Merry Christmas 2009!

Lovin' Life Lots and Lots 2009



There are so many things we are grateful for and not enough space to say it, so we have come up with 9 ways to explain our joy from this year:



Lots and Lots of Family - We had a wonderful time this year with family. In May I went with Rachel and my siblings up to Boise to witness my cousin Nick's fabulous wedding. This was a big deal because I hardly get to see my mom's sissies. Then in July we went to Snowbird for a couple days with my dad's side of the family- the big Packer reunion. There is a blog post about this fun time. The kids loved the rides there! We had an awesome time with John's family in Fairview this past July as well. We rented a big house there and were given lots of R&R. I especially had fun WALKING a 5k with Alex and Erika. I still laugh about Alex's m&m's he carried in his pocket. Such a relaxing time! I am still going to do a post about that but there are so many pics that it is stressing me out! The greatest time was my brother Sam living with us for the summer. He moved up from Dallas and we were very blessed to have him in our home for just a short time.



Lots and Lots of Energy- Hopefully by now you all know that John and I love to exercise whether it be running, lifting, cycling, or aerobics. John did a couple marathons this year. He was a guinea pig for a new marathon that followed the Provo river down the canyon. He is looking forward to next year though when he will do the new Mountain Man Marathon. It is along the Bonneville trail up in the mountains. That is his territory and he loves mountain running! I am so proud to announce that my sister Liz taught me how to swim this year. Literally. I think I was so scared all those years to go under water that I never really learned how to swim laps. I did a triathalon with Liz and Cat along with our friends last April. Before that Liz taught me how to swim at 24 hour fitness. I was so frustrated but finally caught on and it has become my new love! So for Christmas this year I am asking for a 24 hour fitness pass from Santa! John and I snuck in some half marathons as well last year and love it like candy. Now that it is snowy and yucky outside we really miss those long runs. I also enjoy waking up at 5:30 every morning and going to the local rec center to take their aerobic classes. The teacher Marci rocks!



Lots and Lots of Luck- Just recently John woke up in the middle of the night with a pain in the ride side of his abdomen. Since I was such a pro and got my appendix out when I was ten, I kind of kne what it was. We rushed to the hospital at 3am and he got is appendix out at 7am. A quick surgery but long recovery. He is just no starting feel normal again. Also this past June I had an abdominalplasty. In other words my abs were seperated 7 inches and I really had to do something about it before it blew into a full hernia. Needless to say that was the toughest and most painful surgery but well worth it to "get put back together". You can read all about it in the June section of this blog. There are even before and after pics- woohoo! The kids did pretty well this year and only had a couple cavity's each. That beats extractions and root canals! Rachel got glasses a couple months ago because of her lazy eye that she was born with. I didn't want to go for the surgery to fix her eye so we are trying a more subtle way and it seems to be working! Anyway needless to say none of us died this year so I would have to say we have a lot of luck!



Lots and Lots of Learning- like I mentioned... I had a great time learning how to swim this year. I have also been learning some mean lifts at the gym. My favorite is called "skull crushers". Since John goes three times a week to lift he has taught me some new moves and I'm starting to feel like a pro! Ben and Jake are now in Kindergarten and are learning how to read and write. They are also learning to have their own seperate friends and have found that they love to play at other people's houses. Hey, I'm not complaining, that gives me time to have a nap! Isaac is learning how to play the piano and I am his teacher. He is doing really well with it and always asks for another lesson. I think I can teach better than I can actually play. Enoch is in fifth grade this year and is learning a ton! He is starting to catch on more to long division and has learned to do his homework without being asked. I think it is because he has a male teacher this year and really respects him. Enoch has learned how to babysit! That gives John and I a new freedom that we have never experienced! We are looking forward for all the years of dates without paying a babysitter! We have also learned this year how to make our own bread. We bought a wheat grinder and have learned to make John's mom's homemade bread recipe. So every week I make bread and it's delicious! Rachel is learning how to walk but doesn't really show much interest in it as well as learning how to talk. She loves the attention of being the youngest and a girl so I think it puts her learning a little behind. Someday she will catch on!



