Dec Ellis Update

Wow! What an exciting month filled with parties, food, family, friends, more food, more parties, wrapping, shopping, treats, more shopping, more wrapping, and more food and parties!!! I'm exhausted! I love Christmas time and the whole spirit of giving that naturally comes this wonderful time of year. I think others tend to be a little more thoughtful, a little more happy--unless you are shopping at Walmart, and a little more Christlike. I am always sad to see it all come to an end, but find myself always looking forward to a new year and what will come. So, here's to 2010--may it be filled with many happy memories and wonderful growing experiences!
Here are some pics of our Holiday month!

Corbin helping decorate the Christmas tree.


Bella is wishing for spring weather. That is the look of one lazy dog!!!


Corbin painting a work of art. We do a lot of art projects when it's cold outside!


The annual Crowther family Christmas party. This year my aunt Laurie was in charge and we did the nativity. She got everyone involved and it was fun. Goose was the inkeeper and Seth was the lead shepherd over all the little sheep!



Christmas sugar cookies!!! Yum, Yum, Yum!


I succumbed to the pressure and let Corbin drink Mountain Dew on Christmas Eve! He drank the whole can. I guess you could say that I am the meanest mom in the world because I very rarely let my kids drink pop and the only time I buy the stuff is once a year--Coke for Kyle on Christmas. Dental Hygiene taught me way too much information about soda pop and it's effects. Gavin is the Mountain Dew man and he was thrilled when Corbin chose that as his drink of choice for the party!


Christmas Eve was at the Crowther house this year. It was fun--as always! A night filled with laughter, presents, food, candy, money:), more food,a spiritual message, and a gift for our Savior. Dad, your pulled pork was amazing!!! Such a fun night with the people you love the most!


This is Eden saying goodbye to our little elf Jack. On Christmas Eve, he flies back to Santa's Workshop and won't return again until next December. Eden has probably asked me 5 times where Jack is since he left. Her and Corbin LOVED waking up every morning and searching for Jack. He was fun to have in our home. See ya next year Jack!


Merry Christmas Eden! She got a kitchen and I made her the adorable chef hat and apron to go with it. Thanks Valerie!!! (my wonderful friend who gave me sewing instructions through the whole process) You are the best! Eden makes me food everyday! She loves her kitchen and so do I:)


Merry Christmas Corbin! Santa brought Corbin an awesome castle and a whole bunch of knights and dragons to go with it. The castle is almost as big as he is.


Eden LOVES animals. Her stocking was stuffed with these cute little critters!


Let's cook something up Grandma!


Well, here's to a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!

Best Dinner Rolls

Check out these dinner rolls! The rolls turn out light, fluffy and very, very white. Everything a basic dinner roll should be. Great for sopping up red sauce or eating with soup. These rolls will win your heart.

Do not fear the yeast. Yeast breads are not only carbo-delicious, but they make you feel productive when you're really doing nothing more than letting dough rise in a warm corner of your kitchen.

Give The Best Dinner Rolls a try. Bet you can't eat just one!

Here's what you need

3-1/2 to 3-3/4 cups all purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup butter, softened
2 teaspoons salt
1 package regular or quick acting active dry yeast
1/2 cup very warm water (120-130 degrees)
1/2 cup very warm milk (120-130 degrees)
1 egg

Here's how to do it.

Mix 2 cups of the flour, the sugar, shortening, salt and yeast in medium bowl. Add warm water, warm milk and egg. Beat on low speed 1 minute, scraping bowl frequently. Beat on medium speed 1 minute, scraping bowl frequently. Stir in enough remaining flour to make dough easy to handle.

Turn dough onto lightly floured surface. Knead about 5 minutes or until smooth and elastic. Place in greased medium bowl and turn greased side up. Cover and let rise in warm place about 1 hour or until double. (Dough is ready if indentation remains when touched.)

Punch down dough. Form dough into balls. Brush with margarine. Cover and let rise about 30 minutes or until double.

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Bake 12 to 18 minutes or until golden brown.

Christmas Tree Cutting 2009

Every year we have a tradition of cutting down our Christmas tree. This event has become a ritual in my family and no matter how many years go by I still find myself enjoying it more and more. Maybe because the older I get the more I realize life is short in passing and these times with my family all around me are always the best times there are in life!

It doesn't matter if it's packing your tree out on snowy roads or sporting your cutest pink hat. This tradition just can't be beat.

And speaking of hat's, who wouldn't want to wear something as cute at this pink bonnet!
Baylee --- you're hat is almost as cute as you are!
Hat's are definitely in when it comes to tree cutting, and it seems Seth has stolen Gavin's!
I love your hat Gavin, it even looks good on Seth!!! Nice model job Seth. The hat looks like an Eddie Bauer original! Maybe I should have bought two because Seth, I know you secretively want one!

