Christmas Eve Jammies

This year Christmas Eve was on a Sunday. We were able to eat dinner with my family and then head over to Marianne's for pajamas. Marianne read a couple Christmas books to the kids. I have become the designated reader for "That Thy Alms May Be In Secret" every year now, because I can read it without crying. I love that we read that one, it is so touching. We opened our pajamas, took a few pictures and headed home. 

Davis Christmas Party

We had the Davis Family party at Steph and Joe's house in Pleasant View, Idaho this year! It was fun to have it back at her house and her new house is perfect for hosting! Maggie and I had fun doing cute fruit trays with a Christmas tree and Grinch heads this year. We ate sandwiches and appetizers for dinner. 

Joe brought the ring the reindeer game. Claire was so excited to be a reindeer. She made it challenging for our team because our reindeer liked to move around. It was a cute game against families. The Hurd's definitely won that one. We tried playing the cranberry sauce game where you cut a slice off and the last person to cut without the dime falling off wins, but it definitely didn't work. Only three people were able to do it before it all broke. I didn't try that one before hand. The toilet paper game I brought was fun though. You had to roll up the toilet paper without spilling the cup. Everyone won whatever prize was in line with where their cup stopped. 

Our whole famliy did the 12 days of Christmas for my Grandparents this year. Each family had a few turns to deliver the gifts. We gave them the last two gifts together since we were all there. I hope they enjoyed it. I thought it was fun with nice gifts.

We had our cousin present exchange. My kids were all so happy with their gifts. I really loved Claire's bouncer, mainly because she loved it! It was so cute to see her bounce around everywhere. This exchange is the only present my kids pick out so I am glad we still do it. I think next year I will do a sibling exchange again. My parents gave all of us our Christmas gifts at the party too. Everyone got great things. Van got all dino, which kept him entertained until the second I cleaned up to leave. He is so obsessed with dinosaur anything right now, it's cute. 

Overall the party was so great! My favorite party of the season. It is kind of our only real Christmas party, but definitely my favorite still. I have amazing family and I love when we are all together. 

Candy Cane Swim Meet

Kent had a swim meet on the 21st. It was one for their team at Ogden High. Kent swam in a couple relays, the 100 meter breaststroke, 100 meter IM, 50 meter butterfly, and 50 meter backstroke. It is so fun to watch him! His backstroke he swam in 50.6 seconds which is five seconds faster than his last meet!  

 

Gingerbread house

Claire got to make a gingerbread house for her Christmas party the last day of school before winter break. I made some of the frosting and Van and I were able to go to her class to help. Van just found toys and played with another boy. Claire did it on her own, but it was fun to be there and watch her. Her class made a gingerbread boy at the beginning of the school year and it ran away! For the past three months they have been getting postcards and packages from family and friends all over the world that saw the gingerbread boy. Stephanie saw him in Idaho and Ben saw him on his mission in Michigan. I know he was seen a lot of other places too, but those are the only ones that knew Claire. While the kids were making their gingerbread houses, their gingerbread boy came back! It was cute. I have been super impressed with Mrs. Warner so far and Claire loves her!

Christmas Village

I felt like we hadn't done much Christmas fun things yet before yesterday. The dance show was fun and then I wanted to go to Christmas Village in Ogden. The older kids hate going places without inviting other people so I invited my family. None of them could go, but we went anyway. When we got there Kent said he didn't know we were getting out of the car. He was in short sleeves and no socks. I unzipped the inner part of my coat for him to wear and then he grabbed slides instead of shoes since he didn't have socks. It didn't take long before his toes were frozen and he was ready to leave. I was mad that he wasn't more prepared and didn't want to leave yet. Van wore his dinosaur costume because it is so warm, and i liked that he was so easy to spot. Claire and Maggie loved looking in every house to find the ornament. Corbin had already been with the Young Men, but he was a good sport to walk around it again. It was pretty busy and Kent was miserable and sad so we didn't stay long. We did get a cute picture of the whole family though, which is always super nice. As we were walking to the car, Shannon called and they had decided to come. We didn't meet up with her because they were on the other side and we were almost to the car. I told her we were going to get dinner so they took one picture and then left to meet us at Dylans. Dinner was supper fun. The boys all sat at a table and then the rest of use enjoyed visiting for a while. It wasn't a long night, but overall it turned out good. I like to do a least a few little things to bring the Christmas feeling. 

