{the tree}

One of my favorite things about the holiday are the trees.

We have two...one that is navy, silver, and white (our wedding colors) with glass balls that have family pictures in them. Our favorite pictures from each year of our married life.

The other holds all the ornaments we receive for gifts, that the boys make or fun ones we have bought over the years. We also put Christmas books under both trees for the holidays. The books get packed away all year long so when they come out we spend a lot of time reading them. I love them both and insist they be plugged in all day long.

I'm always sad when it is time to take the trees down.

{First time}

So we (me, my parents and B & V) took the kids ice skating for the first time.

Keep in mind it has been at least 11 years since I have been on ice skates, and I don't know how long for B & V.

It is really sad that it took 3 skating adults and 2  non- skating adults to take 4 skaters and one baby.

But we were lucky to have all of us there because we could tag team the skaters, all who have never skated before, and Grandma & Grandpa could deal with the non-skaters or the ones taking a "break."

Everyone did really well. K tried hard and had many falls.

E went around the whole rink quite a few times and fell only a handful of times. It was great to see his determination to keep going and get better at it.

For me....I forgot what a work out it is to ice skate, but I think in my younger years it wasn't a work out. So it's just another reminder of my age.

But they do want to go skating again so that is great!

{even more}

Christmas Morning is wonderful at our house. It is hard to remember why I was so against staying home "by ourselves" for the holiday because I enjoy it so much now.

We have started a little tradition that in the morning the boys come into our room, cuddle up on our bed and HAVE to watch ALL of Polar Express before we go out to the tree. This was a fluke tradition, in that we didn't realize we had done this two years in a row and now I think we are on year 4 so why ruin a good thing? I mean it gives us a good 90 minutes more of sleep in the morning. That is why we can get away with present opening not starting until 830 or 9.

Presents were bountiful this year....nerf guns, wii games, ds games, books galore, games, yo yos, Canadian chocolate...and the list goes on. Santa was good to us all.

At the end of the day I asked E "Did you get what you wanted?"

to which he replied "even more." and it came with a hug.

Melt my heart.

{the Night before}

So my family growing up always took picture by the tree on Christmas Eve. I have 15 years of these pictures with our little family and they are some of my favorites!!

So this is this year's version. They were very cooperative and smiley!! I love it!

{Christmas Eve Fire}

So one of our Christmas Eve Traditions is to make a fire in the back yard and roast hot dogs and marshmallows. This started because on a few trips to Canada for Christmas we went to Waterton on Christmas Eve and played in the snow and roasted hot dogs and marshmallows.

We now do the roasting but continually are wishing for some snow...which truthfully will  probably never happen.

In past years, the boys of the family go out back and dig a pit. This year I kept my eyes open for a fire pit we could buy and luckily I found one. The boys were aware but we didn't tell C but saved it for our Christmas present to him.

Well, when the time or rather day, came to start digging K almost melted with my insistence that C wait to Christmas to open his gift. Finally I told him to ask C if he wanted to open a gift today and after realizing what the commotion was about he agreed and opened the fire pit. K was so relieved to not have to dig a pit.

{Baking Evening}

So this year for our friends and neighbors we decided that we would drop off cinnamon rolls instead of making all different types of cookies and treats to make up plates. So together we made 28 pans of rolls which turned out to be 2 1/2 batches of dough (not the 4 batches we thought it would take), 4 pounds of powdered sugar 1.5 gallons of milk, 27 cups of flour, and 3 pounds of butter. It was a great family project and took only about 5 hours of continual work by all of us (this doesn't count the first half of the recipe since I did that on my own and the time to let the dough rise.)

Our kitchen proves itself too small each year when it is time to make treats for the neighbors and since the kitchen table was covered with puzzle pieces we used all the counter space and floor space we had. It was an adventure and the boys loved delivering the treats in the rain.

24 pans successfully delivered and enjoyed (we hope.)

{Forgotten Carols}

This year was the first time we have taken the boys to see Michael McLean's "Forgotten Carols." C and I saw it years ago in Logan and loved it but it is hard to get tickets for the one night they do the show here so we never have been since.  This year I made sure to buy tickets the first day they were available and we still ended up in the balcony but on the first row quite near the center so that was good.