When we leave the cabin to begin the day of cutting down our handsome piny furs, it's no small feat getting everyone's trucks, trailers and cars loaded up with all of our gear and lined up at the trail head ready to go.

While we are waiting for everyone to arrive, it's usually about this time some one starts flinging snow and it never ends. Attempts to catch the unobservant unaware thereby slamming them with a snowball usually continutes on throughout the entire excursion and it isn't until we're headed home that the snow throwing ceases!

Seth, did you forget to duck?

And how fun would cutting trees be without skidding around on the four wheelers. Craig and Kate are having a good time taking their turn. I love Kate and her toothless grin. I also love listening to her sing "All I want for Christmas is 'all' of my front teeth!"

Right now I have a million things to do and posting on my blog is not really what I should be doing but for some reason it's therapeutic for me. I find more and more Christmas is about stress and tonight I came home from a function a little stressed, so the first place I came to was my study. Glade calls it my cave, but no matter the title, I came in and shut the door.

After turning on my little space heater, I fired up my Christmas music, and started editing pictures for this post. I love pictures! I love everything about them. I love taking them, I love looking at them, I love the people in them, and I find there is something spiritual and soulful in sitting here in my study late at night listening to music and working with each individual photo.

I love my family, and I can't sit here working on these photo's with out realizing what is ultimately important in this life. The older I get the more I realize that life is about love. It feels good to be loved by a family!

What would my life be like without the very people you see here smiling in these pictures?
It would be a sad life. I think that's why I love taking pictures.
Every time I capture a picture, I have frozen a moment in time. I have frozen feelings, perceptions, and emotions associated with that picture that tell a story, a story that speaks to my heart. The mind's eye records everything we experience and when I capture a picture, I can go back and look at that picture and experience that moment all over again!

In this next picture I'm not sure I want to experience the moment all over again. While we were cutting our trees down Emilyn accidentally came upon a tragic loss of life. Deserey couldn't get over the sad sight and quickly came to fetch me with my camera.
Do you see him, the poor little dead thing stuck in the branch? Some unfortunate lonely little mouse was traveling upward in this tall pine tree to who knows where or why and somehow froze to death on the climb. Every time I look at this picture I try to unlock the clues as to how he died.

That's what made me think of my slogan I put on my Christmas card this year "Be alive while you ARE alive! Life is a fragile thing and sometimes we focus too much on that which is of little importance.

Relationships, people, the human soul, Christ's pure example of how to love one another, this is where we need to place our energies! Ali has a bond with her grandpa that is unrestrained. Her love flows easy like and freely, it is unobstructed in every way. As a result she is easy to love back. As I watch her win the heart of her grandfather I see that when any one of us chooses to love in this fashion it produces the same result, a desire to return that love.

So my question is . . . Are you loving regardless, or are you waiting to be loved? Do you love freely, or is your love based on conditions where by you feel loved, so you return love? Do you forgo yourself in all things maintaining a loving heart, or does your love swing on the hinge of conditions, opening and closing according to your limited judgments.

I am thankful today that my family loves me unconditionally! Kids are the greatest example of maintaining a loving heart.

And the people in my life are a great example of that constant open heart! They know me, and they love me anyway!


It doesn't matter if it's on a mountain cutting down a tree,

playing and having fun together,

enjoying each others camaraderie

Their love is steady, dependable, reliable, and rich in abundance.
And it is times like these that are irreplaceable.

How thankful I am for Christ and for His birth. For the chance to build a tradition around celebrating his life. It's a fun tradition and after it's all over everyone is a little sad to go home.

As you can see even Eden didn't want the day to end.

2009 Christmas tree cutting once again was a huge success.
Happy Christmas Crowther Family!

Happy Birthday Gage

Look at that grin. This little girl loves her daddy! And boy does this daddy love his little girl!
Being a great dad is just one of Gage's many talents!

A couple of weeks ago I had my traditional Grandkid Jammie party. I started this a few years ago and it's been a hit with the grandkids ever since. Every year just before Christmas the grandkids come over to my house and we eat, play games, watch movies, open gifts --- which include a new pair of pajamas to sleep over in (if your old enough.)

This year Gage and Missy came over to my house and spent the night helping us with the festive event. I decided after watching Gage with the kids all night that next year I'm buying him a Santa suit! I also hate to inform him that he's going to have to show up every year now because he made the night so fun. I really felt like I'd hired an entertainer for the evening. He had the kids giggling and laughing the whole night long.

As soon as it was time for the kids to get in their pajamas, Glade and I produced the wrapped gifts from the basement and for the moment while we were getting kids situated we just sat the gifts on the kitchen counter. That's when they suddenly went missing. After settling rambunctious kids down I went to grab the gifts and mysteriously they had disappeared. That's also the moment I noticed Gage standing front and center with a giant grin fashioned on his face. For those of you who haven't figured this out yet, Gage is the biggest tease ever.

