It's finally Christmas Eve!

As an adult isn't it funny how quickly Christmas comes around each year and even more surprising how fast the month of December goes? For Megan, Tyler and Emily the days just couldn't go by fast enough until Christmas Eve. They faithfully opened the advent calendar each day and marked off the days on our cool magnetic calendar. Even then, the days were just so slow, according to Tyler. When the day finally came we had a great time celebrating. We started off the day with breakfast at Jeremiah's and then headed to a church for a family party. This is Emily showing off her skills at cleaning up the "snowball" fight.

We of course played the M&M game, bingo, and then had a paper "snowball" fight. Basically we all just threw newspaper at each other for a specified time and then declared the team with the least amount of paper the winner. All the kids enjoyed hitting the parents the most and the mess they made was a bonus.

After the party, we headed to Mammy's for more fun. Mammy makes the kids earn their pajamas each year by doing different games. This year we had to design a Santa outfit using only tissue paper, cotton, and tape. This is Tyler sporting his suit.

Emily reminded me of the Travelocity dwarf when her suit was finished. The kids also had to decorate cookies, fill in words to the Night Before Christmas, and other relay games. Definitely a good way to wear them out for bed. Tyler and Wendell ended up winning all the games only because Tyler was the only one who actually read all the directions and knew what to do.

They did finally "earn" their pajamas. Here they are ready for bed. When we got home they quickly set out cookies and milk and sprinkled the lawn with magic reindeer dust from pre-school. This is the one night a year when all three get in bed and stay in bed. Awww, the magic of Christmas Eve. I have to admit I get just as excited as the kids.

Great Traditions!

Every year my friends from college plan a Christmas party. For the past 2 years we have gone to Temple Square. Wendell even admits this is fun. We get reservations at the Garden Restaurant in the Joseph Smith building and then eat dinner while over looking the lights. It is a fun place to be at Christmas and a great way to look at all the beautiful lights without being in the cold. It was really snowy on the Friday before Christmas when we went, but the kids had a blast throwing snowballs at each other and it kept most people from coming into town. Temple Square was practically deserted. The few couples that were trying to enjoy the lights quickly found other quiet spots when they saw 10 kids coming. Another great tradition with good friends, good food, and strange white elephants--We're already planning for next year.

Kids are Singing! Ears are Ringing! Parties Happening!

Tyler and Megan each had a short Christmas program for parents. I think the word for Tyler's is definitely short. His started at 2:00 and was done and ready for clean-up by 2:15. The class sang 3 songs and then said thanks for coming. Having had to sit through unbearably long class programs this was actually quite enjoyable. Let's be honest, who really likes them after about 15 minutes anyway.

The 5th graders combined with the 4th and 6th grade to perform their songs. Even with 3 grades we were done in 45 minutes. Megan's class did Hawaiian Christmas songs. They had to hula and everything. Emily is practicing for when she is in 5th grade.

I somehow was put in charge of both Tyler and Megan's Christmas parties. I spent the afternoon before Christmas break running between the 2 classrooms. Wendell was recruited into helping also. It was a fun day with the kids and a great way to kick off the holiday break. Tyler's class did relays to try and move "snowballs" (aka cotton balls) across the room. It really is harder than it sounds to not drop the cotton.

Emily joined right in the party with the fifth graders. She played all the games and even went up to play Charades--even though she can't read.

The M&M game is always a favorite of school classes. Megan has had lots of practice and got a lot of M&M's. We were a little worried giving her class butter knives, given how wild they are. Amazingly, no one was hurt.

Tyler's class decorated ornaments with glitter glue and pom poms. I left to help in Megan's class before the clean-up began. I think that took most of the party.

Emily and Megan proudly showing off their cookie creations.

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Initiation of a Bobcat!

This is Tyler at home as the newest Bobcat! It took a lot to get this smile.

Tyler was finally able to get his Bobcat award on Tuesday, Dec. 16th. He was excited about receiving it after the pack leader forgot to give it to him last month. That is until he found out what the new pack leader wanted the parents to do to him and the other 4 new Bobcats. Initiate them into the pack by painting their faces. Now Tyler has never liked his face painted. He doesn't even like it at fairs or carnivals, let alone in front of an audience.

The face painting wasn't a little. The pack leader wanted full on war paint. If only the camera could have captured the pain Tyler was in with every stroke of paint.

