Temple Square and Tabernacle Christmas Concert

This weekend we traveled to Salt Lake for the annual Mormon Tabernacle Christmas Concert, one of my most favorite events of the year. We left Saturday morning and went to the Clark Planetarium for a 3D IMAX show. We saw "Under the Sea," which we all agreed was the best 3D one we have seen so far. We shopped around at the Gateway and had lunch, it was so much warmer than it had been earlier this week, thank goodness.

At 6 p.m. we went to Temple Square and saw the lights. It's always a sight to see and there were a few new things displayed this year.
After the lights we met Nanna, Harmony and Cannon for some fries and ice cream. We all stayed at the CottonTree Inn in Bountiful. The hot tub and pool were the highlight.

Sunday Morning we went to the Conference Center for the concert. This was Hayden's first time to the Conference Center and the Christmas Concert and seeing President Monson. I was so excited that she was finally able to go. It's a tradition I look forward to and was glad she finally was old enough.

This years guests were Natalie Cole and David McCullough, author and announcer. There is so much that goes into these productions: the Orchestra on Temple Square, the Bells on Temple Square, the Dancers, the children's choirs, Richard Elliot, the amazing organist (he did a NutCracker organ solo that was absolutely phenomenal.) The shows are always so amazing and powerful, they are hard to describe unless you are there.

Every year the concert gets more popular and more people show up, its hard to get tickets. The tickets are done by a lottery and not one of us got tickets this year. We were lucky that some friends had just enough tickets for the 6 of us.

When the concert was over there was a snow storm going on outside. We had lunch together and journeyed home through the snow.

Catch Up

What a busy last couple of weeks it has been. I haven't had a minute to get caught up on things.

Here is a condensed look at Hayden's 10th birthday.

Hayden is such an animal person, me, not at all. We tried a dog and a gerbil in the last 2 years and they were both insane and we weren't home enough to give them the attention they needed.

Hayden made a list of what she wanted for her birthday and it was "a dog or a kitten or some sort of animal, but preferably a puppy." I told her there was no way we were getting another dog.

So finally I agreed that we could get a cat from the Humane Society. I figured a cat can at least stay home a day and a night by itself and survive and it wouldn't be chewing and hyper and peeing everywhere like the maniac dog we had for 6 months.

The day of her birthday we went to the Humane Society and she picked out an 8 week old gray kitten. After polling half of Utah on what to name her, she decided on Tara Tacie.

So Far the cat has been the best pet. She already knew how to use a litter box, she is calm, and loving. I hope we can be pet people now :-)
Friday night Hayden had a late night friends party. It was a Polka Dot party. She had 8 girls over and 4 stayed the night. The girls were all well behaved, they had a fun time.

Sunday was the family party. We were happy some of Jeremy's family made the drive up.

We ate dinner and the kids did a pinata in the garage.

Harmony made this cute cake. I was not born with the cake decorating ability and so I have to hire out the cake decorating each year.

It was a fun week of celebrating. Now we are excited to go down to Jeremy's parents for Thanksgiving.

Can You Believe It?

Hayden Kelsie Merritt was born November 9th at 1:35 a.m. She weighed 8lbs 12 oz. and was 21 inches long. She stood out from all the other babies in the nursery because she was the cutest and the only one with a bunch of red hair.

(One day old)

Hayden was born with a personality stronger than most. Her mother wasn’t too happy that she would not take a bottle until she was ten months old. She was a picky eater and did not like baby food like most babies. The only baby food she liked was macaroni and cheese, her mom thought it stunk. Hayden learned to walk when she was 11 ½ month old. Her first word was “Abbey,” her favorite Aunt.

(Blessing day, Dec 26, 1999)

When Hayden was a little over 2 yrs old her best friend was born. Halli had red hair just like Hayden; they looked like they could be sisters. They would get so excited to see each other, they could hardly contain themselves.

(Bloomington Lake, Very dirty)

(3rd birthday)

When Hayden’s Mom started nursing school Hayden was 3 years old. She was always happy to go to the babysitter’s house and she never cried when her Mom or Dad left her. She has always been social and very talkative. Hayden started gymnastics when she was 3, she was taller and stronger than the rest of the kids.

(First day of Preschool)
Hayden started preschool when she was 3yrs old. She Attended Murray Community Preschool. She loved school and could not wait to go. When she was 4 yrs old she went to Miss Vicki’s Preschool right on her same street. She wished she could go every day. Miss Vicki taught her how to read, sing and play the piano. Hayden had great friends that lived right across the street; they would play every day, from sun up to sun down.

