A Christmas Story

I posted this on my blog and thought I'd copy and paste it here. It includes pics from our time at with Kris, Jeff, Adam, Alisha, Scott, BABY AYVA!!!, Mike, and Debi. You should be able to scroll over most of the pics to get a caption...

Chapter One: Christmas Eve

First of all, Acadia ended up feeling much better on Sunday and fortunately, her friend felt better on Monday.  Whew! :)

On Christmas Eve, our good friends came over for dinner.  We wanted to share our annual Christmas Eve dinner with them and it was so nice!  The kids were really well behaved and we enjoyed having a quiet night.  We ate our usual: cheese, crackers, shepherd's loaf of bread, summer sausage, grapes, apples, olives, cider, et.  We sat on the floor on blankets and watched the short 5 minute Nativity video that the church came out with a few years ago.  Then we finished up our last day of our advent calendar where Cadi puts another part of the nativity scene on the magnet board and we read some scritures, a poem, and sing a Christmas Hymn.  Of course, the last piece was the Baby Jesus so that was perfect!  Afterwards, we let the kids play a little and the adults visited for a bit.  It was a really nice night. :)

After our friends left, we put Rori down for bed and Acadia got to play Santa's Helper for her first time!  She helped stuff Rori's stocking and set up a toy set for her.  She stayed up watching Christmas with the Kranks with us and finally we kicked her off to bed so Santa could come for her. ;) 

Ryan had told my aunt he'd bring a cheesecake to dinner on Christmas and he waited to start it until then, so he was up pretty late!  (But the cheesecake turned out really good! lol) 

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Chapter Two: Christmas Morning

Christmas morning was so fun!  The girls both woke up just before 7am.  Ryan, who had only gotten to bed at 3:30, was so sweet and patient!  He woke up and didn't even make the girls wait.  He was ready by the time I had Rori changed and we all headed out to see what Santa had brought.  It was so fun to see Rori experience Christmas - she loved everything!  She especially loved the Backyardigans playset that I won a few weeks ago! :)  Even though she would stop and check out other gifts that she got, she kept coming back to this one.  I'm so glad we won it! lol

Here are some fun pics:

First, Ryan and Rori in matching Christmas Gifts (apparently, mine is coming - they couldn't find my size in the stores so we're ordering it.  I'm super excited, I was hoping to get one!!!)

And here is Rori playing with a few of her favorite toys:

I have to admit that the kitties were almost a gift for me! lol  I got them because I wanted them!  And once they were opened, they spent a lot of time on MY lap! lol  These cats are so cool, they respond to your touch, they meow, purr, move, and the mom even kneads her paws when she's super content!  Finally, we have cats at our house that won't kill Ryan or Cadi (allergies)!  :)

Cadi had a great Christmas too!  Santa brought her a bathrobe (what she wanted most!) so she wore it the rest of the morning.  She also loved a little stuffed hamster that Santa brought.  Two years ago, we gave Cadi a hamster for Christmas and she named her Angel.  Angel died earlier this year, but this new little Angel won't ever die. :)

Cadi also got some Littlest Pet Shop toys, which she had really wanted.

Ryan spent at least 2 nights out searching for this sweatshirt - he went to at least 3 malls!  We knew she wanted it but it took awhile to find it.  It's a little big but that means she'll get to grow into it. ;)

And how can I leave out this?  Cadi LOVES Hannah Montana!  She got the 2 disc CD and a t-shirt... and her Aunt Debi gave her this...

Ryan got many things football: a jersey, a Patriots gift set, a Patriots football, an official NFL football, etc.  He did get a few things not football related, but that did seem to be the major theme this year.  He wasn't complaining!

I got a super cute bracelet that Cadi made for me, a couple really good books, some great cds, and a leather jacket!  I am also promised a Brady jersey. :D  (Now Cadi will be the only one without one, but she doesn't like football and doesn't want a jersey.  So we're not wasting the money! lol)

Here are some more random pics from our morning...

