Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Christmas Day

Noah was with Kent this year until 2 p.m on Christmas day. I just slept in and then waited for him to come home. Of course he had a fun time opening all of his presents. His big gift this year was a PlayStation 3 from Santa. He was very excited about that. He also got some Jazz stuff, movies and books. After he opened his presents here, we headed to my parents house to exchange gifts. Of course my mom spoiled us again. She also made these really cute blankets that fold up into a pillow. She made one for each of the grand kids. Noah's was a BYU one. I got slippers and a Kohl's gift card. Yeah!! Then we just spent the rest of the day hanging out, playing games and eating and more eating. It was a great time.




Each year I let Noah pick out a new ornament. This year, he picked out a Utah Jazz one.

Sunday, December 27, 2009

Christmas Eve

Our traditional Christmas eve consists of getting together with all of my siblings and their families and having a nice dinner, talent show, white elephants and of course, the game where everyone fights to open the gift to win the "Christmas Prize". It was so fun this year as always. Everyone was there, including Kent and Noah. This year, Noah was with Kent for Christmas Eve but I invited them to our family party and to my surprise, he came and brought Noah. I thought the night might be awkward or uncomfortable but it actually was fine. Noah even told me how glad he was that they came. This year, we had the party at my parents church so that we could have more room. Everyone seemed to have a great time. We had a nice dinner with ham and turkey. We had some fun games with prizes for the kids. The kids seemed to have a great time. Some of the dads and kids played basketball. We also had a fun talent show. I wish I would have gotten some pictures of that. It was awesome. I definitely have some talented nieces and nephews. Kenny and Melodie won AGAIN (love you guys(:) the hard to open "Christmas Prize", which was a gift card to Applebees.Playing some fun Christmas games




White elephant game with the kids
I love this picture of Kristi and her girls

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Christmas Fun

At Christmas time there is always lots of food, parties, activities and fun. Here are some of the fun things we did this year. One night, we drove out to Thanksgiving Point to see their Christmas lights. They were so awesome. It was $6 per car to drive through but definitely well worth it. They have Christmas music playing as your drive around and at the very end they have little signs with pictures telling the nativity story. We also made a gingerbread house. It didn't turn out very good. The frosting wasn't that great but we had fun with it anyway.The finished house with the "Big Cheeser" smile

We also made sugar cookies but I have to admit that I totally cheated this year. I bought the premade cookie dough that already had the shapes cut out. All we had to do was bake them and frost them. Noah didn't seem to mind that we weren't rolling out a bunch of dough so it was fine. That part is always so messy. I won't buy these kind of cookies again though because they were so small. We kept laughing at how small they actually were. I guess the whole point was to have fun so it didn't matter too much.

One other fun thing we did this year was go to the Larry Miller Sing a Long. Aside from the long wait and crowds, it was a fun night. We took Trax down to the Energy Solutions Arena and everyone got a free hot dog and drink. The whole arena was full. We all sang a bunch of Christmas songs. The Jazz bear even made an appearance which Noah was excited about. At the end of the night, each person got a free Jazz ticket, free popcorn at any Larry Miller theater and tickets to a Bees game. The Jazz ticket is for the nose bleeders but Noah still really likes to go. Of course at this time of year, there never seems to be enough time to fit everything in and things feel so rushed but we managed to do some fun things and spend some good quality time together to celebrate the season.

Thursday, December 17, 2009

School Christmas Progam

They always have a Christmas program at the school. It is always a little disappointing because they won't let the kids sing any songs about Jesus. It's also so crowded that if you don't get there way early, you can't see very well at all. I didn't get very many good photos because I was clear in the back of the gym. Each grade sang 2 Christmas songs. Noah is starting to get to the age where he doesn't want me to take his picture so I can never get very many good poses from him. He bugs(:

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Finally.....

We finally ventured out and got our Christmas tree the other night. I love going and picking out a tree. It's a pain getting it home and setting it up but the memories I have of picking out real trees as a child are so priceless. People tease me for not just giving in and getting a fake one but I just can't do it YET. I'm sure that I will one of these days. Of course I had issues with the lights and had to make a Walmart trip. This happens every year and I get so frustrated. Once I got the lights on, we got all the ornaments up. It was a lot of fun to decorate. Each year, Noah gets a new ornament and this year he picked out a Utah Jazz one. It's nice having the tree up and the other Christmas decorations. Now, I feel like I can start to get into the Christmas spirit a little more.

Thursday, December 3, 2009

Festival of Trees

Tonight we went to the Festival of Trees. It is so fun and cool to see how these trees are decorated. I can't believe how creative and artistic people are. My favorite was the Grinch tree. It was really cool. Noah really liked the Jazz tree and the BYU tree. They had just about every kind of theme you could think of. It was a fun night and all the proceeds go the Primary Children's. To top off the night, we got a scone with honey butter. Yum!! It started getting me more in the Christmas spirit. I only got one picture. My camera was acting weird but this was Noah's favorite tree. It was a Utah Jazz tree.