Lots and Lots of Work- John is working full time still as a seminary teacher for Pleasant Grove High School. He loves teaching the youth and is a great role model for the students. He is also enjoy his work for Devry University teaching English online. He has picked up two classes each term and really loves the fact that he can work from the comfort of his own home. I am lucky to be able to stay at home and be there for my kids. Although I still have a lot of work to do for example around 9 loads of laundry a week. I am working full time as a homemaker but love just playing with Rachel while the boys are at school. John just recently got called as a stake high counselman in our church so most Sundays he is gone to meetings and other wards. Sundays are hard for me but the boys are good at helping out. I am working in the Primary Presidency and really love the children in our ward. It seems like kids are so brilliant these days and each have a special gift to give the world. We love our callings and have put them as one of the most important things to us in our lives. Speaking of work, we also painted our kitchen cupboards black this past summer. I saw it on a blog and loved the look of it so we read her instructions and did it ourselves. We love the destressed look and think it's great because if our kids run into them and it makes a ding it just adds to it! That was hard work but we love how it looks! John also put in new lighting in the kitchen and that makes a huge difference!



Lots and Lots of Firsts-Rachel turned one this year and also got her first tooth. Now she has four. It is fun to see her with all her firsts. I absolutely love babies! Isaac got baptized this year into our church and has really grown since then as a new member of our ward. His cousin Lacey was also baptized and we had a nice luncheon afterwards. We bought Enoch his first cologne and deordorant this year although he probably doesn't need it yet. He puts it on after he has a shower and it makes him feel so big. He used to spray John's cologne on him before school so he is glad to have his own now! I got my first life size cardboard character of Edward from Twilight. my friends decorated my front lawn for my birthday and Edward was standing by the front door. Now it's in my boys' room and they still get freaked out by him there. But I have to admit I totally love the Twilight series and saw New Moon for the first time and three other times since. John even took me to it! I also went off sugar and realized for the first time that I'm an addict and so are my kids! My friend Colleen and I did a half to half challenge. We went off sugar from one half marathon to the other that we did at the end of the year. It was two months to be exact. It was hard and challenging but the best thing for my body! Next year we are paying our kids to not eat sugar!



Lots and Lots of Laughs- On the right side of our blog there are quotes from our boys and the funny things they say. In fact the other day Ben came up to me upon finding out that the toothfairy was late in delivering a reward from Jake's tooth and said, "I know why the tooth fairy hasn't come yet. I think she has the swine flu." They are always saying the funniest things that make us laugh! John is still getting lots of laughs over the fact that last year he put a student's used phone in my stocking and told me that was all he could afford. (although he gave me the new phone like an hour later.) He played it up for the whole hour though and it really didn't bother me at least it was a phone. He always tells his students that now and gets a laugh out of my reaction to that. But I really didn't mind getting a used phone! So this year hopefully I can get him back by some of the gifts I'm giving him. John is a great story teller in fact that's one of the reasons I married him so there are always lots of laughs at our house! I don't think I've ever laughed so much then when I'm around him.



Lots and Lots of Fun- We had loads of fun this year taking the kids on new adventures. One of which our friend let us borrow his four wheelers and we took them up American Fork canyon with the boys while John's mom watched Rachel for the day. It was very fun especially when John took us the wrong way and led us up an extremely difficult and bumpy path! We also had fun in Idaho this past summer at the sand dunes and the drive-in theater. (we ended up being the only ones there because it was a rainy and cold night). This year our boys have really taken to playing board games and we are excited about that because John and I are gamers! We love to play board games with bowls of candy and popcorn and bathe in the beauty of having fun with small minds. They really are better at some games than we are especially with the Wii!



Lots and Lots of Blessings- We feel really blessed this year especially with John's jobs because of the economy. We are so blessed to have the necessaties of life and so much more. I think of all of you especially during this holiday season and remember how you have touched our lives in one way or the other. We feel extremely blessed to have you in our lives and realize that the most important things are the relationships that we have with you.
I want to end this letter with a challenge and I love giving and receiving challenges. I want to challenge you to read the Book of Mormon, even if you are not a member of our church. Let me know if you read it and what you think of it. I know that it will help you in your life and know that God has the capacity to give you blessings if you will read this book and take it to heart. I love a good book and am in the process of speed reading it during the next two weeks. One of John's goals this year was to read the Book of Mormon two times this year and he is almost done with that goal. So our challenge for 2009 is to read the Book of Mormon!
We are especially grateful for the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ and hope that we can remember him not only at this time of year but all the time. He is the reason for all seasons! We love you and wish you the best for 2010!
Love, the Fossums
Sarah and John
Enoch, Isaac, Jacob, Benjamin and Rachel

Holy Yummy!

