Family.

We had a nice surprise from my family this weekend - Nathan and Lauren flew in from San Francisco and stayed with us so consequently Dallin came up from BYU and McKay ditched the parents in Park City to came and play!  We had a blast, good food, good talks and a slumber party under the Christmas Tree.

 Late Saturday night we somehow got started on arm wrestling wagers.  All the boys had to arm wrestle each other with both left and right hands.

 "did you see that"

Nate's only win for the night!

Little brother is winning ...

Gregg beats Nate.

hurt? what?

 Is that a cheaters move I see ...?

 Two hands and he still can't win ... sorry Nate.

 Next up were the sisters

{Laurens younger sister Shannon came up from BYU)

 Is that Nate yelling at his wife?

 Nate was promising Lauren all sorts of gifts if she could beat her sister - there was some serious wagering going on between Nate and Lauren ... 

 ... but in the end her little sister beat her.

And what is a weekend with family without some game playing?!

I tried a new strategy in Ticket to Ride Europe and beat everyone!

{even though Lauren tried to show this Instagram photo of my hand of cards to Nate ...}

German Pancakes*

German Pancakes

4 eggs

2 cups milk

2 tablespoons butter, melted

1 1/2 cups flour

2 teaspoon sugar (I like 2 tablespoons)

1/2 teaspoon salt

In a blender mix eggs, flour, salt and sugar.  Preheat oven to 400 degrees - put a 9x13 pan in the oven when preheating with the 2 tablespoons of butter so it can melt.  When preheated (and butter is melted) pour in the batter and bake for 20 minutes.  It will puff up while baking (if you don't over mix it).

Cut and top with fruit, jam, yogurt, syrup, whipped cream and powdered sugar.

*I did a little research online because there is always a debate over whether these are 'German' pancakes or 'Swedish' pancakes.  They are in fact German pancakes ... Swedish pancakes are more like a crepe.

Another fantastic recipe I made a couple of week ago:

Pumpkin Waffles

2 cups flour (can use whole wheat)

1/4 cup sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 large eggs

1 1/2 cups eggnog (I like the pumpkin spice flavor)

4 tablespoons oil, melted butter

1/2 cup canned pumpkin

Combined dry ingredients in a bowl.  In separate bowl combine wet ingredients and then blend into dry ingredients.  For an extra treat throw in a handful of chocolate chips.

ho, ho, ho.

Friday Flashbacks.

Check out this hunk-of-burnin' love I married :)

Gregg Simons | 1995 | senior year

Tree.

The Christmas tree is up and decorated!

{I am still on the hunt for the perfect tree skirt}

Thanksgiving 2012.

Thanksgiving was very low-key and relaxing this year - which is just what we needed after a stressful November and a big December ahead {more on all that later}.

I made this thankful tree for everyone to add their thankful leaves to - Truman and Jean drew pictures of each other for the tree!

The dinner!

My aunt Marie and uncle Jerry came over from Colorado, and my grandparents came up from St. George.  

Dallin was the lucky uncle who got to share his lap {and plate} with Truman!  Thanks Dallin.

I take no credit for these darling decorations - my friend Tami had the idea - we made them earlier this week together.

Nap-time.

and pie time {I was in charge of making all the pies}.

Jean playing dress-ups.

Stories with grandpa.

Santa's elf in the wood shop.

and Santa's other elf at the sewing machine!

We are thankful for all that we have and especially for our families!

s'mores.

We kicked off the Thanksgiving weekend tonight with a trip up the funicular at the St. Regis for s'mores by the fire.

On the ride down Truman liked hanging from the top of the funicular.

And then of course Bodie had to try.