Christmas Crazy 2008

Things have been a bit on the crazy side for awhile. First of all all huge snow storm hit us a week and a half ago. Tyler came home on his lunch hour and picked me up and we went to Ailey's preschool for her little Christmas program...elf hats and all.





Little did we know that day that Tyler wouldn't head back to work until the next MONDAY...and that school would be out for the next two days...which gave our Christmas break a two-day head start. I wish I could say that the snow was fun and exciting and white Christmasy...but I wasn't feeling it. Instead it was a complete nuisance. Impossible to get around...horrible road conditions...cancelled recitals...parties...activities. I am still recovering from last winter where snow actually was falling from the sky in June. So I wasn't too thrilled. The kids on the other hand were loving it. Being snowed in did allow me to get all my Christmas baking, Christmas wrapping, and Christmas cards done.

At Ailey's Christmas Program:


Ailey with Aidan...her boyfriend...according to her. They play together at school everyday...much to her preschool teachers chagrin. Her teachers have been trying to break up this little duo and encouraging them to play with other kids. Ailey came home hopping mad one day and said "Today I had to play with a GIRL!!" Aidan's grandma told us at the program that all Aidan talks about is Ailey and I said that it was the same at our house. Unfortunately...Aidan doesn't get to return to preschool after Christmas break for family reasons. Poor Ailey. When I first saw this kid I burst out laughing. You can't really tell from this picture but he has reddish hair and is truly the spitting image of Tyler at that age. I asked Ailey if Aidan looked like anyone she knew. She said "Who?" I said "Um...Daddy." She started giggling and said "I KNOW!!" Too funny.

Christmas just came too quickly for me this year. I don't know if it was the late Thanksgiving or being pregnant or what but it was over and done with before I could really "feel" the Christmas spirit. Oh there were moments here and there but I like to savor the season and this year things just felt really rushed and busy.

We spent Christmas Eve at our house again this year with just our own little family. It was wonderful. We did that for the first time last year and it felt weird to be all on our own but this year it was nice. Our kids are old enough to have established traditions and it was really neat to enjoy Christmas Eve with our own spin on it.

I am ready to throw our family computer out the window though because I took many a heart-warming family picture only to lose them all and only be able to recover a few. For some reason we can download to the lap top just fine but downloading to our family computer crashes everything...this happened with our Thanksgiving pictures too!!

Christmas Eve is always my favorite part of Christmas...good food, family, fun, anticipation, and music. This Christmas Eve was no different. We had a fantastic meal: Steak, Shrimp, Reilly's gourmet mac and cheese, teriyaki green beans, cookies, candy, cream puffs, and eggnog. YUM. It was a lot of fun to cook with Reilly this year. She helped with all the Christmas baking and then helped with Christmas Eve dinner.

The finished product

Tyler and I came to the realization that with the digital camera we have pretty much stopped "filming" anything with our camcorder. So this year Tyler was manning the camera the whole time. The result: fewer pictures. What can you do? It's either one or the other.

Getting ready to open jammies

We really enjoy the timer on our camera...can you tell? :) This was just one of MANY!!

The kids put on the most hilarious Christmas pageant and we sang carols around the piano. I lost the pictures so you'll have to take my word for it. We read the Christmas story from the scriptures by candlelight as is our tradition. Then the stockings were laid out...as our fireplace is downstairs in our family room...so we don't hang them... and cookies and eggnog were left for Santa.

This year was really fun because Ailey was so into everything. We had a phone number where the kids could call throughout the night to see where Santa had been. They would call and he would have just been in Tennessee, then they would call and he had just left Iowa...Colorado etc. When they called and he had just left Montana Ailey ran screaming for bed!!

Santa's little helpers were up until 3 am waiting to give Santa a hand. Tyler wanted to get "helping" at midnight only to have the pitter patter of little Ailey feet put a stop to that. Luckily on Christmas morning we got to sleep in until 7:30 am.

The kids and their loot:

Santa brought lots of Polly Pockets...Ailey's favorite.

Lots of Star Wars stuff for Kameron

And...oh my...a cell-phone!!

Reilly taking over for Stacey as the family "trash girl". Stacey was "trash girl" in our family every year while growing up. I thought you'd appreciate this picture Stacey!!

We had a wonderful Christmas breakfast, showered, and took a terrifying road trip to my mom's house. She lives up by the Canadian border and the roads were horrible. My mom and her husband Ken are renting a little house while they decide where and when they want to build or buy so there's not a lot of room for all the family so we stayed at the CUTEST motel ever. It is owned by one of my mom's friends and it is absolutely DARLING!!



My my mom as usual is the most festive person around and made the holiday extra special. She had baked, cooked, and decorated like crazy and it was so much fun to be there and enjoy everything. Kirk, Jayme and Kaiden had Christmas in Utah with Jayme's family, Jordin and Jaylah were in KC, and Kelley had to work so it was just my mom, Ken, Stacey and her family and all of us. But we still had a great time.

