How cold did you say?

I talked to my dad today. He asked if I wanted to go Ice Fishing this Saturday. I quickly looked at the weather and saw that in Spanish Fork, which is 4000 ft lower than where I go ice fishing, that the high on Saturday will be 16 degrees with a low of 0 Fahrenheit. Don't get me wrong, I love ice fishing, but I'm having a hard time wanting to go when the ice hole I drill will freeze over in 30 seconds.

I still have decided if I'm going or not. Not much more time to make a decision.

Originally, I wanted to go the morning of Christmas Eve and may still do that, guess we'll see.

Shhh Don't tell Deni

Two of my favorite pastimes are:

1. Teasing Deni
2. Surprising Deni for Christmas

When I combined the two, it's twice as fun.

The other day Deni and I were out and driving on I-15. I saw a Billboard about Laser Hair Removal and the idea came.

I looked and Deni asked her which side of the bed she wanted. She looked at me a little confused and I continued to explain that I was getting her Laser Hair Removal for Christmas, but I could only afford one leg, so I wanted it to be on the leg closest to me in bed.

We both got a good laugh out of it. It's fun to tease Deni that I'm going to get her only one leg of Laser Hair removal.

On a side note, I have my kids trained that they DON'T ever want to have a dog. I told the kids that if we got a dog, that they would be in charge of 2 things.

First, cleaning up it's poop and
Second paying for it's Vet bills.

If I ask Ryan if he wants a dog now, he says "No way, I don't want to clean up poop or pay the Vet bills." Awesome.

Ok back to teasing Deni about her Christmas present. We were out as a family shopping and Deni ran into a store by herself. As soon as she got out of the car, I asked the kids if they could keep a secret about Deni's Christmas present. They said they could, so I said "I'm getting Mom a puppy for Christmas". Ryan immediately started laughing and said "Ohhhh, so Mom can clean up it's poop and pay it's vet bills."

Berger Mento Experiment

Last night we went to the grocery store to get a few things. As we walked in, all the Coke products were on sale. 2 liters for 69 cents. Ryan went straight to the Diet Coke. Why Diet Coke? Blame it on Youtube. For some time now, Ryan's been begging us to buy Diet Coke and Mentos and to try the Youtube "experiment".

I agreed and we put the Diet Coke into the shopping cart. After that we had a hard time finding mentos, however Deni finally found them. It was too dark to do the experiment, so I told him we'd have to later.

When I got home I asked Deni if it was appropriate Sunday activity. Neither of us saw a problem with it and decided we'd do it Sunday Morning.

So here it is. one 2 liter of Diet Coke, 12 mentos, one 6 inch piece of PVC pipe and a slip of paper.



This was great family fun, all for under $2.00

A funny note, after we did this and watched the video Ryan said that his voice sounded different. We said that is how you sound. His reply was "Curse you Technology."

Here comes Santa Claus

We had just finished dinner when we heard a knock on the door and before we could get up to get it, the door opened and we heard "Ho, Ho, Ho" and the some bells. We turned around and there's Santa coming in our house with a large red sack (just like in the story books).

Santa was tired, but on a mission to come and visit with Ryan and Sydney.


Sydney got 2 bears (a girl and a boy).




Ryan got a supersized Rudolf Stitch. In this picture he has his old stitch and the new Rudolf the Red Nose Stitch.

Santa must have been working overtime or his Elves are working at the Disney Store. We went to the Disney store a few days ago and Ryan found this Rudolf the Red Nose Stitch, however he was too expensive to purchase. As we left the store, Ryan was thinking of ways to save money to come back at a later time to purchase the Stitch. How did Santa know that Ryan wanted that Stitch.

As Santa left, Deni asked if she could go with him. He agreed and they left together to make a few special visits.

Ryan and I played Monopoly while we were waiting for Deni to come home. I lost to Ryan after continued to land on the only property Ryan had put buildings on. I think I landed on it 3 times in a row around the board. I mortgaged all my properties, but finally ran out of money.

I put the kids to bed about 8pm.

Deni got home about 8:25pm and shortly after that Deni's parents showed up. They will be in town for the next few days visiting us.

Black Friday, Berger Style

I woke up at 4:18am this morning to an empty bed with a kid on each side in a sleeping bag. I got up showered and headed downstairs for some breakfast. Deni had gotten up sometime before my alarm went off and was just so excited to go shopping, she went down to go through the ads again.

We left about 4:45am and headed to our first (and only stop), the Disney Store in Orem. It opened at 5am and had an additional 20% off everything in the store. When we got there, there were more employees than customers, which is quite unusual for Black Friday, but we didn't complain as it gave us time to look around the store and get what we had gone there for.

From the Disney Store, we headed to Macy's to get some new silverware. At this point, we were done with our shopping. It was about 6am.

With the kids silently sleeping (we hoped) at Grandma and Grandpa's we thought we meet up with Teresa and help her out. So we called Teresa and decided to meet up with her at Target.

After Target, we parted ways with Teresa and we headed north to American Fork. We got some jeans for the kids at Old Navy, can't beat 50% off (kids jeans $9.95).

Ryan is currently wearing size 8 and Deni always makes sure that she buys him Slim, as he is very slim. Matter of fact, if they had an XX Slim, we'd buy them. When we got home and had him try them on, the length was perfect, the waist was another story. I think we could have fit 2 Ryan's in here. Thank goodness for adjustable waists. After a little adjustment, they almost stayed up without a belt.

We spent the rest of the day at my parents eating turkey and pie leftovers. We played a few card games but mainly visited.

We left about 5:30pm and on the way home, picked up a Pizza, so Deni didn't have to cook dinner.

