and ALL THAT JAZZ!

We enjoyed Williamsport's district Jazz concert the other night. Here's Isaac's solo (he's the first sax to play).
P.S. He hee! I just listened to it - and without great speakers u sure miss out on the great quality of the band music! Forgive it all sounding like little squeaks - it was awesome live! ;)

We LOVE Conference!

General Conference only comes twice a year, which makes it all the more appreciated! I love it more every year (it's getting awfully comfy watching it from BYUTV at home!). Mike pulled out the table, conference packets off lds.org and we were off to feasting on 4 great sessions from home. Mike, Isaac, and Calton enjoyed the the Priesthood session at the church. We felt SO UPLIFTED AND BLESSED by the WORD! Here's a funny family pic of the weekend.

They Are Finally Here! Broadway pics!

Hey Everyone! Sorry this took so long to post, but here are some pics from the Wizard of Oz that Anna, Emily, and Mikela and our cousin Marisa were in last November.

To tell who's who in costume refer to the Winkie picture (the wicked witches soldiers) you'll see: Emily, Mikela, Anna, Marisa from left to right. Mikela was the smallest winkie and DARLING when she saluted to the wicked witch as she was "kickin" her off the stage. Anna and Emily were trying so hard to keep the smiles off their faces in order to look the part of dreary, serious winkies and Marisa was all character - way to be serious, Mis!- (we got the CD Friday, we'll copy and send on soon!). As Munchkin's the girls are wearing purple and Marisa's the "lullaby league dancer" on the right. The Munchkin scene was so vivid, bright, lively, FUNNY and ENTERTAINING! We couldn't believe how much the girls had learned in such a short time. They were GREAT in action and character; they couldn't resist laughing out loud to themselves when dancing onto the stage with the broadway crew, they couldn't believe how MUNCHKIN land looked and sounded either! Great memory!

Kate had the Happiest Birthday!!!

Kate demonstrated the "age of accountability" by being completely accountable for the makings of her own birthday party. From dreaming it up to making it happen (she wrote every invite herself, planned every game and the craft, and prayed the rain away -though she had some help here- to make games and riding possible after a day of great rainshowers). Kate proved she'd do well in "event-planning" as well as demonstrating once again the great LOVE she has for her FAMILY and FRIENDS. She really made us all very HAPPY on her birthday!!!

(Though Kate was the instigator of all the fun she really wants to say THANK YOU to the many helpers she had in putting together and cleaning up the party! THANKS!!!)

We LOVE you Kate! We think it's GREAT you are EIGHT! We are all looking forward to your baptism next weekend and can't believe how lucky we are that so much family (G&G Hoffman, Olsen's, G&G Cooper, Maxwells, Laws - and maybe Kara!) will be here for it!!! Wow. What a special day that will be. LOVE, Mom and Dad

See you later Alligator!

Mikela, Kate, Esther Beth, Zoie Grace, Clara and I made a great escape to REPTILELAND! EstherBethie had worked hard to earn coupons and chose REPTILELAND for her reward! It was rewarding to ALL of us! SO MUCH FUN!

All tuckered out!

Zoie Grace couldn't make it through scriptures! (Happens frequently with someone or the other ;).

Clara takes the Cake!

Clara 'got her cake and ate it too!' Way to go, Clara!

Clara's #1

Officially! Here's sharin'!

"Be our Guest" in viewing Isaac as Gaston!

 

It was really great for all of us to see Isaac in this new role! It was especially enjoyable for us to have Emily and Anna performing right along with him in this middle school rendition of "Beauty and the Beast". (The girls were GREAT at filling us in on all the rehearsals - we'd have never have known one thing if it were left to Isaac to share the details ;). ) There are many, many pics at curtinmusical.shutterfly.com if anyone has time to pick out I, E, and A there.

Kari - we loved the video on your blog! he hee! Thanks!

The foundation for our new home - US!

"Play"ing all weekend!!!

What a fantastic weekend for the Hoffmans! Isaac, Emily, and Anna and their friends and teachers successfully performed "Beauty and the Beast"! It was AWESOME!! We LOVED it!!! It was an exceptional production! It was especially exciting for us to witness Isaac unleashed as Gaston on stage! WOW! It was way too fun to see him make Gaston bigger than life on stage! He did a GREAT job of it! It was especially fun for him to play enemy to his best friend at school, Josh, who played the beast, along with other great friends playing Cogsworth, Lumierre and Chip - they all did FANTASTICALLY! Way too much ENTERTAINMENT!!! We were so grateful for the support of FAMILY and friends as Grandpa and Grandma Cooper, Maxwells, Laws, YW, Kara and a few others joined us for the play!