Mom and Ty sampling the eggnog. We had the most fabulous food: Prime Rib and King Crab. Let's just say I nearly ate my weight...which is considerable these days...in crab!! So good.

Tyler filming everyone and everything

Kameron hyper on sugar!! Between my kids and Stacey's and enough cookies for 100 people things were CRAZY!!

That's good Hot Chocolate Grandma!!

We had a wonderful holiday and hope that you all did too. We leave you with this...

I Belong To the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints


Saturday was a really exciting day for our family. Kameron got baptized!! Yay!! Woo-hoo!! He has been waiting for this day for a long time and it finally arrived...on a bitter cold snowy Saturday morning.

Kameron was really nervous about the baptism...but it went really well. Another boy from our ward also got baptized as did a friend of Kameron's...Kathryn...they were in the same class at school last year. So that was fun. Also our old bishop from a previous ward...Bishop Kulisch was there representing the Stake Presidency so it was fun to have him participate. We just love him!!
Reilly and her friend, Ally, sang the musical number "He Sent His Son" they did a great job!! They also sang this in the Primary Program this year and did fantastic. Thanks Ally for helping out!!

Kameron was excited that Aunt Kelley was there to support him.

And...his buddy Tyler. Thanks Hollands!! You guys are wonderful. Tyler got baptized a few months ago and Kameron got to check everything out during Tyler's baptism...it was fun for him to have Tyler there. Also--Kameron requested a sports jacket for his special "baptism" outfit after he saw Tyler is his snazzy one. Aren't these the two cutest boys you have ever seen??? Watch out girls!! These two are going to be little heart breakers.

It was truly a wonderful day to be a parent. We are so proud of Kameron and the wonderful boy that he is...and the great example he is to his sisters...especially Ailey who looks up to him so much. Kameron took his baptism very seriously and learned all that he could about baptism before his big day arrived. Kameron...Dad and I are so pleased that you made the decision to be baptized. We love you very much!!

After the baptism we all went out for brunch and had a wonderful day. Later that night we celebrated with a Baskin-Robbins cake and sparkling grape juice.

The newest member of the church

We love you Kameron!!

Young Women in Excellence

Reilly won the "Beautiful Ballerina" Award

Wednesday night was Reilly's first Young Women in Excellence Night. She was very excited. The YW leaders did a great job putting it together. The theme was the Oscars and they had a red carpet for the girls to walk down and had awards for all of them.



Several of the girls performed. Reilly played "As I Have Loved You" on the piano and did a great job. It was fun to see how talented the young women in our ward are...and with such a wide variety of talents too.

Since Reilly is a brand-new Beehive she hadn't completed a 10 hour Personal Progress goal yet but she has been working really hard on her "Knowledge" goal and is almost done. So she displayed on her table items that showed how she has grown in knowledge this past year.

She had on her table ballet pictures, pointe shoes, an apron my mom made for her, a recipe box that she has been compiling recipes in etc. Her 10-hour knowledge project is to learn to cook. So she has been compiling a recipe box of family recipes from her grandmas, great-grandmas, Mom and Aunts and has been learning to cook 10 meals. She has really done a great job!!

I love the Personal Progress Program. I love what it does for the girls. It instills in them goal-setting and problem solving skills, charity, love, kindness, perseverance, faith, and confidence. To complete the program each girl has to complete seven 10-hour projects including several value experiences in each of these 7 categories:

Faith
Divine Nature
Individual Worth
Knowledge
Choice and Accountability
Good Works
Integrity

It takes the girls usually a couple of years to complete the program. Reilly is off to a great start!!

We Love You Rye!!

Ailey's Preschool Christmas Party


Ailey's preschool has their family Christmas Party at the Carousel at the park downtown. It is always a lot of fun to go to and this year was no different. We had a great time even though poor Tyler had to work and wasn't able to join us.

Ailey and Friends

Our friends the Frerichs were there so it was fun to hang out with them.

Kristin and Janyse. YUM! They had Ding Dongs and Twinkies too!! This fat prego was HAPPY!!

Jackson and Kameron

Mr. Nye (Reilly's teacher this year) and Janyse. Reilly's teacher has a son that goes to preschool with Ailey. Reilly found it quite HILARIOUS to tell Mr. Nye about her mom and her mom's friend who were stuffing Ding Dongs in their pockets!! Apparently he got quite a laugh. Fab. Can't wait for the next parent teacher conference!! :0

My favorite photo of the night!! I was nearly too FAT to ride the carousel. You HAVE to wear the belt and I was on the last possible latch. That leather was STRAINING!! Maybe I should've rethought all those Ding Dongs and Twinkies!!