Thanksgiving at the Bergers

Today was Thanksgiving. We spent the majority of day at my parents house. The whole family was in attendance except for Shane, although we called him and passed the phone around so everyone got to talk to him.

We had Thanksgiving Lunch instead of dinner. As usual, the meal was great.

After lunch, we played games, put together puzzles and visited.

I finally learned the card game "Hand and Foot". Hand and Foot was one of my Grandma Berger's favorite games, although I always refused to learn it. Ryan learned it about a year ago and after some arm twisting today, I sat down and learned the game. It was surprisingly fun.

Teresa made some gingerbread houses out of graham crackers that the kids decorated. I didn't take any pictures, so I had to steal these pictures from Stefanie's blog.

Cousin Jaycee, Sydney, Aunt Teresa and Cousin Kennedy



Deni helping Ryan with his roof.



Ryan's finished product, complete with pretzel gate.



Sydney's finished product.



We decided to sleep at my parents house, so that we could get up early tomorrow and go shopping on Black Friday, while the kids slept in. We tried to talk Teresa into sleeping at Mom and Dad's house and go with us, however she decided not to.

Headed to bed. 4:30am comes quick.

Visit from the Young Men General Presidency

After returning from the Boy Scouts of America weeklong training called Woodbadge, Deni started working on some of her Woodbadge tickets (goals.) One of her goals was to have a fireside for families about Scouting.

If you know anything about my wife, when she's made up her mind or committed to something, you know it will be done and done well. When she's committed to something you better get onboard to help her or get out of her way, as there's no stopping her. This is one of the many great attributes she possesses.

Deni's first goal was to have the some or all of the BYU football players come and speak at a fireside. She had a contact that said he could make that happen, however it didn't pan out, so she next decided that she was going to get someone from the General Young Men's Presidency from SLC to come and speak. (Notice where Deni aims. BYU Footbal team and General Young Men Presidency from SLC.) She made a few calls and a few minutes later she was cold calling Bro Nieder, second counselor in the General Young Men's Presidency, on his cell phone. After a quick introduction, she stated the reason for calling and requested him to come speak at the fireside. He generously accepted and the plan was set in motion.




Fast forward to today. Not only did Bro Nieder accept her invitation to come speak at a fireside, he expanded the invitation to visit Primary, teach a combined Young Men Class (3rd hour of church), and provide a Question/Answer with Adult Scout leaders an hour before the Fireside.

"His car left late" so he didn't make it into Primary but did make it in time for the 3rd hour of church and attended the joint Young Men's meeting. He was an excellent teacher and kept the boys very interested during the 40 minutes that he spoke. We had all the Deacons, Teachers and Priests, along with our Old Bishopric, the newly called Bishopric (as of today), Full Stake Young Men's Presidency and then all the normal adult leaders (including myself).

A few things from his lesson.

In talking about Priesthood quorums, he said "when we are working together, working as one, our power to do good is increased." He also talked about how we learn in our quorums and then practice at home and that the home is the best place to magnify our Aaronic Priesthood.

During opening exercises, we always quote the Purposes of the Aaronic Priesthood. Bro Nieder was impressed with all of the Young Men knowing and being able to quote the Purposes of the Aaronic Priesthood. While he was teaching had asked if any of the boys could quote anything else. (church or otherwise) There was one boy who quoted his favorite poem (which was impressive as it was really long.) We also had a boy get up and quote Doctrine and Covenants 4 . After the boys had finished their quotes, he had all of the Young Men stand up and learn a new quote. The quote was this "Mom, I love you. Take the night off, I'll do the dishes." Amazingly enough all the boys learned it the first time.

Bro Nieder also taught us the Features of a Quorum.

A Quorum is:

• where the Gospel of Jesus Christ is taught
• a service organization
• a Brotherhood (where we have friends and belong)

Finally he taught the Quorum Presidencies what they were responsible for, by asking a few questions such as "Who's responsible for Missionary work? or Who's responsible for verifying that truth is being taught in the quorum? or Who's responsible for making sure the boys are fulfilling their Duty to God certificate?" Each of the answers to these questions were "I am".

After church, we brought Bro Nieder to home for a quick dinner. We invited our old Bishop and his family over as well. We ate about 5:15pm and hurried out the door for the 6pm meeting with leaders. Although not well attended, the Leader question and answer session was a success.

Finally at 7pm was the Family Fireside. Deni spoke, the Young Women from our ward sang and Bro Nieder spoke. As Bro Nieder got up, he had Deni, our new Bishop, and a member of our Stake Presidency stand up to receive a gift from him. They each got a neckerchief that said "LDS Leadership Conference - Every boy deserves a trained leader." (you can see it below) There were about 100 in attendance and it was a great event.

Here's a picture of Hal Henderson (our Woodbadge Course Director) Bro Nieder (2nd Counselor in the General Young Men's Presidency) and Deni (my hot wife :)-



Bro Nieder was nice enough to pose for some pictures for our family.

Oh, so we're Puerto Rican

I put Ryan to bed tonight and this is how our conversation went.

Ryan: "Dad, how old were you when you lived in Spain?"

Me: Being a little confused, I said "Ryan, I never lived in Spain."

Ryan: "But didn't Grandma and Grandpa live somewhere....."

Me: Realizing what he meant, I interrupted him and said "Well Grandma and Grandpa lived in Puerto Rico before I was born."

Ryan: "Oh, so we're Puerto Rican?"

Proud of my anti-socialness

Through some series of unfortunate events this last week, I think Deni is finally starting to see some merit in my anti-socialness. Maybe I should write a book with some best practices.

Amazing Christmas tree

I was browsing a Sam's club website the other day and came across this unique Christmas tree. It it wasn't so pricey ($200.00), I think I might go for it. Maybe I'll watch for it on clearance.