Christmas Snapshots

As much as I like to stay on top of my blog, the obligatory "Christmas post" is always difficult for me because I'm just so into the whole experience that the camera really doesn't do it's job. And some posts are really all about the pictures. This was also our first Christmas without extended family, so I didn't have the advantage of snagging pics from Grandma either. So, in a round about way, here are some snapshots of our Christmas:

Our small Christmas Eve dinner

The "Santa load"

Table for toy cars. Won it in a drawing :-)

Some of our new books. Star Wars, naturally.

 Duplos from Uncle Tom and Aunt Mandy. They play with these all the time.

 and their new dresses :-)

 Bristle blocks

 between these and the Duplos, the girls are constantly building something :-)

That's the best I got... Hope you guys all had a wonderful Christmas!

(I sent out our Christmas letter by email this year. If you did not get one, but would like one, let me know. I tried to post it on here but couldn't figure it out AT ALL... any suggestions?)

More Christmas Shtuff

I found some much better red ribbon for our banister, so we removed the cheap substitute and now it looks MUCH better :-)

 As you recall, this was the old version:

and the much nicer version, with accompanying lights on the opposite side:

I was going to teach a friend who has all the equipment, but never the time to use it, how to decorate a cake before she moves in February. But the day we had planned, I woke up with the stomach flu. (The last of the 4 of us to get it) So I had to cancel. But I had this cake all baked and so the next day, I whipped up this little creation just in time to send it back to work with Ed at his lunch break. 

It was a fun cake and I heard it tasted good too :-)

We also had to get our annual Christmas picture with Santa at the ward Christmas party, but this year.... 

Attempting to get Carissa to take a picture with Santa...
She's actually screaming her head off here :-)

Carissa had a few choice words for Santa.

And they did not include what she wanted for Christmas.

I think she made it quite clear how she felt about him when he handed her a candy cane, and she turned around, chucked it to the floor, and broke it, screaming "NO!"

She has also mastered the dirty look, as he also was lucky to experience.

Lexi was much kinder. 

When he asked what she wanted, she told him all her presents were already at her house.

 Way to make his job easy there :-)

We still have a gingerbread house to build, some treats to make, and caroling to do and then we look forward to a fun Christmas weekend :-)

If I worked for Facebook

We all have those "friends" that update their statuses with something that, honestly, only they care about, don't we? But you can just shake your head and say "Oh (name here), no one really cares..." and go on with your endless Facebook stalking. :-)
But what about the ones that do this....every....10.... minutes! Or the ones that seem to post 3 statuses ALL WITHIN THE SAME TIMESTAMP! Really..... REALLY!!! 
(THAT IS WHAT BLOGS ARE FOR!!! If someone wants to read all about you and your family, they can voluntarily go to your blog and read to their hearts content. And we don't have to read your autobiography on Facebook! It's perfect!)
As a result, I have "hidden" a few friends this past couple of months. And you know what? Not only do I not have to read their endless saga of whatever, but I also don't spend as much time on Facebook either! I don't have to scroll down for a while before getting to someone's status that I actually DO care to read. It's amazing!

I think we should make a suggestion to the Facebook dudes....

Next time they "revamp" the site (so... next month??), they need to make it possible to only update your personal status 3 times a day. Then it's disabled until the next day. Then people would have to think "Is  this really worth using up one of my 3 chances today to share??" Personally, I think it's more than generous, but that's also just me talking. I feel dominating if I post more than 7 times in a week! Wouldn't that just be great?? If you have more than that to share or such a fun filled day, make a note or write about it on your blog! Voila! Happiness all around!

