MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

The day of many things

Today was a day of so many things.  First we had Church.

The Primary sang in Sacrament Meeting ( I am the Chorister for Primary).  We sang For Unto Us a Child is Born.  It was beautiful the kids did a fantastic job.  The Bishop even cried.  I was so astounded with how well the kids learned it.  We are small in numbers, but they all worked hard and did a wonderful job.

After church we started doing more baking and wrapping presents.  We have been so busy that we decided to only do 2 dimensional Gingerbread to save time.  Usually we make houses for all of my side of the family to do on Christmas Eve.  This year it will be flat ones.

Last night I made some Carmels and so I had to cut and wrap them all up this afternoon.

The recipe was so easy and they taste so yummy!

We also wrapped about 70 presents today (and we still have lots more to wrap.)

We baked 4 more batches of cookies on top of the gingerbread and we gave out about 25 baskets of goodies to friends and neighbors.  It was a very busy day!!  Tomorrow will be crazy.  WE are going to my side of the family for the biggest gift exchange you've ever seen.  It takes hours to open gifts!!  I love the holidays, but right about now I am always feeling a bit overwhelmed.  I always run out of time to get it all done and end up exhausted.

I hope all of you are relaxing and enjoying your holiday!! I will certainly try to :)

Baking Day and Catching Up

Today was a Baking Day.  We made three kinds of cookies.  I made Dark Chocolate Bon Bon Cookies and CocoaDoodles and Dave made his famous, gooey Chocolate Chip cookies.  I still need to do some more baking tonight and tomorrow before I can deliver treats to my friends.  But I am a lot closer to being all finished.

We have been so busy lately that I havent taken the time to blog, so here is a recap.

Last week was the boys Christmas Program at school.  It was really cute. 430 Kindergarteners and 1st graders singing and dancing in the High School Gym.  The bleachers were packed with parents and grandparents and it was crazy!!

Here is Tayden.  He is toward the back in the gray argyle sweater vest.

And here is Kyler.  He is in the back in the black Argyle sweater vest.

They both did a GREAT job!

Last weekend Kyler and his cousin and my dad all celebrated their birthdays together.

My sister made the cake.  It was yummy! She made it look like a space ship that landed on Uranus and there were 2 aliens that had gotten out of the ship.  Kyler is really into space and planets right now. While we were there we enjoyed hearing Kyler tell us all about Uranus and we all had a good laugh making jokes.  Kyler doesn't know yet what other meaning there is with Uranus, so he just thought he was really funny.  My family is all about cheap humor.  :)

I hopr I will get a chance to blog again before Christmas, but if not, I hope you all have a Merry Christmas and enjoy being with your families.

A Gift of Love

Yesterday Tayden came home from school with a present for me that he had made in art class.  It was supposed to be for Christmas.  He did a good job trying to keep it a secret for a while, then while we were at the restaurant eating dinner for Kyler's birthday he said something about the present he had made for me and that it was a secret.  He gave me some clues about it then spelled what it is.  It was so funny.  I said, "Oh, don't tell me.  It's a secret."  He was all surprised then smiled and said "Oops!"  Later when we got home he said he wanted to give it to me now, because it is too hard to wait.  I went ahead and opened it to spare him the waiting.  It was a cute little pot thing that he had lovingly molded and painted.  He wasnt sure what I could use it for, so I decided I could use it as a candle holder.  I love it!!

Here it is :)

This is how I decided to use it.  Isn't it cute?

As a side note, in the background is one of my other favorite decorations that I forgot to put in my blog about my favorite Christmas decorations.  Its a little painting of a Shepherd boy kneeling beside the Baby Jesus.  Dave's Mom painted it and gave it to us.  Its so sweet.  My mom loved it so much that I asked Dave's Mom if she could paint a few more (she makes lots of things like this)  She had 2 more that she had already made so I gave one to my Sister-in-Law, Beth too, because she really liked it as well.  My mother-in-law is so talented.  She has tried to teach me a bit.  Someday maybe I can have the time to do stuff like that too.