Taxes and Erin's Basketball

I should have gone to school for accounting.  Then I could take over Michael's (Mario's dad) business when he retires.  I love numbers and I love doing my own taxes.  But I don't have any real training except for google searches and asking some accountant friends or family for some advice occasionally. Once, when I lived in Guam, I went to the base legal office to get some help with my taxes.  They couldn't have been simpler since we only had Mario's military income.  But I felt like I knew more than the volunteers in the office, so I have never gone back to ask for help.

But Mario really should fire me as the tax preparer.  I realized today that I have made errors the last couple years that cost us $750.  Fortunately, the government lets us amend our returns for the last 3 years.  I went back and checked all my returns for the past 10 years, and I guess I only made the mistake for the past 2 years.  Must be my Alzheimer's kicking in.  So I am lucky that I can amend them. Mario is patient and hasn't even suggested I seek a real accountant (I am sure he would prefer it though.)  He knows how much I love doing them myself.  But they have become quite a bit more complicated now that I have my tutoring business and we have the rental house.  I may need to seek more help than google has to offer in the near future.  Darn it.

In other news, Erin has a sprained ankle, but with two girls out, one with injury and the other for failing classes, they are down to only 6-7 girls that can play freshman basketball.  So the coach is wanting her to play.  I can't make it to the game tonight which is probably better because I might have given the coach an earful.

FHE Basketball

All four kids are playing basketball now. Eric for church, Erin for school and church and twins for the city. So we came to the chapel to play some 3 on 3 for our FHE activity. Having kids this age has been a lot of fun when it comes to family sports.


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Christmas

For Christmas this year, I found a used sewing table that I wanted.  So when Mario agreed to give it to me as a gift, I thought of a clever way to wrap it to fool the kids into thinking it was a new television. Nate had shot an air soft bullet in the family room and hit our other tv, so we have been living with a orange spot on the tv for months now.  The kids have been begging for us to replace it and we kept telling them no.  We decided Christmas would be a good time to replace it.  So we asked our neighbors to store the new one in their basement.  On Christmas Eve,  I took the kids to Target for some last minute items and Mario snuck over and retrieved the new tv from the neighbor and wrapped it and put it in our closet so the kids wouldn't see it.

We put the sewing machine into our old tv box and then wrapped it.  So Christmas morning, the kids all saw the big box and assumed it was a tv.  That was the last gift opened and the disappointment on their faces was priceless when I pulled out my sewing table.  We didn't let the disappointment last too long though.  We told them the Elves were hiding their last gift and they quickly found their new tv. Mario and I had so much fun tricking them though, especially Eric.

Although it didn't snow on Christmas, we had a beautiful day just hanging out as a family.  The next few days after Christmas got into the 50's and 60's so we really treasured those warm days and did a lot of things outside.  Now it's back to being really cold so we are all bundled up inside.

The sewing machine wrapped up

Everyone got new socks

Nate did it again, got Zach an awesome gift

A new quilt for Erin to hide under

Nate made this pillow for Erin

Boys got new R/C cars

Nate got Eric a new towel (we are a practical family)

Eric's new Sperrys

Zach giving Mario his new camping utensil set

Zach got Nate the game Blokus, which Mario and I love

Eric got boys new Lego books

I got Mario and new Ipad mini and kept it secret from him which is no small feat

They found the new tv

Christmas Eve

We have continued my parent's nativity story tradition from when I was a child.  But we do ours with puppets rather than acting it out.  When I was a child, we opened all our presents (except for Santa's gifts) on Christmas eve.  Mario didn't want to continue that part of the tradition.  

This year, we invited our neighbors across the street to come watch our puppet show and then to listen to our children play Christmas carols, and then have dessert.  As you can see from the pictures, Sophie really loved the puppet show.  She was all into it. 

Erin plays the piano for our show

Eric narrates but wishes he could do the piano part  

The twins do the puppets with help from Mario

Homeless Shelter

Mario arranged for our family to serve lunch at a homeless shelter. It was part of our gift to the Savior this Christmas. The kids did a great job. Erin didn't want to be photographed with an apron and hairnet for some reason.

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Writings by Nate and Zach

Haiku written by Nate:

Thankful paper by Zach:

Rubric for Zach's speech on Hawaii that he practiced a ton and he's very proud of his grade.  He asked that I include it on my blog.

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Elves on the Shelf

Even though my boys are getting pretty old, I decided to squeeze just a bit more of childhood out of them by getting them some Elves on a Shelf. I didn't like the official Elf on a Shelf so when I saw some homemade ones for sale from a sister in a different ward, I couldn't resist getting the boys each one.

They are having so much fun with them. I figured it is a tradition that maybe they can do with their own children one day. They can each take their adorable elves with them (if I can part with them.)

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