It's Christmas!

As tradition, we acted out the Nativity story for 'Christmas Eve'. Here everyone gets ready for their part.

It was just slight chaos.

The brothers were the three wise men - with their fancy hats.

And Rachel dressed up like a beautiful angel. It was a successful rendition. 

And the bounty of Christmas morning.  It was great seeing the kids get all excited searching for presents with their names.

Hannah liked the bracelets she found.

Adam was an expert at present opening.  He also did a good job just opening his presents.  Adam got a lot of Paw Patrol gifts.

Whitney with her new nerf guns.

Will was especially excited about the weed whacker.  He doesn't like cutting around the fence. So this will be really helpful in the spring.

Rachel getting Harry Potter Clue.  Thanks for all the fun presents.

Later we opened the family time capsule.  It has been closed for the last 10 years so it was really fun to hear everyone's predictions.  I had some good guesses but some things were way off. We all wrote ones again to be opened in January 2030.  It will be weird to see what my kids are up to in ten years.
Anyway, great times were had by all in Pasco for Christmas.  I'm glad everyone was able to be there.

Hannah Turns 2!

We celebrated Hannah's birthday while we were in Pasco.  It's hard to believe this little girl is already 2.  I think she had a fun day.

I kept everything pretty simple.  Just a regular yellow cake with whipped cream and butterfinger pieces.  Hannah liked being the center of attention.

She liked her cake, even if the picture doesn't look like it.  Hannah just doesn't like her hands being messy.

Then we opened presents.

More presents.  This was good preparation for our late Christmas celebration.

Also that day we went to McDonalds and the kids all got ice cream.  They had a lot of fun playing on the toys.  Hannah is partial to slides now and went on it over and over.

We also went to the coolest Lego village ever.  This huge table was set up in the Caziers house.  She had a scavenger hunt of little things to find.  This was incredible.  So much detail.  Hannah had a little trouble not wanting to play with the Legos, so she and I sat and read books.

We also did our classic WalMart trade gifts that you bought for a little over $3.  It's fun to see what bargains you can find.  The grown ups did it a little differently this year by making it more white elephant style.  That was a fun twist.

It's so crazy that this little girl is now 2!  She likes to tell me that she isn't a baby.   :( They grow so quickly.

Making Gingerbread Houses

I use "gingerbread" but they were really graham cracker houses.  Most of my kids don't care for gingerbread, but Megan really wanted to decorate a house.

There were lots of yummy candy decorations.

Some of us were sneaking pieces of candy while decorating.

Hannah wasn't even trying to be sneaky; she just sat there eating candy and licking frosting. Best Day Ever!

Rachel spent a lot of time on her house.  It looked really cute.

Adam showing off his creation.

Megan was all proud of her work.

Then we needed to work off all the sugar crazies.  So we bundled up and went on a walk.

And spent some time jumping on the trampoline.  Everything was more fun too because there were cousins at grandma's house.

More Christmas-y things to come.

Rachel is Baptized

I am going out of order for our last couple of weeks.  But this one is the most important.  Rachel is 8 and made the great choice to be baptized as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  I am so proud of her. It was a wonderful day.

I am so grateful to have a husband with the priesthood who could baptize Rachel.  It was wonderful.

Rachel was baptized with her best friend, Emmitt Lystrup.  So that made it extra special.

And we had lots of family support. 

Thank you everyone for coming. 

My mom did the talk on the Holy Ghost and she made blankets for each kid.  Thanks mom!  Also, Rachel got her very own quad from Will's parents and she has been loving those.  They come out every night for scripture time.

We set out little baskets so people could write notes congratulating the two.  I was amazed at the turn out and how many notes Rachel received.  She will always remember that she is loved.

My parents brought a great dinner for everyone after the baptism.

Thank you everyone for making this day special for Rachel.  We are so blessed to have a great family.

We're Off to See the Wizard

Rachel is turning 8 tomorrow and decided to have a Wizard of Oz themed party.  This one was a lot of work but I think it turned out cute.

Our first item of business was to decorate bags for future goodies.

Then we played Wizard of Oz Bingo.  This was a big hit.  Notice colorful paper.  I tried to do everything rainbow themed to go with Dorothy's song.

We gave out huge lollipops as prizes for getting a bingo.

Then we played the song and had to follow the yellow brick road to our next destination.  It ended up being yellow brick strips because my order of yellow paper didn't come in time. Poor Will had to keep moving the road around.  But I think the kids liked following it around the house.

We met the scarecrow along the way.

And had to answer trivia about The Wizard of Oz movie to prove that we had a brain.  Then everyone got a medal.

Then we followed the road to the tin man. (I was pretty proud of this drawing).

We needed to have a heart.  I made a bunch of heart shaped sugar cookies (too much work).  Each kid got to decorate one for themselves and one to give to someone they love.

Hannah in baby heaven with her cookie.

Then we got to the cowardly lion.  This one was so fun.  I got some little toy dogs from the dollar store and hid them in boxes and covered them with gross stuff.

The kids had to prove their courage by putting their hands in the boxes and retrieving their 'Toto'.  I started off easy with yarn, then flour, then noodles, then peaches (the slimy ones from a can), and finally pudding.  It was great watching their faces as they put their hands into the boxes.

I made a bunch of green playdough so the kids could form their own emerald cities.

Will was the judge and gave out awards to everyone.  We also gave them bubbles, since that is what Glinda the good witch travels in.

For food we had pizza and rainbow jello.

And rainbow cupcakes.  We were suppose to also have rainbow sherbet but everyone was too full from the jello.

And finally present opening, which is really the best part.  So we had another fun party.  Hard to believe Rachel will be 8 and is getting baptized soon.  So awesome!  Happy Birthday!