Saturday we played up Marisa's 12 year old birthday! Dearly beloved cousin and niece we LOVED having her and family here for the day! We ended up breaking in the barn with birthday decor and PARTY there! Precious, wonderful memories all weekend long!!!

P.S. We'll post pics of Isaac, Emily, and Anna in the play when we receive them from Kristi.

Clara cruisin'

This was one of Clara's first cruising videos last month. She will turn one year old next week! We adore her even more than we did upon first seeing her one year ago!

pics from krstis b-day...

here are some pics of kristi's birthday, i accidentally hit publish before i added pictures. ENJOY!

Kristi's Birthday!

A week or two ago Kristi had her birthday and we got to celebrate with her! It was really fun, going from delicious ice cream cake to all the kids giving her a massage/foot rub/hand rub/anything else you can think of! We had had a fantastic time! We love you Kristi and Calton and Camden! We are SO glad you live close enough to us that we can party whenever! WE LOVE YOU! Happy belated birthday Kristi!

Sick Kids!!!!

We have had a pretty rough week...it all started when Isaac got hives and started swelling up all over. The doctor said it was probably a virus and just to take ibuprofen and benadryl. Well, when Kate came home from school we heard "My back is itchy!" Uh-oh!!!! That night, Clara woke up with a fever and a bad cough... Two kids home from church!!(We found at 2 or 3 other kids were sick that day, too.) Well, Monday morning, Isaac decides he is feeling good enough to go to school... and came home with a REALLY badly swollen lip, hands, and feet. Doctors AGAIN!!! Anna also came down with what Clara had, so she missed school. Tonight we all had hot chocolate and scrambled eggs. Off to bed, everyone!!!!

P.S.- sorry we don't have any pictures... we could have gotten some really good shots but no one would approve.

Happy Valentine's, Happy Day!

Valentine's rush has come and gone - once again Mom survived but has lots of housecleaning and laundry to catch up on after the big week of making and delivering tons of Valentine's cookies, hosting class parties, and wrapping up sweet surprises for her own children. The only regret she has is not getting pictures of her Valentine's - they never looked so cute - ALL of them!- as they did Friday morning dressed in Mom's love (new outfits). Friday night we enjoyed celebrating as a family at the Magic Treehouse event downtown - LOVED Jack and Annie! Poor Isaac spent the entire weekend very ill, fever, rash and swelling all over his entire body!
Saturday brought more celebrating, Mike participated in three weddings, CaMarie accompanied him to one, Emily and Anna headed out the door dressed to the hilt for a friend's Valentine's tea, returned home later to head off to the bounce house with a friend for fun. The kids enjoyed more Valentine's candy and cards and PLAYING uninterrupted all day long while Mom and Dad were busy with the Stake marriage enrichment Valentine's event. Hurray!- it went well and was so enjoyable! Sunday night we opened our own family Valentine's to one another - the kind words were enough to buoy us up for another week! The girls also spent Sunday afternoon reenacting Saturday's tea party for the little girls - so sweet and precious to hear Zoie, alias "Miss Lily" so politely say, "May I have some Miwk?" English accent raising milk at the end, and upon Emily's spilling it she cordially stated, "Dhat's awright, Dawling." Happy days for all of us - and no more blogging now I've got a week long party to pick up after!

Love, Mom

P.S. I feel so lucky to have received 2 dozen white roses from my love - he said he wished he could have had time for the "special plans" he'd been anticipating - but what could be more romantic than spending the weekend LOVING each other, our children, and the stake? (Singing with him, being on the marriage panel with him, and dancing with him was very romantic too!) Love, Wife

Fun In UTAH!

So sorry we haven't posted in so long- we have a lot to catch up on. We went to Utah on Christmas Day. We arrived at the airport on the icy day and checked in our luggage. Then we started making our way to the gate and got there to find that we had a delay, and we got in Utah about 3 hours later than we planned. We made it through very roughly, with all of the kids throwing up at least twice on the plane except Isaac, Clara, and mom and dad. We were so grateful when we made it to the airport to find our grandparents, some of our cousins, and some of our aunts and uncles waiting for us at midnight. We feel so loved! Thank you so much to all those who greeted us there! Anyway, we made it to grandma and grandpas house through a HUGE snowstorm! We woke up and got to play with all our cousins then went down to Brigham city to see the Cooper side of our family! We had so much fun the whole time we were in Utah- we went skiing, went to the zoo, and had a night with each family! We also got to go to our old ward in Bountiful! It was SO great seeing everyone! We spent New Years Eve with the Cooper Side and had a blast making New Years Resolutions, cheering at midnight, banging pots and pans, stuffing ourselves with candy, and just being all together! It was SO FUN!!!!! Here are some pictures of our GREAT trip! And there are also some from our Christmas Day!