The boys loved the play and asked why we stopped going to plays. (We had a brief streak of taking them to the live theater but stopped) So now we are setting a new goal for 2011 to see more live theater with them.

{Chistmas Puzzle and Movie}

This past Sunday's Christmas activity included tithing settlement, puzzle playing and a movie.

We put together a puzzle each Christmas break and each year the puzzle seems to get harder. This year it is a 1000 piece puzzle with lots of greens and browns. E and I seem to do most of the puzzle but the other 2 jump in now and then. Mostly it is everyone to start with then as time goes on it is me and E.

But it is a fun thing to have around the house over the break from school.

{our Elves}

{Christmas Paintings}

December 12 was a Sunday this year and it was our 3rd annual Christmas Painting evening. This year the theme was "candy canes" chosen by E. (the first year was snowmen, chosen by me, then last year was Christmas trees, chosen by K).

Everyone gets a canvas and we just start to paint. It is the quietest activity we do as part of our Christmas Sunday Traditions and probably the longest one too but we love it! And it is the one the boys ask for each year!

{the List}

One of our Christmas "traditions" is that every Sunday between Thanksgiving and Christmas we do something "Christmas-y."

Last Sunday was the "Wish List." Everyone writes one, and you can wish for ANYTHING. No limits and nothing is too much. You can add to the list as the holiday progresses and we hang them on the fridge.

They today while I was working in the kitchen I realized that someone had added some new items to his list...It would be K's list and it looks like this....

He added $$$$. Then gold silver and platinum.  Very clever....and I thing this is a sign of him getting older too.

{Tree Time}

I love having the Christmas trees up with the lights on and the ornaments. It makes the holiday come alive each year.

So after everyone left from our Thanksgiving weekend we started decorating.

{more Gingerbread Party Pictures}

Here's some more from our Gingerbread party.....

{Gingerbread Party}

One of the fun things we do on Thanksgiving is Gingerbread Houses that evening. This year since we had many of the Apos in town we had a big party. Blaine and Vanessa came over with their 3 girls and V's sister and husband and baby boy. K & E were here and Caitlin was still hanging out with us.

So we had 8 houses to make and one tree.

I started on the frosting and all the "adults" started in on the house building.

It was kinda a mess.

Caitlin's bag of frosting blew up on her. K and C were using cans to hold up walls and frosting was everywhere. That was before the decorating even started.

Before long we had 8 houses up and ready to be decorated.

The "kids" decorated and made a bigger mess....but we ate lots of candy, frosting and pie. Laughed a lot and made great memories...

Now we have a small gingerbread village at our house! I love the holidays!!

{thanksgiving 2010}

This year for the holiday we were lucky to have some Apo family come to town.

Caitlin traveled over from DC and Kris and Elisa arrived from SLC.

We had a great time, ate lots, rested lots and shopped a lot (we are Black Friday Shoppers over here). We even made time for an adults evening out before Caitlin had to return home.

Kris and Elisa ended up having to leave early because of a snow storm coming to the SLC area. But before they left they were very brave and took all the kids (mine and Blaine's two oldest) to the movies.

(K cooking with Auntie)

(playing games with Uncle Kris and Auntie Elisa)

We love having the family over and hope that everyone can make a return trip next year too!

{Plymouth Play}

It is that time of year again for our school's annual Plymouth Plantation Play.

This year E was an Indian. He has a speaking part, was part of the Thanksgiving Feast and got to "shoot" a bow and arrow.

K revived his role as Governor John Carver this year. He had a few speaking parts, got to "travel" on the Mayflower to America," signed the Mayflower compact and was elected the Governor.

It is a fun tradition at our school and this was K's last time in the play as he will move to Upper Grammar next year and this is a Lower Grammar Production.

{Dressed for the weather}

So the weather has turned cold here in Vegas, if you are like us and now think 65 degrees as cold.

We went out for dinner on a "cold" night and this is how our children were dressed.....

Yeah, they can't figure out what they should wear either...freezing cold or spring weather?

{Math Bee 2010)

The math bee was fun again this year and the boys did fairly well. In school they are each placed in math classes according to their ability. This year E is in the math class one grade above his "normal" class and K skipped a math class and is in a Pre-Algebra class. So for the math bee they competed with their math class.

K was able to continue through the math bee into the next class level after his math class. He made it about halfway through the next level.

