Winter Break - A Few Christmas Parties, and Baking

Now I remember what we did on Sunday night. Timothy stayed home with the kids, and Aaron and I drove to the stake center with David and Allison. David received his patriarchal blessing. We had a great experience. I had to nurse Allison at some point, and she wasn't exactly quiet the entire time, but it turned out OK. It was neat to be a parent hearing what the Lord has in store for my son.

Monday started the Winter Break for the kids. Aaron still worked, and David actually went to work as well. Apparently Allison woke up too early. I found her asleep like this when I came out of the shower.

David's Christmas wish list was pretty extravagant, and I told him several times he's not going to get much on his list. I think he finally realized that, but instead of scaling back the list he decided he was going to use his own money to buy a DSLR camera. He figured out which one he wanted and then asked me to order it. He doesn't have a credit card yet, but has his own bank account and debit card. So I purchased it with my credit card, and then transferred money from his account into mine. Of course he needed accessories too. He found a refurbished Nikon from some company in New Jersey. It said it had free 2 days shipping, however my credit card company flagged the purchase, so they couldn't send it until I called them back to say it was OK to run the card again. When we got the tracking number it wasn't slated to arrive until after Christmas. He was not happy about that. But what could we do? I reminded him that it wasn't a Christmas present. Eventually he got over it.

With the kids home we mostly just played. They wished there was snow to play in, but there wasn't. We played games, watched movies, played outside, played music. Of course there were still chores and wrapping presents.

Tuesday I was working on making truffles, and banana rolls. Allison was starting to stand on her own, but I still didn't have a great picture of it.

Allison made quite a mess with her dinner that night.

Wednesday was the Peds dept Holiday lunch. I cooked a ham and made sourdough bread. We made some appetizers, three different kinds of cheese dips. A cheese ball, and pimento loaf and a cranberry jalapeno dip. Aaron spent all morning setting up the conference room. I brought the food around 11:30. Aaron made some mashed potatoes, and I picked up some KFC. Others brought salads and dessert. I also brought a banana roll.

We always enjoy the holiday party, and the coworkers open their secret Santa gifts. Petr got Aaron again this year, and got him a Cairns gift subscription. The first box included a camping pillow, and a protein bar, and a couple other things I can't remember now.  The best part of the party was being able to Facetime with Dr. L*. She had been on the East Coast for 2 month taking care of her parents who both have cancer. She had mailed us a box with gifts for everyone, so we had those to give out as well.

Aaron used his projector so everyone could see her. We had to fiddle with the sound tso we could hear better, but it finally worked.

During the party Allison had a blowout. It was such a mess. I had to change her clothes, and realized the extra set of clothes in there wasn't warm enough for the weather, oh well. After the party we cleaned up and then I took the food, decorations and Allison home. Aaron had a trolley that he could put all of the boxes and bags on to take out to the Yukon, it made it so much easier.

When I got back Timothy had put Michelle down for a nap, that was nice. They had eaten and were ready to take a break from babysitting. We still had to get ready for the church party that night.

Allison was trying to stand on her own, but wasn't quite there.

The Christmas party was at 6:00, Aaron got there early to set up, and I got there at 5:30 to help. I had some of the food. We had a pretty good turn out.The food was great as always. The program was nice we sang a few songs, and the Primary had recorded the primary children telling the Christmas story, and then telling what gift they could give Jesus. There was ice cream for dessert, and then Santa came. None of my kids would sit on Santa's lap, so we just talked from arm's length and got the goodie bag.

Then it was time for clean up and going home.

Thursday was another day at home. I baked all day long. The kids helped a lot.

Timothy's photo bomb

 That's a lot of cookies!

After dinner Aaron and I went to the K*'s for a Christmas party. There were a few other couples there. We played some games, and had some delicious food. Allison actually let Bri-Ana hold her. There was a gift exchange and some conversation. It was fun, until Allison woke up and wouldn't nurse. She just cried. So we headed home and luckily she fell back asleep, and I was able to nurse her when we got home. Then Aaron drew names for my goodie giveaway. Erika, and Amanda won!!!

Friday I really don't remember much. Aaron went duck hunting.

pretty sunrise

At some point I mailed off the goodie boxes, and they said they'd arrive by Christmas Eve. I was pleasantly surprised. I think I finally got a handle on wrapping presents. Some presents we had been hoping would arrive finally did. It's really hard to make sure everyone has presents that are somewhat comparable. At least with the older kids. The younger ones won't really notice, or care. Amy really wanted to have a movie night, and I think we finally had one that night.

Hospital Party and Toy Train Exhibit

Saturday was busy. David went to work, Aaron went to a wedding, and I took the rest of the kids to the Hospital Kids' Party. They haven't had a providers party for the last couple of years, and this year they didn't have an employee party, but they kept the children's party funded through a silent auction. We had a lunch of corn dogs, chips, and a drink.

Then we did the activities. They each got to decorate a cookie.

And play some games

Do the cake walk

There were also some crafts. Allison slept through the beginning, and then I nursed her. David was done with work at 2:00, so we met up at the train museum. I bought a ticket for Aaron as well. We explored the museum until it was time to board the train.

I happened to be in the bathroom with Michelle when they called us to board the train, so I had to hurry. And Aaron had just arrived so he had to hurry into the museum.

We rode the train to the "North Pole", and saw Santa and Mrs. Claus. The pictures are hilarious!

 This is the best - haha!!!

Then we rode the train back, and spent a little more time at the museum.

This play set was in a train car outside.

We splurged and bought a little train set. The kids had fun with that at home.

That night was another basketball game. As you can tell we did pretty well. That was the score before halftime.

 

Sunday we went to church early so I could practice with a small group that I was asked to put together. At church Aaron read a letter from the stake president about a special meeting on December 30th. It just stated that the two neighboring wards were going to meet together for all 3 hours of church. We were already meeting together for the Christmas Program, and the choir members were meeting together to practice for that program. As I figured, it started some rumors, luckily I didn't really have anyone ask me about it. I happened to know what was going on, and everyone pretty much knew what was going to happen. After church we had choir practice, and then home for lunch, and naps. I'm guessing we had FHE and dinner.