This is the final product. All the other boys were all smiles. I think I did a great job.

A picture is worth a thousand words. This is the excitement level of Tyler upon receiving his Bobcat with a painted face. He told me on the way home he hopes they never do that again or he will not go. He did finally don a smile at home when he was out of the spotlight.

Family Christmas Party!

Nothing says Christmas is close than the annual family bowling and Santa party. Every year more than 30 of us descend on the bowling lanes and then head to a church for food, white elephants, and of course Santa. There is always plenty of gutter balls, tons of food, lots of kids, and most important great laughs.

To Jeff the cookies made the bowling experience complete. I think Megan gave him a run for his money on who could eat the most.

Megan and Cade are getting ready to take their turns. With the bumpers on the lanes, bowling is a whole lot more fun for the kids. They can actually beat the adults. I think I could get over 100 if I used them also.

Wendell, Tyler, and Emily are waiting for their turn to bowl. Tyler actually broke 100 with his score and was happy to give Jeff a little bit of a challenge.

Emily, Mammy, and Grandma Grace watching everyone wrap up bowling. Mammy's picture did look better on our little screen on the camera. She and Emily look like they are having eye problems.

Megan's name was the first called out when Santa came. He always makes his appearance after we sing Christmas songs. Santa is getting smart and comes after only 2 songs. Yes, our singing is really that bad.

Emily waited patiently right in front of Santa for her name to be called. With close to 30 names for Santa to go through, it was quite the wait. Grandma Grace has quite the crew.

Emily finally got to sit on Santa's lap. After all that waiting she told him all she wanted was a surprise.

Emily and Megan showing off their presents. Megan was thrilled to get a football and sitting next to her, Emily is wearing a princess crown and holding princess stickers. Definitely opposite interests at the moment.

Jeff enjoyed his moment on Santa's lap.

Tyler was a helper for Santa and didn't get his present until the end. According to him, "the Star Wars guys and the white elf hat were worth the wait."

Hair Really Does Grow Back!

Emily just got her hair styled and trimmed today for the first time since she and her friend basically chopped themselves almost bald. It really does look cute now and is hard to believe that Uncle Doug thought she was the neighbor boy this summer.

Her hair even thickened up and can be put in pony holders. It seemed like this day would never come.

For comparison here is Emily sporting her "summer-do." This picture was taken a month after the incident occurred. It's hard to tell in the picture that her scalp was showing in spots and some mistakenly thought she was Tyler. Emily now tells everyone that only ladies cut her hair--not friends or herself. I hope she has learned her lesson.

When Can We Eat Them?

For Family Home Evening we decorated Ginger Bread Houses. Megan and Emily were quite precise with their frosting. Tyler pretty much just wanted to get as much candy as he could on the house.

Emily spent a great deal of time sampling the frosting. It couldn't have been that good considering it has probably sat in a store for months on end.

Here are the finished products. Pretty cute and festive if I do say so! Tyler and Emily can't wait until the day after Christmas when I told them they could eat the houses up! I'm thinking one bite will cure them of ever asking again.

Christmas Village!

What says Christmas more than visiting all the lights in the park village? Saturday was unusually warm and so we decided to see the lights while the temperatures were above freezing. I think everyone in the area had the same idea. I have never seen so many people at the park. We actually had to wait in line at some of the houses to peek inside. The kids had a great time with the neighbors we went with. We even got to ride in the train that circles the park. It runs every Friday and Saturday for free. Emily thought she was in a parade and waved to everyone on the street the entire time.

Double-Header Basketball Day!

Saturday afternoon was spent watching Megan play 2 games pretty much back to back. Emily and Tyler spent the day running through the gym and playing hide and seek with the basketball. They aren't quite into the game as much as Megan.

Megan loves the game. She can be very aggressive and stays on her "man" like glue. If points could be given for arms up and chasing, Megan would win every time.

The games tend to turn to jungle ball early on with a lot of fouls called. Megan's team has done very well this season and up until Saturday had won every game. They ended their season 5-1 and will be headed to the play-offs. They lost their 2nd game of the day to the best team in the league. The score was pretty close at 16 to 10.

This is a great action shot of Megan trying to steal the ball. I think it was one of many jump balls in the game.

Breakfast with Santa!