As soon as the kids noticed the gifts were gone they all started clambering and pitching a fit demanding their presents. That's when Gage started to laugh and exclaimed "oh, oh, looks like Santa hid them." From that moment on it was mass hysteria with kids running everywhere through the house looking for their gifts all the while with Corbin trailing behind them crying "I don't want to have to find my present." I've never laughed so hard at such mayhem!

The kids finally through a series of hot and cold tips, found their gifts and excitedly dressed in their flannel attire. What a fun night and I guess what I'm trying to say here is, I'm sure glad I have a son named Gage! I don't know what I was thinking though having him two days before Christmas! He was actually due well after Christmas but I guess wonderful surprises that bring great joy to the heart must surely come at Christmas.

I still remember coming home from the hospital on Christmas eve, a brand new baby in my arms. It's the only time in my life I have ever been fully prepared for Christmas. That Christmas eve was a night I'll never forget. The feelings and emotions of that night are still with me in great detail! One must keep in mind, it was only a year prior that I had trudged through the snow stood by the side of a cold tiny grave and buried a baby. Now I sat comfortably in the chair next to my porcelain nativity scene, dressed in my new red bathrobe Glade gave me, pondering over distant heart throbbing memories, while cradling God's great gift to me under the soft glow of the Christmas tree lights.

There is no greater joy than to hold a brand new healthy baby in your arms on Christmas Eve! Especially when you just got done sending a baby back to Heaven! For some reason the ultimate gifts that encompass the real meaning behind Christmas to me felt so much deeper that year. Well, they had meaning now. Suddenly Christ's gift of living and dying for me personally had great meaning! After having experienced the greatest loss a mother can experience, the death of her child, suddenly I came to personally appreciate the Saviors love for me in my life and in the new life I was holding.

Gage's birth two days before Christmas was no accident. Corbin's death twelve months prior was no accident. It was my Father in Heaven's way of searing me to my Savior and helping me as I make my way back to my home on high. That night as I sat in my chair holding my new son, looking at the Nativity with Joseph and Mary kneeling by the baby Jesus with all the meaning this scene now held in my life was the most beautiful Christmas I've ever had.

Gage I know you would have really liked a July birthday but I'm sure glad you were born in December, even if it is crazy! You'll always be my Christmas Joy! You healed my heart the day you were born and I'm so thankful you filled a place in this family at a time when no other spirit could have filled it quite like you did. You are great person with a great heart! I can call you and you're always good to help me with whatever I need. There are so many things I look up to you in.

When I look at Baylee I see Gage all over again. She is the cutest baby and the best natured baby just like her dad, she is always happy and never ever cries, just a joy to have and to hold. So too are you Gage; a joy to have and to hold! Happy Birthday! Thanks for being you! Thanks for always making life great! I'm buyin' you a Santa suit. You've got yourself a job! We love you so much! You are a great blessing to this family and I hope you have a wonderful day today!

The Correct Way To Weigh Yourself

With the holidays coming up I thought you'd all like to know
the correct way of weighing yourself.

I can't believe I've been doing it wrong all these years! Hahahahahahaha

{ Merry Christmas }

I am sorry I am such a blog slacker but I rarely update my own blog, but here is a little Christmas card from me and Gage, you will all be getting one in the mail, but we just wanted to give you a little preview.
Hope you all have a Merry Christmas! We love you All!

Christ: The Real Gift of Christmas

Christ: The Real Gift of Christmas

Take your mouse and click on the above title "Christ: The Real Gift of Christmas." Take sometime to watch a video featured on LDS org.com It's beautiful and at this time of year when the 'worldly' threatens to overshadow the real meaning of the season, I hope you will feel of the spirit and it will bring you peace, comfort, and joy, bolstering up your spirits and helping you gain the fortitude to deal with all the mayhem and madness that this Christmas season often brings. While Christ may be one of the smallest figures in the Nativity scene, I pray He is not the smallest part of our lives!

As Seth and Goose Would Say . . . SA . . WEEEEEET!

There are some things in life that just don't come any sweeter!

That is . . . according to Seth and Goose!

It is right here that I really should insert a picture of Gage and Missy. Thanks to them, Seth and Kelson got to attend one of the most anticipated Jazz games of the season. And I should insert a picture of Craig and Emilyn here also,
because thanks to their generosity, Seth and Kelson got to move on down in the world!

Now it's not often a person wants to move down in the infrastructure of life, but when it comes to a Jazz Game and soft padded chairs on the 2nd row of the gymnasium floor, (TRANSLATION = BEST COURT SIDE SEATS IN THE HOUSE) then . . . baby . . . move me down! Seth and Goose could have reached out and actually patted Ron Artest on the head. Instead Kelson just shouted some kind of verbal encouragement, like "You Suck Artest!") Notice the smug grin on Seth's face as he obviously agreed enthusiastically with Kelson's fine sense of sportsmanship!

