Christmas Happenings

December is always a crazy month for us. My last post was about our Anniversary which was December 1st. That was just the beginning of the madness. Five of our seven children, two grandsons, a daughter in law, and Scott were all born in December. (Not to mention my mother and 2 sisters.) (Five of them are in a single week!) Between that, and me trying to finish my sewing projects before the kids started arriving, made it busy all around.

Emily and Patrick and the kids arrived on the 18th, followed by Levi the next day and Hilary, Ben and Sarah the next. All of them traveled through the snow and ice. We were so grateful that they all arrived without incident. Hannah was supposed to arrive the morning of the 21st, but because of the weather, all flights into Pasco were cancelled. She got the airline to switch her to a flight to Spokane, but flight after flight was cancelled and she was bumped from one flight to another. It looked like she would be stuck in Seattle for a day or two. Scott looked into the driving conditions but every highway to Seattle was closed somewhere. In the afternoon when it became apparent that she wasn't going to get on a flight, we saw that they had opened Highway 90 so Scott, Emily, Patrick and Hilary packed up and headed to Seattle to get Hannah. I was a bit nervous, but they made it there safely and successfully collected Hannah and returned home unharmed. What a blessing!

Aaron and his little family arrived Monday afternoon and so for the first time in many years, all of our children were under one roof! It was so much fun to be together!

Tuesday we had family pictures taken in the morning. The photographer I had hired lived in Prosser so we headed up there. I will post some pictures once we have them. Hilary went to the Temple Tuesday afternoon and then that evening we had a group birthday party! Levi, Aaron, Sarah, Eli, Isaac, Hannah, Hilary, Luke and Scott were honored. We had a big cake (with I think a million candles). Following the birthday celebration, we did one of our Christmas Eve traditions. Aaron and Lindsay were heading back one the next morning and wouldn't be with us Christmas Eve, so we opened the gifts that we had for each other. (We have been drawing names since the kids were small and we usually open these on Christmas Eve.) It was fun and it was good to do it with everyone together.

Christmas Eve was amazing with our traditional reenactment of the events of the first Christmas. It was fun to see how creative the kids can be with their costumes. Christmas morning was incredible. I just love seeing Christmas morning through the eyes of Children! They are so excited about everything and they love everything. Isaac got a Nintendo DS game in his stocking and he was thrilled. The funny thing is that he doesn't have a Nintendo DS game system. He didn't even mind, he was just go excited to have the game! (Of course, the game system was wrapped up under the tree and he was so thrilled to get that too!)

We spent the days after Christmas being together and playing games and eating. On Luke's birthday, we got out the leftover cake from the big birthday party and put candles on it and sang. We tried to bring it out again on Scott's birthday, but he wouldn't let us. (Who knew one cake could do so much!)

Almost everyone has gone home. Levi is still here and will leave tomorrow or Tuesday. The house is quiet; no toys litter the floor and there are no little bodies for me to snuggle. The chaos of the past 3 weeks has settled into a melancholy lull, each of us anticipating the return of the structure of work and school. We're all settled into the same room enjoying the warmth of the fire and the Spirit of family and love which still lingers. Months may go by before we meet again, but we know that the bond of family unity has been strengthened; fortified by sharing the magic of this special holiday!

Here are some pictures highlighting just a few of the things we have done this month.

Here is the mass birthday party! Eli and Isaac are poised to blow out the candles. I think that Mr. Luke took care of it before they got a chance! I think that Ben is taking the picture.

Sledding on the hill behind the church. The grandkids had never been sledding before and they really had a good time!

Before the Traditional re-enactment of the Christmas Story. Joseph is giving one of the shepherd a few pointers.

Is this how angels normally pass the time between singing engagements? Esther is a sheep.

Shepherds tending their flock of sheep. Can you see Esther's tail?

The holy family. (I am not sure why Mary is still riding the donkey.) Wise men and sheep are worshiping them.

Christmas morning we discovered this little princess.

And this proper little princess.

Princess tea party.

Bright eyed and bushy tailed!

Christmas breakfast! Notice the matching pj's on Hannah and Sarah! One of our traditions is to open new pj's every Christmas Eve. We usually end up wearing them all day on Christmas! This year we went silky! You can't see Ben's, but the guys all got silky pj pants.

Look at my quillow Grandma made!!

Snug as a bug watching Gilmore Girls! Actually, my Pj's were so slippery, I kept slipping off the bed!

Everyone made gingerbread houses. I thought it would be fun to vote on the favorite. It turned out that it wasn't one of my best ideas. Little children and grown boys are sad when they don't win!

Luke is sweet 16!! Cake and ice cream!! (Again??!!??)

Sweet little things enjoying a sweet treat!

The girls and I making a snowman. Esther had been rolling the ball, but it got too big and I was helping.

Cute little girls with our snow man! This was right before Esther pushed his head off!

This was so cute, I had to post it. Esther wanted to set the table. I have a picture of Mr. Luke setting the table when he was about the same age using the same technique.