the beck family: November happenings in a nutshell:)

Aren't I so lucky to be with this guy all day long, every day:). He makes me laugh so much - Bradley's many faces!

Bradley planted a pea plant in October for Joy School. He was so great at making sure it got watered regularly. This plant grew to be about 12 inches long and even grew a pea. He was very proud of it.

Byron had a 3 day conference called the Global Analytics Council in Provo that hosted about 8 Nu Skin employees from other markets around the world. For the closing part of the conference, they went to Ruth's Chris in Park City and invited the wives to join. I was a lucky recipient of some amazing food. It was awesome to meet some of the people that Byron talks about all of the time or visits while on business trips. They all are so nice and it was great to see Byron in his work environment. I enjoyed some delicious stuffed chicken, sweet potato pie & yummy salad. Byron got fillet mignon and broccoli cheese au gratin. What amazing food! So fun to experience the food and not have to pay for it.

Byron was taking to picture of the group - I am on the right side.

The day after heading to Park City, Byron headed out to Europe for almost 2 weeks. While he was away we enjoyed some fun activities. I had purchased a coupon for Pirate Island, so we decided to try it out. What a fun atmosphere. We ate dinner - it was fun for the kids to pick anything they wanted from the menu. The food wasn't the best, but the atmosphere and game area made up for it. Afterwards, we headed over to the game room to enjoy playing for about 30 minutes (or until their tokens were gone).

Johnathan, Tanner, Carter, Parker, Camille & Bradley

Johnathan enjoying the games.

Carter playing Guitar Hero.

Camille playing something similar to Dance Revolution. She did awesome!

Tanner had the annual 6th grade Egyptian program, Temples and Tombs. He had been studying about Egypt for quite a while in class. He wrote a report on "The Nile and Boats". He also made some fun pottery. After learning quite a few fun Egyptian songs, they perform them for the parents. The night before (around 8 p.m.), he told me that he needed to dress up like an Egyptian the following day. Luckily we had quite a bit of material that we turned into a costume and just had to buy some thick ribbon to put around his wrist. He looked awesome!

Tanner with his teacher, Mrs. Westbrook before the program.

Below is a video of the first song of the performance. Tanner is on the bottom in the middle row.

Carter & Parker are definitely twins in every way. They have always been about 2 lbs. from each other in weight and have also kept the same consistency in difference of height since birth. In November they both lost their top right tooth the same day and the following day lost their top left tooth. What a funny thing to happen! Of course, I think one of them might have wiggled it a little bit more than the other, but they both lost them the same days.

Parker & Carter after loosing their first tooth. I tried to get a good picture of both of them gone the following day, but kept on getting their fake smiles - oh well - they are pretty darn cute anyways:).

Parker made this cute pilgrim in class. I had to take a picture of the writing so I can remember how cute it was.

Tanner came home from school with this cool card that Johnathan had made for him at school. So clever and fun.

Jared, Danielle and their family came to visit us right before Thanksgiving while they were up to spend the holiday with Danielle's family. We were able to meet cute little, Blake, for the first time. He is so adorable and fun to hold. They ended up blessing him after Thanksgiving at Danielle's moms home, which was fun to participate in.

We missed Byron terribly and were glad that he got home after his long whirlwind trip to 6 countries - Moscow, Tel Aviv, Budapest, Brussels, Copenhagen, and Johannesburg. He arrived back home around 10:30 a.m. on Thanksgiving Day. I was so glad that all of the flights home were on time so he could be with us on that day. We decided to not be with family this year, but enjoy Thanksgiving at home. My parents were planning on coming up from California, but ended up staying due to bad weather and sickness. Even though it was weird to not have other family with us, it was more relaxing that way due to the craziness of Byron's long trip.

I have an amazing daughter who prepared most of the Thanksgiving Dinner all by herself while I went to the airport. She was so awesome to help out and even decorated the table all by herself (I think she got a little carried away, but still fun). She made 4 pumpkin pies and 2 cream pies the night before. Camille also makes the best "Lion House rolls" that definitely put mine to shame.

Byron brought some fun things back from his trip. he bought 2 vuvuzelas from Africa, some yummy licorice covered chocolate from Denmark, a shirt for me from Africa, and other trinkets and candy. The kids all love hovering over him while he unpacks his suitcase.

Johnathan and Bradley playing the vuvuzela. It is like a big horn that is extremely loud. They all had fun practicing with it.

These yummy chocolates from Denmark were amazing. They are balls of black licorice covered in white chocolate and topped with glitter.

The crazy kiddos on Thanksgiving.

Carter with his turkey.

Tanner

Parker

Camille with her delicious rolls.

Bradley & Parker with their turkeys they made while I went to the airport.

Camille with her pies.

We got a pretty good snow storm on November 28th. The boys and Byron were so awesome to go outside and shovel. It is so great to own a snow shovel for every person in the house - best investment over!

Byron, Parker & Johnathan

We put up our Christmas Tree for FHE on November 29th. The kids are always so patient while I string the lights onto the tree. They do an awesome job at decorating.

Bradley decorating.

I was able to go with Carter & Parker on November 30th to see the Nutcracker in Pleasant Grove. It was fun to go with them. I had seen the Nutcracker when I was a teenager, but hardly remembered it. I was amazed that an auditorium of 2nd graders could sit through the whole thing where I was fidgety myself. The dancing was awesome, though. It was fun to go to something I wouldn't have normally done.

Poor Parker started complaining about his foot hurting on November 29th. He stayed home from school since he couldn't put much pressure on it. I just thought that maybe he was going through a growth spurt - I guess it was one of those bad mom days where I wasn't thinking much about it. By the next day it had gotten worse and he could only hobble along. He didn't want to miss his field trip, so I decided he could go and then I would take him to the doctor. While we were on the field trip, I carried him on my back for the walking part because he was in tears it hurt so bad. I felt so bad I hadn't taken him the previous day to the doctor.

After the field trip I took him to the doctor. He ended up having a really bad sprain. The crazy part is that Parker doesn't remember any one thing he did to cause it. The doctor made a boot for him that molded to his foot and wrapped it with a bandage. We put a large wool sock on the top so he didn't get his toes cold. He was able to walk on it for the next few days until it was good enough to take off.

We headed to Cabelas and enjoyed walking around as Byron showed the kids some of the animals he tried while in Africa. He ate warthog, impala, and kudu. I will write all about his awesome trip in the next post.