And, thanks to Craig and Emilyn's generous offer to trade seats with Goose and Seth during the third quarter of the game. These two goof balls not only got to watch the game from the best seats in the house, the one's where you can actually feel and smell the sweat of the Jazz, they also got to be on TV!

The pictures you are actually looking at were taken by Kelson sitting in Seth's living room watching the Jazz game on television for the second time. Kelson was a little shocked when suddenly the image on the screen showed two energetic mug shots of non other than . . . you got it, the Crowther boys! Now that's all we've heard about for the last two days. Did I mention the Jazz beat the Lakers 102 - 94! I think that alone is worth two days of praise and acclamations (I hate the Lakers,) but how cool is it to see yourself on TV . . . while . . . your beloved home team is beating the Lakers 102-94. Well, it has to be exactly as Seth and Goose described it . . . SA . . . WEEEEET!

November Ellis Update

Wow! Where did that month go? I can't believe how fast the months go by. The holidays come and go way too fast!!! We had a lot of fun in November.

Corbin loves to help me make cookies, bread, anything that has sugar in it:) If it has anything to do with dinner--forget it! He is only into helping me if it's some kind of treat and he can lick the spoon or the beaters!


This Target toy catalog came in the mail at the beginning of the month. It was the first thing Corbin wanted to look at when he woke up every morning. So one day I said, "Maybe there is something in there you would like for Christmas." I handed him a marker and told him to circle the things he liked the most (not the right thing to say to a 4 year old because he circled something on every page!) He kept asking me everyday when it was going to be Christmas. One morning, I found him in the kitchen with Eden looking through the beloved catalog. This was the conversation..."Now circle a toy you think I might like Eden because you're going to have to buy me a present. Tell me the ones that you like and I will try to buy them for you okay?" He would turn a page, point to something and say "Eden do you like this? That might be fun for you." Then I would hear Eden respond with "Awewite" (alright). It was too cute. By the end of the week Corbin just couldn't wait any longer. He woke up, asked me if it was Christmas, and when I told him no he said "Mom, we need to go to Target today because this is just taking way too long!"


Eden is ready for the snow!


Corbin wanted to set up his tent and have a movie night. Eden was so excited because the move they watched was Tinkerbell and the lost Treasure:)


Eden is always so fashionable when it's time for bed! Do you think she could start a trend? Yikes! That could be really scary.


Cutting teeth is NO FUN! Eden is getting her 4 molars and has had a constant runny nose because of it! I found her happily playing with her toys one day with tissue shoved up each nostril. I think she got tired of the runny nose and instead of constantly wiping, she figured out a better method:)


Eden is helping Grandpa load the dishwasher after Sunday dinner. Give me another one Grandpa!


Corbin had a fieldtrip with his preschool class to the Ogden Train Station! He loved it!


Future author of a famous book? Corbin is into writing letters and making up stories. Then, he reads them to me and Eden. I will have to post a video of his finest work! It is certain to be published one day:)


PIE DAY!!! Every year all the girls get together and make pies before Thanksgiving. I was not a fan of this tradition when I was going to school and not married. But, I have to say that now it is one of my favorites! The kids love it too. They always make cookies with the leftover dough. We make Apple, Pumpkin, Pecan, Raisin, and the favorite-Berry! It was such a fun day! Mom, I need you to send me the picture of all of us!


Thanksgiving was spent with the Ellis family this year. It is always fun to get together and share stories and just be together. I am most thankful for my families! I love you all!


The annual cutting of the Christmas trees! Every year on the day after Thanksgiving we all go to the cabin and head up to cut our trees. It is always so much fun. The trees are a little more like the one on Charlie Brown but the experience each year is priceless. We enjoyed eating, making gingerbread trains and trees, movie night, eating more pie, talking, laughing, and just being together. A GREAT tradition!!! Thanks mom and dad for another fun weekend at the cabin--Good Times!


My friend Erin told me about "The Elf on the Shelf." It is something that EVERY parent should invest in-especially if you have little ones. Meet Jack! He is our little elf that comes to our house daily. He flies back to the North Pole at night while the kids are sleeping and reports to Santa of naughty and nice things he sees throughout the day. He can see everything! Then, he flies back in the morning and appears in a different place in the house. Don't touch him--his magic might go away. The first day you find him, you have to give him a name. He is under strict orders from Santa not to talk to you, but only watch and observe, then report. Corbin named our little elf Jack! It is so fun! Every morning when the kids wake up the first thing they want to do is find Jack. On Christmas Eve, he will fly back to Santa's workshop and will return next year on Dec, 1st! He is like part of our family now:) We love it!


Happy holidays everyone! We wish you a very merry Christmas and love you all!