The Perfect Christmas

Forgive me for posting this three weeks late. No excuses.

We went to UT for Christmas again this year, and thankfully avoided the nasty weather we encountered last year. But we did get snow while we were there and enjoyed a beautiful white Christmas with my parents and most of my family (we missed you Matt and Jenn!).

There was snow play, pool, ping pong, air hockey, movies, bowling, last-minute shopping, fender benders, laughing, playing with cousins and eating, eating, eating. It was fantastic.

After five or so days with my family in Orem we headed to Fairview to spend a couple of days with Jarad's brother and his family. We love Fairview and always enjoy hanging out there.

I've come to the conclusion that the best way to do the holidays is to go away. I'll tell you why.

1. I was better prepared for the holiday since we left a week in advance, so I was able to really enjoy the time leading up to Christmas.

2. I always have a problem letting go of Christmas, and get a little depressed the day after. There's a month-long (or longer in our house!) buildup, and then the day gets here, and then there's the next day. It's like it's just over, but I'm still sitting here in my decorated house, listening to Christmas music. But there's nothing to look forward to. When I'm gone, I'm still having fun with family, and there's the going home to look forward to. It gives the holiday an ending point. Although if you walked into my house today you'd think I didn't quite get the hint about the ending point, since all my Christmas decorations are still piled in there waiting to be put away. I just took down Christmas this weekend :).

Anyway, some fun pictures from the trip...

The kids in their red union suits on Christmas Eve.


Tess and her little cousin Avarie got matching dollies from G&G Stastny.

Emma catching some air in Fairview...

Fisher catching some air in Fairview...

Fisher catching some attitude in Fairview...

Emma and cousin Coletyn

Volleyballer

Emma finished her first volleyball season the Saturday before we left for Utah. She had gone to two volleyball camps last summer and really loved it, so we signed her up for a season with the Yellow Lightning. She did awesome, and all the girls really improved over the course of the season. The team had a lot of heart and came in a very close second in what was a totally nerveracking championship match, playing against an undefeated team. We can't wait for another volleyball season to start!

A Special Visitor

One evening we were out delivering holiday cheer and looking at our neighbors' very tasteful Christmas decorations. At one house Tess mentioned to our friend Jera that she LOVED her Dora inflatable Christmas decoration that adorned her lawn along with a lot of other, um, somewhat gauche decorations someone had barfed onto their front yard (my personal favorite part of these decorations was the huge banner on the garage that read: Felice Navidad Neighbors).

The next morning Tess went outside as the kids were leaving for school and just stood on our front porch with her jaw dropped to the ground, having seen this:

She said, incredulously, "MOM it's just like the one at that girl's house last night!!" Yep Tessie, JUST LIKE it. :)

Thanks Cami and Jera for letting us borrow Dora. We intended to pay her forward before we went on our trip, but we completely ran out of time, so she sat deflated on our front porch while we joyously celebrated Christmas in Utah. Sorry Dora.

Resolution

At the top of my list of resolutions this year is to blog more often. OK not at the top. Not even close, but it's at least on my mind... so today, the first day of 2010 (wow I feel old -- 2010 used to sound so futuristic and science-fictiony) I'll start keeping that quasi-resolution. We'll see how long it lasts.

First order of business is to catch up on pictures from before Christmas...

The twins and I took a trip to the zoo. For some reason I haven't taken them to the Children's Zoo part of the zoo. Ever. I think I just don't like the germiness of the petting zoo. Yick. But they loved it of course, and now I fear it's the only part of the zoo I'll ever see again.

Case was much more comfortable with the goats than Tess was :)

Milking a cow.

One for the bedroom wall! He thought it was pretty cool a tractor had HIS name on it. Unfortunately all of them had his name on them, so he thought they were all his...

The world is their oyster.

We made my favorite Cookie Monster Sugar Cookies one night and decorated them... they lasted about a day. Yum!

Dreamin' of a white Christmas!

I am diligently (and nervously) watching weather.com this week to determine the best day to drive up north for Christmas. Forecast is for snow in Orem on Christmas Eve! YAY!! Now I just have to round up enough borrowed snow gear to keep my kiddos warm.

Thanks to the Browns for all the snowpants. Erin, I'll be calling you to mooch too. :) I don't imagine you're going sledding anytime soon LOL.

Faking It

I have never, ever been a fan of artificial Christmas trees. I still am not really a fan. But I caved this year and bought one so that we could actually have a tree up AND go to Utah for Christmas. Last year we didn't get a tree and I couldn't handle it.

So this year I took the plunge and we were able to put up and decorate our new tree on the day after Thanksgiving. Once the kids got done yelling at me that they wanted a REAL tree, they helped decorate it, and it looked pretty darn good. It just felt right to have a tree in our front room. I was relatively happy with it!

Until this week when two strands of lights have already gone out. Don't tell Jarad, but I'm buying a real tree next year.

Team Jacob

Not me. Jarad. We went to see New Moon a couple of weekends ago and Jarad just could NOT understand what Edward and Bella have. I mean, Jacob is her FRIEND, right? They can have CONVERSATIONS, right? Isn't that what women want?

And he thinks I lust after 17-year-old Taylor Lautner, but in all honesty I can't get over the Shark Boy images.