We are happy and proud of the dedication the boys have in their school work not only math but in every part of their education.

{Star Wars Halloween II)

So Star Wars is a yearly theme in our house it seems.

E picked to be a Storm trooper and his brother reverted to his stand by of a Jedi costume.

After two costume meltdowns I was just happy to see them in something. E was pretty much forced into his and I gave up with K b/c he just didn't like the costume we tried to put together and wasting 10 dollars on his didn't seem like too much to me since he will wear those other clothes as regular clothes now.

We trunk or treated on Saturday with our cousins and our ward. The place was pretty full and we got tons of candy. It was a lot of fun!

{cake}

For our war Halloween Carnival the boys had to each make a cake for the cake walk....this is what we ended up with...

a zombie alien

a mummy

{DS Sadness}

K's DS Story..............

He got a new DS for his big day after breaking his first one 6 weeks after it was bought. (we made him wait over 2 years before he got this one to teach some responsibility.)

Well last Wednesday night I went to switch the laundry from the washer to the dryer and guess what I found?

His DS.
Sopping wet.
In the bottom of the washer.

I took it apart the best I could. It was dripping water. It was 9:30 at night and tech support was closed. So I did what all moms do and googled then facebook-ed friends for ideas to revive this DS.

But it is officially dead. Tech Support will let us pay 50 dollars to have it fixed since it is less than 6 months old.

K has to pay for it. He isn't too happy but the alternative is no DS.

Decisions Decisions...........

But I hope that he has learned not to leave the DS in his pants pockets now.

It is really sad to see how upset he was and how much more he was upset when he figured out he was going to have to fix this one on his own. It's hard to be the "mean mom" who won't just fix this problem, but I keep telling myself he has to learn.

{Why I hate to carpool}

As you know we live a bit aways from out school, so we spend at least 1.5 hours in the car everyday driving too and from school. We are usually a quiet bunch at 7 am on the way to school. But the way home we get to talk about all kinds of things.

For one year we carpooled to school with a handful of parents so I only had to drive out to school for 1 day every 4 weeks I think. And after about a month I discovered that I was missing something. I figured it out that I was missing those chats in the car.

Friday made me remember why I am so lucky to drive them too and from each day (not to mention to spend the day at school with them too).  Our drive home consisted of many gospel topics from what heaven would look like, why you would choose to get married in a backyard instead of the Temple, if you can be righteous without being a member of the church, the 3 degrees of Glory, and patriarchal blessings. It was a great conversation with both boys talking a lot. I think you can also add this conversation to the list of reasons we love our school too. A lesson K had in his class had sparked this conversation and that is wonderful too.

So if you need parenting advice from me I say: drive your kids to all their activities...carpooling is overrated!

{Simple Fun}

We love our babysitter. He teaches our boys things we forget to teach them like....to play Nerf gun war in the dark with flashlights, to built mega big marshmallow guns out of plastic tubing, how to beat ds games and to build card houses.

After a few hours with our babysitter last Saturday night, the boys spent Sunday building houses out of cards. A few days later I found about 30 pictures on the camera of this guy made out of cards. Card guy and pictures taken by E.

We love the simple things he reminds us of. The simple things we forget to show our own children that he remembers to show them. Thanks A!

{A Visit}

We were excited to be able to spend a day with Grandma Walker and Grandpa Will on Monday. They came to Vegas to deliver a few gifts they brought home from Italy for our family and spend the day with us.

The boys also got to be taught a fun 2 person Italian card game that they continue to play together each day and Grandma made cinnamon rolls with them too. That was the one thing they asked if she would do with them while she was here. There was a time when every visit to our house she would make cinnamon rolls with her. And this is on of their fondest memories of time spent with her.

We are happy to have them home again and excited that we will be able to visit with her more often now.

{Spirit Week 2010}

At school we have Spirit Week and each day the scholars get to dress up in a themed outfit (normally we wear uniforms to school so this is great fun for the boys).

First day was cultural day, so we went hawaiian...easy comfortable and part of us.

Second day was mismatch day. K wouldn't give in a look like a fool with the rest of us so only E and I dressed up.

Third day was historical day, pick something from the past to dress up like so we went with togas.

It was lots of fun and gets us out of our uniforms for a few days.