(and in case you were wondering, yes, I had some time alone again to think..... ;-) )

The Truth about Santa

As I was sitting and wrapping presents this past weekend, my mind got to thinking.
(You notice any time I have a quiet moment to myself that this happens?? I guess I don't get many of these moments....)
I was labeling presents and trying to decide on whom was to be the giver. They couldn't all say "From: Mom" though surely I had purchase most of them, even the ones that I felt were from Dad :-) But there is always that default giver: Santa.
This got me thinking. We have never really put much effort into letting our kids be "into" Santa. We even had them with us when we made many of the purchases, so Lexi definitely knows who bought her stuff, and she keeps asking me to get them out for her. (I know, I know... we won't do that anymore, so no need to think about my stupidity factor. We just happened to find good deals when we had the girls with us. It happens.)
So as I'm labeling these presents, I put who they were really from. Ed has a few things that he already knows about, so those; those can be from Santa. So why am I not so big on Santa? I guess I've always been that way.
Let me take you back, oh, 25 years ago. Imagine a beautiful Christmas in Fort Collins, CO. A young, innocent girl was talking with her two older brothers. The details are a little fuzzy, seeing that this girl was only 2 at the time, but long story short, her brothers told her that Santa was not alive. They didn't just say "He's make believe"... Oh no! That would've been just wrong! No, they said he used to be alive, but that Dad had shot and killed him, right on our roof. But the rest of the world didn't know that. Dad had to dress up and pretend he was Santa so no one would ever find out, and so she was not to tell anyone else the truth: Santa was dead.
This, obviously, happened to me. And boy did I keep that secret! I really can't ever remember making a list for Santa because I always knew that it was Mom and Dad who were going to be buying my presents, so my list just went up on the fridge. My dad used to dress up all the time for friends and family, and he was great. But I always knew it was my dad. I always knew every Santa I saw was fake, since he was either dead, or when I realized that that my brothers had, in fact, LIED to me, that he was just made up.
(Did you know they bought me cute Barbie clothes one year, but instead of just wrapping them like a normal person, they put them at the bottom of a large box and filled it up with rocks? Not my favorite Christmas memory that year either... boys can be so mean sometimes...)


So now you all know.

I never really believed in Santa Claus.

So do I feel bad that I don't encourage my girls to believe in him? Not really. I don't go out of my way to DISCOURAGE it, but going to the extremes to convince them something is real that isn't, just isn't my thing. We still take pictures with him at the Christmas party. They smile. They get their candy. No harm done.
If a time comes when they are talking with friends and ask me about it, I'll probably tell them the truth (if they haven't figured it out already).
So although he represents all this good stuff, blah blah blah.... We all know the real meaning of Christmas, and it doesn't revolve around a nice old guy giving everyone free gifts. My girls are pretty appreciative of the things they get, and I like hearing them say "Thank You" with sincerity. It's kinda hard to thank a secretive, sneaky old man, isn't it?

If this post makes you sad, I apologize. If you still believed in Santa before reading this post, to that, I also apologize (and scratch my head). We love the idea of Santa, so don't go thinking we're all grinches here. Everyone has experiences that affect their lives... and mine left me without a belief in Santa. Oh well! :-)

Out of Touch

Lexi has this bad habit of deciding what everyone else wants. If you contradict that, meltdown ensues. So because the world doesn't function according to her plans, we have many of these.

Today, Lexi ate lunch while Carissa was still napping. So when she woke up, I had her sit down and eat. But according to Lexi, "She wasn't hungry". I'll let you decide if I was in the wrong here:

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

It's that time of year again!

And since this year, we are lacking in the "wintry" weather, I have to try really hard to get the house to look all Christmas-y. I guess it was just really easy to look at the snow outside and sigh as you thought "Yup, it feels like Christmas..."

But NO MORE, my friends.

No, now I have to do all the work while mother nature just does the same ol' thing, day after day. 

(I did wear a hoodie the other night because it was breezy and I wanted to. So comfy!)

To begin, if you remember my fireplace from 2 years ago, you'll see I got out my trusty felt board fireplace. 

One problem though. 

We don't have a fireplace! 

*hand slap to forehead*

NOT A PROBLEM... the discount store sells vinyl brick walls by the dozen! Sweet! So me and my bad self whipped up this little number. Oh yea!

Then of course, we have the Christmas tree. 

I'm sure you've seen one of these in your life, so I don't really need to say much more.

We decorated it. 

Ok, moving on....

Our newest addition, courtesy of Ed's childhood nostalgia, we have a little electric train.

Choo Choo! 

On the landing upstairs is our small Christmas tree...

