A few of my Favorite Christmas Memories

 The Monday before Christmas I decided to copy the Young Women's activity we had the first week in December and tweak it a little.  Denise had taken a talk by President Howard W. Hunter entitled, The Gifts of Christmas, and cut from it a list of things we can give our Savior during the Christmas season and throughout the year.  Denise had a gift box filled with strips of paper listing things from the talk and had the girls draw out and read each thing.  I did the same thing for my family but found these shadow boxes at Michael's Craft and painted them silver.  I had the kids paint the wooden back of the frame with chalkboard paint while I read to them from President Hunter's talk and then had them add the picture of Christ to the shadowbox while that paint dried.  Then we drew from the gift box I had put the strips of paper in.  I had them choose one or two of the things from their strips that they could do over the next week, place their strips in the box and then write with chalk who they were going to do those things for.  Then we hung their boxes from silver string onto the Christmas tree.  I'm not going to lie.  It wasn't the most spiritual FHE we have ever had.  In fact, J had the older kids doing push-ups and other exercises after we were done because they had been less than respectful while I was trying to teach the lesson.  On the upside they were fully penitant afterward and I plan to use the boxes every Christmas (and perhaps throughout the year as well).

 Dinner Christmas Eve: Homemade pizza and sparkling grape juice.  Pretty simple, but everyone loved it!  After everyone was done eating we opened Christmas pajamas.  
This is actually the first year we have done Christmas pajamas and it was so fun!  AP and D went around calling each other twin.  AJ had her and her doll's matching white nightgowns that I had made last year so I just gave them matching red and white striped socks.  It was really cute and she was very happy.

Here we are Christmas Eve reading the Christmas Story in Luke.  D, AJ, and I drew nativity pictures while we listened to J and AP read.  Everyone was quite well behaved which made me happy.

Opening Christmas Eve presents.  D is in the background sporting his Super Cape designed and given to him by a cousin (sewn by his dear aunt), and AJ is enjoying a journal that came in a duct tape bag, also made by a cousin.  Love those creative cousins!

AP opening card and money from Grandparents.  The card said, "We hope all your Christmas wishes come true and not the just the ones money can buy."  He shook his head, smiled, and said, "I just love how Grandma always does funny little saying like that to go along with her gifts."

 These next ones are out of order and totally jumbled up, but I don't have time to fix them, so I apologize for the confusion in advance...
Decorating cookies for Santa, checking out stockings, and snuggling with Dad before heading down to see what Santa left.

"Wow!  This is the puzzle I said I wanted.  How did Santa know that?"

Sporting the Super Hero shirt from AP

One of my FAVORITE moments was that as soon as we got downstairs AJ headed to the kitchen (without even a glance toward her presents), so that she could get rolls and hot chocolate for everyone to enjoy while opening presents.  Love, love, LOVE that girl!

Baby Jesus that AJ and D set up a couple of weeks before Christmas

A boy after his father's heart... building legos together!

Another favorite moment.  We always let the youngest go down first.  D was halfway down the stairs when he noticed a little pile of legos sitting there from the night before.  He stopped,sat down, and started playing with them completely oblivious to the toys waiting for him downstairs.  After he was done building he turned around and went back up the stairs to share his legos with AP and AJ and it was a couple of minutes before he became aware that there were toys waiting downstairs.  Such a sweet boy!!

Grandma's Reindeer

D has taken on a little bit of a naughty streak just in time for Christmas... After throwing a paper clamp that hit AJ in the head, she decided something must be done to "reign him in."  She gathered all of the reindeer that J's mom has made for her over the years and distributed them around the living room.  She introduced them, by name, as Santa's reindeer (they are all there including Rudolph and his girlfriend in the wreath), and then told D that they were watching him and if he did anymore naughty things they would tell Santa and then he wouldn't get any presents. 

                                                      

A visit with Santa

I have only taken my kids to see Santa at the mall a handful of times. Once when AP was very small, a couple of times in the "pre-D" days, and last year D and I stopped by during the day when there was NO line.  That's what it comes down to for me: the line.  Just not worth enduring a line at the mall when you can see Santa at Ward Christmas party right?