Tis the season for Spudnuts! The other night Liz and David and their kids came up and we made spudnuts and ate them all! They are especially delicious when they are fresh and hot. My mom made them every year when we were growing up for neighbors during the holidays, and my Mom-in-law makes them as well with a special spice: cardimom. I like to combine the two recipes and make my own. I was thinking of opening up a doughnut restaurant called "Rispie Ream". I know it sounds like Krispie Kream but hey, if I can get people to come to my resaurant that way all the better!

Spudnut Recipe

2 C. Milk

7 C. flour

1/2 C. shortening

2 eggs

1/2 C. sugar

1 1/2 tsp. cardamom spice

1/2 tsp. salt cream of tartar (optional)

2 T. yeast

crisco veg. oil for frying

1 C. mashed potatoes (I use instant)

Cream together sugar, shortening, and mashed potatoes. Warm milk and add to mixture. Add all ingredients except flour, mix well. Add flour, kneading until smooth and elastic. Let rise until doubled in size. Roll out and cut into shapes. I use a mason jar lid for the doughnut shape and a smaller lid like a lemon juice lid for the hole. Let rise again. Heat oil on medium heat. Test a doughnut before cooking to make sure oil is hot enough. Place doughnut counter side up in oil. Cook to a golden brown. Icing: powdered sugar, water, vanilla. Mix until semi-thick. You will love these!

Crafting it up!

I love to surf different blogs about homemade crafts. Here are a few ideas I have copied. I love to crochet and always have to be doing something while watching tv. On Thanksgiving I decided to crochet my little niece some gloves and a scarf. I know it looks like totally 80's but I love it! I have made some other friends gloves like this as well per request! I found this keychain idea from my sister Liz who found it on a blog. I made myself one and love it! You can put the fabric around your wrist so you never forget your keys! Also, the big thing right now is scrabble tile necklaces. I made keychains by cutting up some wood and the same way as the tiles, then spiced it up with beads. Some other ideas were these blanket covers for the newborn carseats. I made a boy one and a girl one for my friends' showers. It is so much fun to relax and have a crafting day every once in awhile. I have found some other ideas as well but can't post them cuz they are Christmas gifts!
Some of the blogs I like are makeitandloveit, ucreate, and infarantlycreative. When you hit these blogs there are other links to more and more. Happy crafting!

Twilight Party: in Celebration of New Moon

This past Friday night I had a Twilight party before New Moon comes out this week. For all you Twilight Saga fans, I'm sure you know how fun it is to go with the craze and celebrate! My friend Colleen was so kind to host it at her house. She has a beautiful basement that just got finished with a home theater system. We had Stephenie Meyer, and Edward and Alice look alikes there. Everyone brought lots of food: cupcakes, peanut butter bars, brownies, artichoke dip, and lots of other mouth-watering food. There were lots of pictures taken with the celebrities, then we started the movie, and afterwards had a raffle with New Moon gifts. My sister Liz crocheted a little Edward doll for the raffle. He was holding a little apple. It was very cute! We dressed up in Prom dresses or vampire attire. I decided the easiest way to go would be vampire. Needless to say I look like a cardboard cutout with my pale face and strange black hair. It is so fun to dress up though. Who ever gets that chance once you are a mom? Later on during the movie, my friend's husband (Richard) decided to come and scare us. He has custom made vampire teeth. The girls thought he was just plain funny. He was sucking on cinnamon breath mints and blowing it in people's faces. Needless to say, he wasn't very scary, just funny. It was a fun night out with the girls. Don't feel bad if you couldn't make it this year, because we will probably be doing a New Moon party next year!

Edward: where is he going to be next?

For my birthday this year my friends gave me this life-size figure of Edward from the movie "Twilight". He is pretty scary when you walk into a room and aren't expecting him to be there. You really feel the presence of someone watching you, it is way wierd! So John thought it would be funny to take it a little farther and try to scare me even more. He tried to put Edward in the least expected places: behind my door, in the kitchen, in the shower, and even in my bed! I thought it was so funny and so did all my kids! My boys have been begging me to put him in their room because they think Edward is very cool. So after my Twilight party, I put him in their room and just this morning as I was putting something in there, he scared me again! Edward, where are you going to be next?

Girl with Glasses

Rachel was born with a lazy eye in her left eye. So eventually her doctor told me to take her to a pediatric eye doctor. I went to one that was located in Orem and didn't have a very pleasant experience. He was very pompous to say the least and jumped to the conclusion right away that Rachie needed surgery. So I wanted a second opinion and took her up to Primary Children's hospitol to Dr. Larsen. He said that Rachel has a very mild case of youth far-sightedness which is different than that of an adult. He recommended that she try glasses before surgery. Glasses are a more mild way of fixing her eye and will strengthen the muscle over time so that when she is around four or so she won't need them anymore. If the glasses don't work, which we will know around eight weeks, then we will opt for the surgery. I think she looks pretty cute though, don't you? It was hard for me to get a pic of her without her glasses glaring. She seems to like them though and doesn't take them off except when we are driving in the car. I think it's because I tease her in the rearview mirror so she takes them off and throws them. Cutie!