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Chapter Three: A White Christmas

Living in the Northwest, you don't really expect to have a white Christmas.  You can hope for it, but you just don't expect it.  The chance of getting one is about 1%.  Of course, as the holiday approached, we watched the forecast hoping it would show snow but all we saw was rain.  Then, on Christmas Eve, I heard a weather report say 80% chance of snow in the afternoon!  I hardly believed it!  But sure enough...

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Chapter Four: Fun with the Family

After we opened presents and chatted on the webcam with Ryan's parents back East, we got dressed and went to my aunt's house.  They gets a lot more snow than we do!  Here are some pics...

It was nice and warm in their house though!  We had a delicious dinner!  And it was fun to visit.  My cousin was there with her brand-new baby girl!  Ayva Belle was only one week old - exactly!  She was so sweet!

We had fun playing there, too.  Cadi loved playing ping pong.

There was a huge snowball fight after dinner!  Unfortunately, I don't have pics. :(  But I do have pics of Rori tackling Ryan...

Cadi was cold after playing in the snow and she wanted Ryan to wrap her up in a blanket, so he did...

It was a really nice Christmas and we really enjoyed every moment of it!  I hope you all had a great Christmas, too! :)

The End

 

 

Picture a Christmas

I have been posting on my blog but I think I've decided to post at least some of those posts here too, that way those who don't regularly frequent blogs other than this will still get our updates. :) So, here are a BUNCH of photos I just posted on my blog from the last couple of weeks...

I LOVE this time of year!  We have so many fun traditions and activities!  One of our favorite, newer traditions is attending the annual Festival of the Nativities that our stake hosts each year.  I think this is their 6th year and every year it seems to get bigger and bigger, better and better.   Here are some pictures from our experience this year (pictures taken two weeks ago):

First of all, we went on Sunday so we were still in our church clothes, we don't usually "dress up" to go to the nativities, it just worked out that way this time. 

This room is the "Home Sweet Home" room, they make it look like you're in someone's home.  It's cozy and warm and they have the cutest nativities in it!

The cultural hall has hundreds of different nativities set up.  There are so many different kinds!  Elegant, unique, international... It takes awhile to look at them all!

After we look at all of the displayed nativities (over 600 in all!), we go to the Children's rooms.  It's the girls' reward for being patient and well-behaved in the other rooms.  In the children's room, there are hand-on, kid-friendly nativities.  Finally nativities we can touch and play with!  Rori just loved running around (surprise, surprise!), Cadi liked dressing up and getting pictures at the stable.

And finally, before we left, we visited Joseph's Workshop where Cadi made a little decoration (Jesus in a manger) and colored a picture.

Last weekend, we visited our good friends in Idaho.  This is another tradition.  When we lived in Idaho, we became such close friends and since most of us didn't have family close by, we started celebrating holidays together.  Now that we've all spread out a little bit and don't get to see each other as much, we make an effort to visit at least every Christmas season and have our annual Christmas Party.  It's ALWAYS a blast!  We keep adding more and more kids, so it's getting bigger and bigger every year - but that just means more fun, right?  Here are some pics:

We started this gift exchange when there was only one kid in the group.  Now we have a kids' gift exchange and an adult exchange.  The stories are usually pretty fun - about Riley Right.  Left, right, right, left, and... LOTS OF LAUGHTER!

The next day, on our way to church, we stopped by the Twin Falls, ID temple.  It is almost finished and should be operating sometime in the next year!

Later that night, we read the scriptures about Christ's birth and let the children act it out.  This is always pretty entertaining.  No one dressed up to play their part this year... except for Sleeping Beauty. ;)

And that brings us to THIS past weekend!  Friday night we went to our ward Christmas party.  The children did a great job on the Nativity...

And finally, here are some random pics from the last few weeks...

Rori LOVES playing with the Fisher Price Nativity set...

And now that we have our front room finished, I actually get to put up a tree in our front window!  We have a tree in our family room that is fun and has all our ornaments that contain lots of special memories but the front room tree is my "pretty tree".  I like how it turned out...

Was that enough photos?  We hope you are enjoying your holiday season as much as we are! :)