Before I wrote my version, Maggie wrote the following paragraph as if it were me writing. I liked it.

My family and I were planning on going to Christmas village, but my kids didn't want to go without another family, so we invited Shannon and her family. They didn't know if they could go, but we decided to go either way. When we got there it turned out that Kent forgot socks and a coat, so we got out and he used part of my coat and he wore sandals. We went and looked at lots of the small houses and looked for an ornament that was hidden in each house. The lights outside and the ones in the trees of the houses were especially pretty this year. Most of my kids had seen enough after being there for about 45 minutes. On the way to the car Shannon called and her and her family just got there. I was texting her and after her family was there for about 15 minutes they met us at Warrens and we got diner there. 

Christmas dance recital

 Yesterday was Claire's first dance performance ever! She looked so cute as a little grinch. I realized as we were almost there that I had forgot her dance bag that had her tap shoes. I was going to drop the girls off and run home and get them, but Meredith called Matt Aardeema and he ran and got them. He made it right at one and I barely missed getting them to Claire in time. Because I was back stage I also missed watching her dance. I was so sad! Claire's cute Kindergarten teacher got to the doors the same time as me and was locked out from watching Claire dance. I thought it was so sweet that Mrs. Warner would come to watch Claire. I went and got Claire after her dance and she was able to say hi to her teacher and Mrs. Warner gave her a little treat and took her picture. So cute! A mom shared the recording with me after and Claire did such a great job! Even without tap shoes. Her leg warmers made it so you couldn't even tell she didn't have shoes except her leg warmers were slipping off a few times. It all worked out fine. I made sure Claire didn't see how stressed I was.

Maggie danced on her new team for the first time. I was super impressed. I thought their dance was great. They danced to Run Run Rudolph. The whole show was only 30 minutes. It was a little crazy, but also fun to have two girls dance this time.

Dipping Pretzels

I love that my grandparents invite us up each year to dip pretzels. I was also glad we were able to find a time that all of my kids could go. Our schedules have been pretty crazy lately. They all really enjoyed it. Van just liked eating the pretzels and playing with the drawer of toys. The rest of us enjoyed the pretzel dipping. They had pretzels, nuts, and cherries. We were only there for a short time, but I love that we have time to spend with my grandparents still.

Merry Christmas Elder Moyes

We all were together for family dinner last Sunday. My mom wanted to take a picture of everyone to send to Ben. Maggie made a cute poster and then I pulled out my phone to take the picture on timer and it was so hard to get everyone and the sign and make it clear with good lighting. Everyone was so done by the time I took a million pictures. I should have brought my camera, had I known. We ended up with a couple cute picture of the entire family (minus Elder Moyes.)

 

Nature Center Field Trip

Claire came home from school one day so excited to show me a piece of paper. When she pulled it out she told me that she gets to go on the bus to the Nature Center and I can come too if I just sign here! She was so excited I couldn't say no. Only four parents could go so luckily I was one of the ones drawn to go. It was really so fun to be with her. It was crazy cold and snowy, and the whole fieldtrip was outside. Towards the end, the kids were so cold they ended up moving our bird feeder making into one small room that was available. The kids learned all about how animals get ready for winter. They got to climb through a bear cave, migrate like deer, and make bird feeders. I enjoyed being with Claire and seeing all of her friends. She loved having me there too!

 

Thanksgiving

We started Thanksgiving at Carl's Jr. for breakfast. It was hard to find somewhere that was open this year. Kent was sick on Thanksgiving for the second year in a row, so he and Corbin stayed home. It was just a quick breakfast and then we took some home to the boys and finished eating there.

For Thanksgiving dinner we went with the Thompson family to a church in Ogden. There were so many of my cousins there that I hadn't seen in such a long time. It was fun to be able to talk to them and catch up. My kids didn't love the huge crowd with people they didn't know, but it was a nice afternoon. They pretty much just stuck to their own cousins, except Claire. My little social butterfly was able to make friends to play with. Claire was super excited for Bingo too, because she had seen the prizes my mom bought for it. She got bingo first and didn't even choose one my mom brought, but was thrilled with her purse with a mini dog in it. 

We left Kent home while we were at dinner so we didn't stay too long. We went home and rested for a bit and then went out to Mark and Marianne's for pie. 

I was determined to get a family picture before Thanksgiving was over so we snapped this just as we were headed home for the night! I am so thankful for this amazing family of mine!