December

December was jam packed full of fun and festivities, school programs, dance recitals, and tons and tons of snow!

Bryce and I started out the month volunteering at the festival of trees and then spent the first weekend in December in Midway, only to come home and discover it had "snowed" in our kitchen! The kids had a great time with their cousin Kaite while we were gone and the snowflakes have stayed through the holidays - I'm not sure I'll ever be able to get them down without a major protest!

Autumn had her Christmas dance recital where she got to visit Santa Claus, and performed in her Kindergarten christmas program for her 6th grade buddies - she was singing "Twas the night before Christmas" the entire month!

We hadn't had much snow by the middle of December, but the last two weeks more than made up for it! We had a great time playing, building snowmen, sledding and shoveling (okay not so much the shoveling) in the 18 inches or so that fell in the week before Christmas. Sasha especially loves the snow and bounds through it like a black jackrabbit - happy as can be!

My mom and Bernie were supposed to be here for Christmas, but thanks to all the snow there and the storms here, they weren't able to fly out of Portland for 4 days after they were supposed to. We still got to spend some time with them before they left for California and their 2 week cruise through the Panama Canal - hope they are enjoying all the warm weather!

We had Christmas Eve celebrations here with my side of the family - complete with a great meal, fun games and stories, acting out the nativity with the cousins, opening pixie presents and fun times for all.

Christmas day was even more fun with the kids all getting their Christmas wishes - a doll house for Autumn, a Nintendo DS for Seth, a guitar for Devin (he'll be starting lessons in January - can't wait for those sing-a-longs around the campfire!), and what Megan is calling her Christmas miracle - her own cell phone! We had the worst storm of the year so far that day and ended up snowed in and had a great, relaxing day with just us - it was very fun!
We went tubing at Soldier Hollow over Christmas break and had a great time being towed up the mountain in our tubes and then sliding back down - the best way to go tubing, if you ask any of us!

We celebrated the New Year with lots of confetti and loud fireworks and a sad little dog cowering in Megan's room (she hates those fireworks!) Happy 2009 everyone!