Sunday, December 25, 2011

Christmas 2011

Christmas this year was crazy with four little ones around.  Actually, Erin isn't so little anymore, but there were four kids, two adults, a dog; all we were missing was the piggy stole from the shed.  Nevertheless, it was fun and we are truly blessed.

I have read many of my friends blogs talking about attending church on Christmas this year.... well, we didn't.  Christmas Eve found Matt & I busy being Santa's helpers when we heard the noise of someone throwing up!  That's right... Allie strikes again.  This kid has a knack for being sick.  Needless to say, we got our quiet Christmas day at home.


Every year for Christmas, we all get new Christmas jammies from Grandma Homer.  This is something that my mom has done since I was a kid... I think it was to make sure that we all looked halfway presentable in the Christmas morning pictures.  Another fun tradition I have with my dad is our annual Christmas Shopping Outing.  We have been doing this for close to 25 years.  On Christmas Eve, I meet my dad for lunch and we head out shopping.  When it was a kid, I went with him to help pick out gifts for my mom; now, it's more of a chance to sit and visit and be Daddy's Little Girl again.  Well this year, one of our stops found us at Fanzz and they had these great hats on sale... two bucks!  We got enough for the kids and as you can tell from the photos, the girls LOVED them.


I can't believe that we are here, but this year our girls only asked for a couple of things.  Electronic devices topped their lists.  Erin wanted an iTouch so that she can do FaceTime with her dad.  Okay, it's really her friends, but that's the argument she used to convince her dad.  She also got a pocket camcorder and ski lessons at Brighton.


See, even sick, this kid is fairly happy.  She just opened her Kindle Fire.  Allie has really started to develop a love of reading and this is all she asked for this year.  We debated whether or not to get it, but in the end, decided that she was responsible enough to handle it.  She takes very good care of it, doesn't use it when she's not supposed to and it has helped to keep the peace between her and Erin in a major way.  Both of them stick their headphones on and it is nearly bliss.  Worth every penny!  Allie also got a new iPod Nano (thanks to a recall and replacement from Apple) and ski lessons as well.


Will gets two pictures... mostly because he's so cute.  It was also his first Christmas and he was by far my most involved child.  Although we couldn't get him to open his own gifts, we had no problem getting him to play with his brother and sisters.  Will got a fun drum set with all sorts of noise makers, Little People, a quilt from Mom and a Lightening McQueen toy to ride around.  He got a walker that he used exactly twice before he didn't need it anymore and a chair of his own, which he loves!



Here's Will with his daddy!  This boy loves his dad!  Matt got a lot of great things for Christmas this year too.  I made him a couple of boards to display his race medals and bibs and pictures from his races.  He got a new Garmin watch with GPS and the best gift..... 12 months of prepaid and pre-planned dates from his wife.  I know, I'm awesome.


This was something that Matt work on incredibly hard to design and build for Jack for Christmas.  Any of you with little boys have probably heard of Beyblades.  They are an annoying Japanese fad... think Bakugan, Pokemon, Pogs, whatever.  Anyway, they're basically metal tops that "battle" in arenas.  Up until Christmas, Jack battled in Tupperware bowls.  Matt decided he needed something better... so he built this awesome arena.  He glued and sanded together pieces of wood; painted and designed the thing and put handles on it so he can take it when he goes to friends houses.  Jack absolutely loved it and my wood floors are grateful.


The other big project for Christmas this year was a quilt for Jack's new bed.  This boy has wanted a bunk bed forever, but since 9 nights out of 10 he seems to wind up in my bed, we haven't caved.  That is, until I found this awesome loft bed on KSL that fit his full-size mattress that he already had and gave him more floor space in his room to play in.  All that plus a desk he may actually need in the future.  Sounded great.  We bought it.  So, he needed a new quilt.  Matt and I decided that the boy would probably like Superman, so that's what we went with.  It was a little stressful to try and get it finished for Christmas, but boy, did I feel like a rock star when I gave it to him.


This is the only picture of me from the week of Christmas.  There were lots of things we wanted to do, but I spent the whole week on the couch, sicker than a dog.  Blech!

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