Christmas

  

 We are always thankful to celebrate this special holiday of the saviors birth.  It is nice to be together as a family and enjoy our gifts that we give to eachother.  We are also thankful for all the gifts that were sent to us from Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles.  The kids get excited to see the mail packages on our doorstep.  I was able to stay home Christmas Eve since our unit at the hospital was not very busy and there were others that wanted to work.  It was a nice present from them to let me stay home and enjoy time with my family.  We spent Christmas Eve with Matt's brothers family partaking in their tradtional cheese fondue.  Then, we headed home to open our Christmas pj's and some of our grandparent presents.  Carter was so tired that he didn't feel like opening anything and just wanted to go to bed (it was only 7o'clock).  I don't think he was feeling well so we ended our present opening and waited to the morning hoping that Carter would feel better. 

 

Christmas morning came and Carter was feeling better and was a little more awake.  We enjoyed our present opening from each other and started preparing dinner.  Lastly, Matt cooked a turkey and Tracy joined us for dinner.  It was such a treat to finally have her for Christmas because she always been gone for Christmas.  (Thanks Tracy for joining us!) 

From Ashlynn

This is so cute..I had to post it.  Ashlynn wrote this letter to Santa.  She also worked hard on the friendship bracelet for Ms. Claus and made a matching one for her to wear too.  Ashlynn is very creative and thinks of these things on her own.

I think the bracelet got moved because there is an arrow at the top of the page pointing to the bracelet.  She made sure the cookies, milk and letter was near the tree so he would see them.  It was so cute to see that everything was ready before bed.  The bracelet was gone in the morning..I hope Ms. Claus is enjoying her bracelet. 

Treats & our Elf

We spent some great time as a family this holiday season making treats for others.  Over a span of a week we got it all done. Yay!  Carter was so cute wanting to put on his Santa hat and run to each door and deliver the popcorn bags.  We drove around the neighborhood and Carter would jump out the car and run to each door.  It was so fun to watch!  Poor Ashlynn was sick and didn't have the energy to help.  Then, Carter got the flu bug from Ashlynn and had to sit out making the reindeers.  So, it was a trade off.  Then, finally it was time to make the candied almonds with a crockpot, which turned out so yummy.  I will definitely be making these again..very soon!   

Here are a few places we found our "Elf" this year. This is always a fun tradition for our family to see where he ends up each morning.  We also enjoyed the movie that came this year about our friend. (Thanks Grandma Frankie for sending it our way!) 



Our elf "Buddy" is now sitting in our tree waiting to go back in his box to make his appearance next year.

Candy Windows

There back...the candy windows!  A few years back when we would visit Utah I was always amazed at the ZCMI candy windows around Christmas.  So, I was so excited when Macy's announced that there were going to have their own version of the windows.  They were so fascinating to look at as well.  The kids thought it was so cool to see the different kinds of candy they used to make the ornaments.  We had fun naming all the candy used. 

 I just love walking downtown with everything decorated with the lights.  It just makes the holiday magical.

To the North Pole...

To the North Pole we go...Midway's snow decided to melt away so instead of riding on a sleigh we took at ride on a large wagon pulled by horses.  It was a neat experience to do only once.  The scenery was pretty.  This was Carter first time being around horses for a length of time and suffered a moderate allergy attack.  The poor kid was sneezing, coughing, red eyes and a scratchy throat.  That is another animal we can put on his list that he is allergic too.  Other than the allergy problem we enjoyed our time outside and our visit with Santa at the end of the ride.

Christmas Randomness

We have been slightly crazy with lots going on with things to do around this time of year, but we can always squeeze in time to enjoy these fun moments with each other.  I have made a conscious effort this month to not be so frazzled when things aren't going as planned and enjoy this holiday season.  Even if the house is messy, dishes and laundry are little behind.  It will all get done..right?..yes!..that is what I keep telling myself.

 

Here are a few highlights:

 Matt and Ashlynn are our funny people in our family and like to wear random Christmas hats.

 I love their Christmas spirit.  Ashlynn even wears a Santa hat to school.  She is so cute!

Matt had their company work party at Sur La Table at the Gateway Mall.  We cooked our own food with a gourmet chef and then got to eat our yummy creations.  I love this Christmas tree at the Gateway Mall it is set to music and we got a picture of it while it was lit up during the music show.  It was perfect timing! 

This picture was taken at our Ward Christmas party and it just makes me smile.  It should be on one of those "most cheesiest" Christmas cards websites that has been floating around the Internet.  The decor, our random outfits and Carter's face just adds to this photo.  Too Funny! 

The Halls are Decked...

Our "Elf on the Shelf" is in place and we are ready for the Christmas season to begin!  We can't wait to see all the things this elf is going to do this year.  We always have a good laugh when we think about all the funny things he did last year when he moves around the house.  He is another set of eyes watching closely over how the kids are behaving during the holidays.

His starting place was selected by Ashlynn.  After he is placed in the tree he can no longer be touched. 

 

He moves only if he sees good things from the kids with Christmas magic after he reports to the man in red each night.

Our cute little tree. We continued our "elf" tree theme again.

Our train adds the perfect touch!

Leave Clean up

Finally!! All of our leaves from our trees have fallen down.  Now, the final step to clean them up before the snow hits.  The kids were such good helpers to get the last part of the leaves up from the ground.  Carter liked blowing the leaves to make a pile and then sucking them up.  He did a great job!  I had to take a picture of this nice act of service he did to help out.     

Hard worker!  That bags gets heavy when it is full of leaves.

Family Night at the Jazz Game

Matt scored some VERY cheap tickets to a Jazz game so he invited some friends of ours (The Dalton's and the Call's) to the game.  The seats were up at the very top of the upper bowl.  Even though the we were way at the top it was nice to have space to spread out and chat during the game.  The Jazz were losing by 10 points the entire game until last quarter when they caught up.  It was a close game at the end, but the Jazz prevailed and won! Yay!! The crowd was so loud and it made the game super fun!  We even scored some neat metal lunch boxes. 

Thanksgiving in Idaho

Our little family traveled to Idaho to spend Thanksgiving with our families.  We really excited to finally spend a holiday with Mike and Laura's family since it has been 4 years since our 2 families have been together to celebrate.  Matt's parents bought a Turducken for our meat to feast on.  It was very interesting how they are all stuffed together.  It was very tasty!  It took us some time to prepare the meal with all the sides for everyone, then to sit down and eat for 20 minutes and then it was time to clean up.   Then Laura and I dove into the newspaper ads to check out the big deals.  We headed out Thanksgiving night to some tradition shopping and enjoy those holiday deals! We had a fun time together!  But, poor Carter was not enjoying himself.  Matt did not want me to know that Carter had been really sick with vomiting, wheezing, and a headache back at his parents house while I was out.  I came back to all of the vomit cleaned up (thanks Tom) and Carter not looking great. He was able to get some rest and feel better the next day. 

 On Friday we visited with my mom and got to spend some time with her. (Thanks for all the fun gifts) 


Then, on Saturday we headed to my dad's house to visit with Corey on our way home to Utah.

We were very thankful that we had great driving conditions and that Carter got to feeling better and that we could spend some time with family even if it was for a short time.