(First time skiing, 4 yrs old)

When Hayden started Kindergarten at Viewmont Elementary, Mrs. Ball said she was one of the top students. At the end of the school year Mrs. Ball submitted Hayden’s name to move to the Murray School Districts Accelerated Learning School. Hayden had to go and take a test at a school with over 100 other children her age. Hayden was selected as the 2nd alternate, they selected 8 kids and she was tenth. Her Mom was so proud of her.

(First day at Providence Elementary)
One month into her 1st grade year Hayden moved with her Mom to Providence to live in her Aunt Britany’s basement apartment. It was exciting to be able to live with Halli. Britany got Hayden ready for school every day and watched her after school until her mom got home. Hayden instantly made new friends at school and in the neighborhood. She also started taking gymnastics again.

(Finally seeing The Little Mermaid, 2nd time to Disneyland)

Hayden likes to play with her friends as often as her mom allows. They like to ride their bikes, do make-over’s, go to Terabithia, and jump on the tramp.

(Britany, Halli and Hayden at the Miley Cyrus Concert)

Hayden is such a great kid. She is out going, but also shy at times. She always gets her homework done without being asked and has always loved to read. She is still a picky eater and takes home lunch about every day to school. She has never liked juice or pop and prefers water out of the tap with no ice. Hayden easily wakes up every morning for school and doesn't complain. Hayden has always had a sense of style and enjoys wearing earrings and having her nails done and she would wear high heels if her Mom would let her. She has the thickest wavy hair and has been learning new ways to do it herself. She is very adaptable to most any situation. She really loves to babysit her younger cousins.

We love you!

Happy Birthday!
HAYDEN IS 10!

Can you believe it?

Halloween 2009

Early in October Hayden and her friends decide what they all wanted to be. They all got these beautiful gowns. They are "Princesses Gone Bad." Pretty original I thought.

Brooklyn had a Halloween party at her house before they went out trick or treating. They had a great time helping each other get ready.

I loved Brooklyn's white cotton hair streaks.
This is the first year Hayden has gone out trick or treating by herself.

Hayden painted this cute dog pumpkin and entered it in the Macey's Painted Pumpkin Contest.

Today we all met at Jen and Tommy's to see the kids in there costumes.
Abbey and Todd and Cache were Bikers.
Cache looked so cute and tough in his leather.

Mason was the cutest little tiger

Hayden got to go an perform "Thriller" for a church activity, this is her in dance mode.

Halloween's Past

We are getting excited around our house for Halloween, are you? Hayden has her costume all ready to go and has coordinated it with her friends. She is going to be cute and scary at the same time.....you will have to wait and see :-)

Here is Hayden's First Halloween as a Ladybug. I remember when I was pregnant and I saw this really cute ladybug costume at Target and knew that's what she had to be.

My camera broke and so I am missing when she was China Girl when she was two. When she was three she was this cute lion. I originally wanted her red hair to be the mane, I thought it would be perfect, but the costume mane was cuter.

I am missing a few other years too. In Preschool she was a very cute Witch.

In Kindergarten she was a Beautiful Butterfly and Halli was the Incredible's Mom

In first grade she was the Corpse Bride

2nd grade she was a Rock Star

Last year she was a skinny, petrified Mummy

HALLOWEEN is so fun and creative. I hope we don't run out of candy this year.

Bryan Adams - Heaven - Acoustic Live

Circus Fun

Yesterday we all went to the Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey Circus at the Energy Solutions Arena. What a fun show it was.
There were so many amazing acrobats and animal tricks

Our favorites were the Elephants and Tigers. The Elephants sat on stools, layed on the ground, did head stands and made a train. The tigers jumped through hoops, danced and rolled over.

There were so many acts. We couldn't believe all the tricks they could do. Dogs did back flips, an elephant disappeared, they rode bikes across a high wire, there were too many to mention.

The performers made their acts look so easy.
There was a lot of cool magic tricks too.

We had a great time!

Two ladies were shot out of a cannon

After the Circus Hayden got to go to her best friends the Arnold's while Jeremy and I went up to Kingsbury Hall for the Bryan Adams concert. Harmony won tickets on the radio and gave them to us. He was so good. It was him, his guitar and a piano player. He sounds just like he does on the radio. Almost every song he sang we knew. It was great for the two of us to get a moment by ourselves and what could be better than a bunch of loves songs?