Our ward has their traditional Christmas party in the morning and invites Santa to dine with the kids. Other than the early hour--9:00 am is extremely early for Emily---it really is a fun party. It leaves the rest of the day open and tons of people come.

Tyler really was excited to be at the breakfast. There were over 800 pancakes cooked and ham and eggs and chocolate milk and apple juice. We were all full the rest of the day.

Every kid was anxiously awaiting the arrival of Santa. He was running a little late from the North Pole and we ended up singing and singing and singing. We could tell he was really late when the chorister suggested "Twelve Days of Christmas" and we actually made it through all 12 days.

Emily is all smiles sitting on Santa's lap. She informed us later that this was not the "real" Santa because his beard was too long. I didn't know length of beard was the determining factor.

Megan told Santa she wanted a "surprise" for Christmas. Does coal count as a surprise?

Tyler smiling to tell Santa he wants Legos for Christmas.

NYC!

Knowing that Wendell's sister Rebecca and her family may not be living in Manhattan much longer, we took advantage of having a place to stay and ventured out for Thanksgiving break. Emily was all smiles on the plane ride.

Here we are trying to decide where and how to get on the subway with all our luggage. We rode the subway to Rebecca's without even one wrong train. We were quite proud of ourselves. Tyler has always wanted to ride in a subway and he got his wish about 100 times over by the time we left.

I think they are a little tired or just bored with the subway after our first transfer.

The Statue of Liberty was our first big adventure on Monday morning. The security to get inside the base of the statue is tighter than at an airport. Unfortunately the statue is closed to venture up to the crown. We had to just see inside by looking up through big windows in the base.

Yes they are trying to stick their heads up the nose of Lady Liberty in the museum. I guess it does give good perspective as to the actual size though.

Megan and Tyler didn't think the Statue of Liberty looked that big from the ferry. They changed their minds fast when we got close to it.

The skyline of New York as seen from Liberty Island.

Megan found a cemetary right in the middle of the financial district. It is attached to the Trinity Church. The graves dated back to the 1700's. I think she is trying to look dead---she made need some acting lessons.

What is New York without trying the pizza? The slices are huge and they really are good.

This is the official spot where George Washington was sworn in as President. It was on Wall Street right by the Stock Exchange. We tried to impress the kids with some history, but I don't think it was the highlight.

Megan was excited to find a police car. We always make fun of her since last year when we were playing a game and she didn't know what NYPD was. She pronounced it NIP-ED and thought it was a word.

The kids are super excited because right behind them is the world's biggest Toys R Us store in Times Square. Yes it was so big that Megan did get lost and have to find a worker. It was a little strange to get a call from the Toys R Us security asking if we were missing a child. I guess it's a good thing Megan has all our cell phone numbers memorized.

Tyler in Times Square in front of one of what seemed like a million taxis.

Tuesday morning was spent visiting the Metropolitan museum or MET. There were really cool ancient Egyptian things along with about anything else you could imagine.

Tyler especially liked the armor and knight room. Too bad we had to go through the Greek statues room to get there. Emily just asked why there were so many naked people in the museum. We just told her to keep walking.

The kids in front of the Teddy Roosevelt statue at the entrance of the Natural History Museum. We had just eaten hot dogs from a food vendor. We tried to have a real New York experience.

Heather and Danny came down and met us on Tuesday for the day. Because it rained that day we spent most of the time in the Museum of Natural History and the Charmin place of course. This was a very kid-friendly museum and we actually spent hours in there. It isn't exactly like the Night at the Museum movie, but some of the exhibits were similar.

One of the highlights of the trip was spending time in the Charmin (yes, as in toilet paper) building. It was a building dedicated to clean toilets and fun for the kids in the middle of Times Square. We went 3 days in a row--in fact one of the workers recognized us on our 2nd trip. Basically there were about 20 individual bathrooms that were cleaned after each use, a dancing stage, a play area with a slide and swing, nice soft couches, and Wii's to play all for free. It really was fun for Emily and Megan. Tyler thought the whole idea and place was very weird. We just told him it's New York.

What a great way to end a great day! A trip to a 3-story candy store. Here they are showing off their purchases. Heather and I bought giant cupcakes. They were so much better than the candy.

On Wednesday morning we woke the kids up bright and early to go to the Empire State Building. The lines get really long as the day goes on. We only had to wait about 5 minutes which was worth the lack of sleep. At the top it was very windy and cold. Luckily there was a nice enclosed area also that the kids stayed in most of the time.

