's Eve night Jess hit the stake dance with her friends. (She gets SO excited for them.  I almost die laughing every time she goes because she wants to show me her dance moves in advance, and talk about strategy, etc. Oh my goodness, I can hardly keep myself from busting up just thinking about it....) Noble went to a friend's house, and we hosted Grace's buddies here for a night of wii, and Barbie princesses and munchies. Tillman & Sully sacked out upstairs with Mike and I for a movie. I totally fell asleep on the couch at about 11:00, and I was a zombie when Jess came in at 12:45 AM and gave us the post-dance run-down. I am going to need a lot of naps if we are going to have teenagers around the house.

Yesterday we put away Christmas decorations, took care of some nagging errands, Mike and I went out for lunch together (one last day-time date before returning to our routine / the chain gang), and had a family dinner all together at home (Mike is usually gone for week-night dinner because of his work schedule). 

We had a good break. But it is always refreshing to get back on track... in many ways.

Some of the kids weren't sold on going back to school this morning, especially when we woke them up for 6:30 scripture reading. But by the time we got on the road, I think they were even excited.

A hilarious story about Jess on the ride to school this morning...

A little background: Jessie has been accused regularly of being WAY too perky when she answers the phone. Like, you-might-think-she-is-being-sarcastic-and-rude perky. 

So, I was talking to Noble about bands and drummers (he got a set of electronic drums for Christmas), and Jessie interjected, "How about Neon Trees? Their drummer is a girl. She's the only girl in the band..."

Me: "Yeah....I just have a hard time listening to their lead singer. He's SO intense. I think he's trying too hard."

Jess: "Well, maybe that's just how he is. Maybe he can't help it...Like me on the phone." It was a good point.

I was laughing so hard I could barely breath. For the rest of the drive we were all (including Jessie, lest you think we were having fun at her expense) making jokes about Jessie's phone voice. (She is seriously so awesome.) 

Anyway, happy New Year!

I couldn't resist sharing this rad photo of the kid next door who came to play with Sully. She was standing there like this when I opened the door. Awesome.

I'm not sure what the year will bring for us, but I do know that if we just  keep pressing on a little farther, it's going to get good.

First day of post-Christmas break...the big kids gone to school. A quiet morning with these two angels.