A Happy Halloween!

I had a fabulous birthday this year. Since my birthday falls on Halloween, it is literally a treat every year. This year my Mom and Sam came down from Idaho to celebrate with us. It has been a long time since they both have been with me on my birthday. John and I woke up early that morning to run the Halloween Half Marathon which took place up by Sundance and down through Provo canyon. I ran it with my friends because of course John is way to speedy for me. Four of my friends and I trained for a long time for this race. We decided it would be fun to dress up as Cheetah girls. A lot of people wore costumes. It was a fun race. The first five miles were a very steep downhill so my legs really took a beating. When we reached the Provo trail, it was really foggy and kind of spooky: perfect for halloween. Then as we came out of the canyon it turned really sunny and beautiful: a perfect run. I was pretty happy with my time: 1:59 which was my personal goal. And of course John ran it like in 90 minutes.

It was a surprise to me when we got home to see that my yard had been decorated with every halloween decor you can think of. I thought it was awesome but my friends were hoping I would think it was discusting because it was major overkill. I loved it though and felt loved as well. The tombstones read stuff like: here lies a hottie, and i ran here.... and the date of my birthday. I thought it was so fun. They even put Edward from Twilight on my front porch! Liz and Sam helped decorate as well. I thought that was pretty surprising since Liz came up from Provo and then came back down and met me at the end of the race. I had no idea what trouble she went through that morning. Sam also went to Krispie Cream and bought us all doughnuts! My friend Colleen and I went off sugar for two months and Halloween was the day that we could eat sugar again so that doughnut tasted so good!

I went out to lunch with Sam, mom and Liz and we went to Iggy's to eat. Then I went and got some new jeans at the Buckle because John gave me some birthday money! I got a lot of fun gifts from everyone this year and feel so loved!

That night we went trick-or-treating at the church trunk or treat. Liz and David and their kids came up as well. Liz made a yummy white chili and brought me my favorite sugar cookies topped with candy corns! I decided not to have a cake this year because all I wanted were those cookies! It was worth every bite too! I think I ate like four!

This year the kids were very cute in their costumes: Enoch was Michael Jackson and was "thrilled" because he really loves his music! Isaac was a zombie-mummy(anything to look as scary as possible). the twins Ben and Jake were ninjas and Rachel was a little unicorn. I was going to dress up but by that time I was dead tired so I just painted my face and called it good.

Afterwards we took the kids around the block trick-or-treating and then hung out the rest of the night. I think I crashed at like 9 because I was wiped out. What a fun and Long day!

Thanks so everyone that made this day special! Earlier on in the week my friends surprised me by having John take me out to dinner and they all met me at the restaraunt..... I also got the treat to go to my favorite restaraunt with John, mom and Sam: the Red Iguana. Then on Sunday after my birthday we went to Mom and Dad Fossums and they had a special birthday dinner for me with everyone. I think I'm all birthdayed out now! Thanks everyone!

Family Times

We just went to a family reunion for my Dad's side of the fam - the Packer reunion. It was a short one, only a couple days. I wish it was longer because by the time we all got reaquinted it was time to go home. It was up at the Snowbird resort. They have awesome summer activities up there: the Alpine slide, Zip line, bungee trampoline, tram ride, to name a few.We all got day passes so that we could go on anything and everything as many times as we wanted. The boys really had a lot of fun because they have never done anything like that before. When we went up the mountain to the top of the peak, we all got out and took pictures. It was very beautiful and the pictures don't do it justice. John got a second wind and wanted to run down the mountain on the trails. We watched him on our way down and could see him running along the edge of the peaks. It looked like he was in a movie, it was so pretty. We went swimming and hung out in the condos we stayed in as well. It was all a lot of fun. We took a family picture the last day we were there. It is a rare occasion when all my Mom and Dad's kids are together. We also had a birthday party for my 80 year old grandma, Lola. She is the cutest little lady and so genuinely charitable. We also played games: Dudo (dice game on Pirates of the Carribean) and Scum (a card game). What a fun time! I love Summers because of family reunions. Now in a week or so we are going to a reunion on John's side of the family. We are looking forward to more fun times!