Decorated with colorful lights a plenty and salt dough stars :-)

...right next to the candy cane banister...

Outside, we have our new friend, the Christmas penguin. He definitely wins cuteness points. We also have random lights on the bush and porch door, but really nothing worth photographing.

And the door has my little wreath I made, just how I like it. 

Simple.

We have some pretty lights here,

 (with some festive poinsettias)...

 A little flotsam there...

                      And some snowmen hanging from our fans...

And what is Christmas without a little sugar? I've actually been really good this year (so far). I made my peanut butter rounds here for our Relief Society dinner, which I'm sad to report didn't get much attention.

Their loss... and Eddie's gain! :-)

This last Friday, we went to the lighting of the Freedom Tower on base where there was music and food and just a simple fun night to go out and enjoy the cool night air.

It was just Lexi and I since Carissa and Daddy were tired. 

Other than that, we are prepping for the big day. Santa has been grounded from buying anything else for the girls because he has already gotten enough. Now he just needs to help me figure out what to get Eddie!

Mele Kalikimaka!

Thanksgiving - Friend Style

This was our first Thanksgiving (and will be our first Christmas) without family of some sort. We decided to do Thanksgiving with our friends, Kristi and Mike, and some of Ed's co-workers. It was just right! It was small and personable and the girls were pretty well behaved. Ed got to play games with friends, while I got to cook and socialize. Everyone contributed and we had a bountiful little feast. My turkey turned out pretty good too, which was the only thing I was really worried about. Ed's friend brought over his Rock Band accessories, which the girls wanted to be part of too. I wish I would've gotten more photos, but.... I didn't :-P.

Hope you all had a wonderful holiday as well. 

The following day, we did a nice day of decorating for Christmas and lounging about the house, with a fun trip to the mall as a family to watch:

  

 Two Thumbs up for this one! Very original storyline, which is hard to come by these days, for sure. 

The best judge is if my 3 year old can watch the whole thing without getting into trouble. 

It's been a fun weekend so far :-) 

And it's not over yet!

Shaving Cream

As I mentioned earlier, the girls have been fighting all these nasty bugs lately. On Monday, we just hung around the house. Lexi was kind of out of it, which really threw her out of sorts, so I had to make sure I stayed on top of her using the bathroom since she wasn't processing everything going on. I didn't even bother to get them dressed... I actually let Carissa go "Jay bird" for a while before lunch, baracaded in the dining room to help air out her little bum's redness. So without really saying too much more, the dining room floor was in need of a good  cleaning. So for a Monday night activity, we cleared out the room and emptied a can of shaving cream onto the floor and let the girls go at it. Carissa was a little too fussy to enjoy it (we have another can for another day though ;-P) so she went up to the bath while Lexi had the time of her life!

After they all were bathed and asleep, Ed and I finished cleaning it up (and mopped) and the floor still feels soft... seriously. It's weird. But it makes it less sticky too!

A "Go Go Go!" Sunday

Our Sundays are usually pretty laid back. We sleep in as long as the kids let us, then take our time getting ready for church since it doesn't start until 12:30. Then we get home by 4, whip up some dinner, and wind down for bed.
Last week, we were still dealing with the lack of sleep from the girls waking up throughout the night. But we (which meant Eddie, since I did most of the "dealing" that night) had friends dropping off their kids at 7 AM so they could go to the Laie Temple Re-dedication. So by the time the girls and I came downstairs, the house was bustling with 5 kids instead of 2. I made a batch of rolls for sandwiches at lunch. As it came to 10 AM, the older kids were starting to get rambunctious, so I quickly whipped up a batch of Rice Krispy treats and had everyone make their own creations, using up some other sweets we had as well.

 While we were busy doing that, our friends came back and we enjoyed a simple lunch...
                                            ...while Carissa stole the oldest girls Sunday shoes.

Then we sent our kids to their house while some other friends and us headed off to another session of the re-dedication. (I managed to stay awake for the dedication...whew! Dozed a little through the prelude...) Then we headed on back to our friends' house to get the girls and a nice dinner. Whew! It was a long, but GREAT day! And now we can go back to doing temple work! Yea!!!