One of the views from the top of the Empire State Building.

At the bottom of the Empire State Building were beautiful Christmas trees and decorations.

The windows outside of Macy's were decorated with all kinds of Christmas scenes. This is a hand monitor of how much everyone believes.

This was the street ready for the parade on Thanksgiving. This was the "VIP" section---definitely not for us.

Emily was in heaven to see horses on the street. The police were very patient and let her pet the horses.

The ice skating rink at Rockefeller Center. Our feet hurt so bad from walking everywhere that we didn't dare attempt to skate. We did enjoy watching everyone else fall.

NBC studios is located in Rockefeller Center. We did go on a tour of the studio and got to see the set for Saturday Night Live. Megan and I also got to pretend to do the news. For a mere $40 we could have bought our acting debut---but for that price we can just relish the memory.

Our Broadway adventure was seeing the "Little Mermaid." It was so good. Megan really was excited to see it. The costumes, sets, and acting were incredible. This was Emily's favorite part of the trip. Our seats were 4 rows from top, but we could still see everything great!

Right when we got to the Macy's parade on Thanksgiving we were about 20 rows of people back so the kids could not see anything except the big stuff. Everyone around us started putting their kids on the top of a police van. We of course followed suit. Luckily the police officer who owned the van didn't return for a good half an hour. When he did see all the kids he yelled to get off. I've never seen so many kids move so fast. Tyler was down in record time.

The balloons in the parade are really huge in real life. I think they have to be for the mobs of people to see.

This was a picture before a nice man let us all squish up to the front of the parade route. The kids were standing on boxes to try and see. All the kids ended up right next to the gates and had a great view--they only crawled under a few legs. It took a lot of pushing and shoving. This is not a relaxing parade. Anyone who had chairs had them either folded up or couldn't find them. Basically we were all crammed behind metal gates like cattle. It really was a lot of fun.

Wendell tried to get a picture of just how many people were on the streets right after the parade. This doesn't quite capture that this mob extended for blocks and blocks. I guess a million people have to go somewhere.

This is our pre-eating picture. Steve was very nice and cooked all the food while we were at the parade. He did the turkey, potatoes, and yams--plus the dishes that he had used. We were very impressed. All the food was wonderful. Steve's friend also helped and made rolls and pumpkin cheesecake. Great way to unwind from a hectic parade.

After we ate the turkey dinner, we all headed to the pool that is part of the apartment building.

Megan and Tyler trying to play chicken. We didn't know how they had the energy to even get in the water. I sat on the side and took a nap. Good thing they didn't drown.

On Friday we spent the entire day in Central Park. Central Park is full of cool rocks to climb on and streams to play in. The kids played tag on the rocks and even slid down some of the steep parts. Who would have guessed that New York is that rocky? Tyler informed us that this was his favorite part of the trip.

Rowboats in Central Park. The pond is quite large and we actually stayed the entire hour we had the boats. Wendell got to go with Tyler and they made good time around the pond.

Rebecca and I were the lucky winners of taking Emily and Anna. This is about the only time that an adult actually rowed. We spent a lot of time going in circles with the girls rowing. We did get very good views of the bridge that spans the pond.

The fountain in Central Park made famous in the "Enchanted" movie. Without water it is not quite so cool looking. Tyler did find quite a few coins hidden in all the cracks.

This was the favorite floor of the kids at FAO Schwarz. They got to try out "carpet skates". Basically, there were plastic shoes that were slick. Amazing that they could sell for $30.

Of course we had to visit every toy store which included FAO Schwarz. We were there on the Friday after Thanksgiving and there was a 5-10 minute line just to get in the store. We saw the famous "Big" piano and all the toys imaginable in a 3-story store.

Before we left New York we went to Macy's to see Santa. The whole experience is very Disney-like. The line starts in what looks and sounds like a train taking us to the North Pole. Once out of the train, the line winds through a forest with all kinds of toys and winter scenes. It was definitely the best waiting experience for Santa we have ever had.

This was a talking tree in the magical forest on the way to Santa's house.

Santa at Macy's. This was our second time through the line and Emily informed us that the first Santa we saw was the real one and this was just a helper. He was a little scary looking.

Emily on the airplane ride home. Twisting her hair and sucking her thumb. I think we finally wore them out.