Well this year I was going to take the kids to the Festival of Trees, but once we got up by the Expo center the parking lot was so packed and traffic so insane that I changed my mind.  We went to Barnes and Noble instead and then headed over to the mall for a visit with Santa.  We waited in line about 40 minutes.  Which actually wasn't too bad.  There were various activities for the kids to do while they waited and D had a good old time crawling through all of the decorated trees they had everywhere (thus his messed up hair in the pictures).  I also ran into an old friend from high school and talking to him helped pass the time for me.  He was several people in front of us but we ended up face to face as the line curved.  After he and his family moved on AJ asked me: "Who was that guy."  When I told her he was the brother of an ex-boyfriend she scrunched her face a little and said, "That's just weird."  I didn't ask then because her reaction was just so funny all I did was laugh, but now I'm wondering what was so weird.  Was it weird that I once had a boyfriend other than her dad?  Weird that the ex-boyfriend has a brother?  Or weird that we ran into him in the line to meet Santa?  Anyway here is the proof that I did, in fact, at least once during their childhood, take my children to see Santa.

A little "telling"

 I hope AP won't mind me "telling on him" a little bit.  Let me start by saying sometimes it's hard to be the oldest cousin; especially when the younger cousins are girls.  AP sometimes laments that none of his boy cousins live close enough to hang out with, but he has always gotten along fine when we hang out with Kate's kids.  In fact, he started to take it upon himself to make sure Av had something to do when she was feeling left out of AJ and Scarletts fun.  Well Avie had her birthday party a couple of weeks ago and AP was dismayed to find out that we had gotten her a "girly" present.  He was afraid that meant that she would not like the same things he likes anymore and said, "She is my only cousin that lives close by that likes things I like and if she is starting to like girly things she will only want to do things with the girls and not me!"  Well no need to worry. We had them over this weekend and Avie was still interested enough in some of the things AP was doing and he and Asher got along quite well too!  Here I think AP is showing Asher his latest interest, Skylanders (they are holding the two Skylander figures AP recently bought) .

Handsome D

This morning after I was done fixing D's hair he looked in the mirror and said, "Oh!  I look handsome in the mirror.  And if I smile like this then people will respect me."  I have NO idea where he came up with that idea, but I think it is so cute/funny!

all I want for Christmas...

I sat down with the kids to do their Santa wishlists and as AP and AJ were writing theirs I was trying to help D with his.  I asked him what he might like Santa to bring him and he said, "Uh, a Scooby Doo guy I think.  You know like Dogster (his pug webkinz).  Let's measure Dogster so we can tell Santa what size he is."  So I wrote down Scooby Doo, promised we would measure Dogster and then asked if there was anything else he wanted for Christmas.  He raised one eyebrow and said, "A Happy Family would be a good thing."  I agreed that would be a very good thing and definitely something I want for Christmas.  Then I tried one more time asking if there was a toy or something Santa could give him.  His response was, "I would like Santa to say hi to me."  And there you have it.  I love the fact that even when I kept prodding he can't think of anything else to ask for than a Scooby Doo toy to cuddle, his family getting along, and a hello from Santa.  Sounds like a perfect Christmas to me!

A teacher, an author, and a veterinarian

AJ has decided that when she grows up she wants to be either a teacher, an author, or a vet.  However, she can't figure out what she would enjoy most.  So to her help her decide she is practicing all three options.  She recently wrote her first chapter book and is working on 3 others.  She frequently rides her bike to the vet to visit the cats they have in the waiting room and to talk to the secretary (and she loves taking care of her own cats as well as all of the neighbors' cats).  She has been teaching her dolls school for months, but decided she needed some live students to practice on and this last week she started her own preschool in our basement.  She put up banners, posters, and a whiteboard, made up a lesson plan, and then invited D's friend over so she could teach them.  Here she is with her best friend teaching D and his best friend about money and counting.

She did a really good job engaging them for a full hour.  I checked on them a couple of different times and everyone stayed involved and interested.  She enjoyed it so much that this week she is planning on inviting some more of D's friends to make it even more "real."

Thank a Vet!

Veteran's Day has passed, and I hope we each took the time to reflect on those who have and continue to serve our country in the armed forces.  I took my kids out to my parents' for the weekend and while there we went through old pictures trying to get them labeled and dated correctly.  I brought back with me pictures of my grandfathers in their military uniforms taken while they served during WWII.

This first is of my maternal grandfather who served in the navy.  Most of his service was done in the Pacific.

This is my paternal great-grandfather who served in France during WWI

This next one is his son, my paternal grandfather.  He joined the army as a cook with no intention of fighting.  He was shipped to Italy and during combat was handed a machine gun and told to get out there and use it.  He suffered from frostbite and had trouble with his feet forever after due to the freezing cold winter he spent overseas.

 Here I am with my husband, daughter, brother and his family and sister at my Grandpa's funeral in 2004.  My brother is in his army dress uniform.  He along with two of my cousins (also army guys) did a military tribute at my Grandpa's funeral.  My brother is still serving in the army.

 My husband's maternal grandfather who served in the army during WWII

This is my husband's paternal grandfather who served in the air force during WWII

My father-in-law who was a U.S. marine

And my husband who served in the U.S. Army. He enlisted first in the reserves and then the national guard before going active duty as an officer in 2002.  He was given a medical discharge in 2004.

I'm so proud of and grateful for each of these men and their examples to me.  A great big thank you to ALL of those who have and continue to serve!

Happy Family

One of the older kids had left their Diary of a Wimpy Kid book on the table and D was looking through it.  While looking at the pictures he said to me, "I wish they had a happy family."
I said, "I wish they did too.  I wish everyone had a happy family."
He said thoughtfully, "Yeah."
Then I told him, "I'm glad you're happy.  That makes our family happy."
He said, "I'm happy because you guys are happy to me!  I love you for that Mommy."
How that boy warms my heart!

And now onto something not wholly related to the title of the post (but that I will add so that it's not another post only about D again)...

As I was trying to come up with a topic for FHE I decided that we needed a lesson on friends and the importance of choosing good ones, but I wasn't sure how to approach it.  I honestly don't spend a lot of time on facebook, but when I got on yesterday to check my messages this link jumped right out at me  http://yourlifeuncommon.blogspot.com/2011/11/fhe-choosing-good-friends.html.  Thanks to my cousin Jen for posting it!  I knew AP would enjoy playing with food dye and bleach, and boy did he.  So much so that I had to keep reminding him that he was supposed to be listening to me (ha, ha!).  AJ and D also stayed very involved.  I won't go into a lot of details because you can check out the link if you're interested in the actual lesson.  However, I will say that the one difference I did was give them each their own bowl of noodles to represent their own group of friends and then we came up with common interests for each of their groups.  Then we talked about possible "sins" to fit each of their groups and they added their own coloring drops.  For example, D's interest was toys and the bad choices were not sharing or grabbing from someone else.  I helped him put his drops in and it worked out great (until he started sticking his hands in it).  AP's group liked video games and cartoons (he put in drops for violence, swearing, and immodesty) and AJ's group liked reading and animals (same kinds of things as AP).  Anyway it went pretty well despite a few little arguments, and while it wasn't perfect it fit what we needed and can be added to the efforts of trying to work together and be a happy family.

A little lunchtime gratitude

 We sat down for lunch and as I sat watching D my heart just felt so happy and full so I said, "D you are SO sweet and I'm SO grateful you're part of our family!"

Pause. (thinking)

Then his reply, "Hmmm.  I AM a child of God you know."

Costume Up!

I love Halloween!  Well actually that's not really true.  I'm not really into all of the spooky decorations and I just can't really love a holiday that is all about candy and the idea of people knocking on my door and ringing my doorbell until I don't know when, BUT I love the costumes!  I love seeing what other people come up with coming up with something fun of my own!  I especially love doing theme costumes with my hubby.  J has always been very creative with his costumes and dresses up for work.  His costumes have been such a hit that this year everyone in his office was encouraged to follow his example and dress up.  Now the pressure was on!  Well we went to the thrift store for our Friday night date last week and found this awesome outfit: Uncle Rico by day (How much you wanna make a bet I can throw a football over them mountains?)... 

  and Cowboy Woody by night!  D wanted to be Buzz so we decided to go along with that theme and be Jessie and Woody.  

As we took him trick or treating D was more excited to point us out as Jessie and Woody than he was to tell about his own costume.

Woody and Buzz (aka Daddy & D): Best buds to the end

It was so fun to watch D as we went from house to house.  He had to tumble on the grass in every single yard and do this evasive side to side action as we walked down the sidewalk.  It was hilarious to see him totally getting into his Buzz character.

AJ was a werewolf.  Of course she wanted to do something involving the animal kingdom, but has spent so much time as a cat that she was ready for something a little different.  She also wanted to go a "little" scary this year.  She came up with the idea of a werewolf, but I told her it might be hard to find a "girly" werewolf.  What do I know?  Girly monsters are totally in right now.

And AP was the grim reaper (or something along those lines).  He had a hood, but by the end of the night (when I was able to catch him for a picture) it was no where to be found.  It must have gotten lost somewhere during his trick-or-treating adventures with his buddies.  He was the first to say, "Oh well.  It's really not a big deal anyway.   Halloween is over."

And so it is.  Hope you had a good one!