It's not Disneyland...

Last year we surprised the kids with a Christmas trip to Disneyland. Well that didn't happen this year. This year we spent a few days in Logan at my parents house. All of my sisters and their families were there. While there we found out that Beaver Mountain was having a family ski night the Monday after Christmas so we decided to go. Everyone went with the exception of my parents, my little sister Bailey (she's expecting), the little girls (Kate, Scout and Eli- who are all to young), and my nephew Logan who had puked earlier in the day (yuck!). They stayed home and went to a movie instead.

Here's the movie bunch...And here's the ski/snowboarding bunch, all 14 of us...Bryan and I had not strapped on skies for 13+ years. I was a little nervous. Ellie learned to ski last year in school but had not skied since. She hung out with us up on the big hill and did really good for only her second time. Anna learned to snowboard a few years ago but doesn't go very often. She hung out with her cousin and uncles. Here we are after surviving our first time up the lift. Tyler took an hour long lesson along with my sisters and 3 of his cousins. I guess there was frustration and tears at first, but he finally caught on and enjoyed himself. After the lesson Bryan took him up the lift to try out the big hill. And he survived! Overall it was cold, but a lot of fun. I actually hope we get to go again before the season is over

It came and it went...

Christmas came and went. And it was great!

We slept under the tree on Christmas Eve Eve...

We made cookies for Santa...
We ate our traditional Christmas Eve dinner at Pizza Hut with Bryan's sister's family...
Santa came...
Everyone got what they asked for...
The End!

Tradition #3

Sleeping under the tree.

Our kids sleep under the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve Eve (so December 23rd). They can't sleep under the tree on Christmas Eve cause they would be in Santa's, but nothings wrong with sleeping there the night before! This is a tradition that was Bryan's when he was a kid. We turn on the tree lights and put out a bunch of blankets and let the kids try to sleep. I think this will be the first year that Kate will be included in this tradition. They really don't sleep all that well, but it's okay cause then they are extra tired on Christmas Eve. I tried finding a picture from a previous year, but I guess I don't have any. I will definitely get on this year.

Christmas traditions #2

Pillowcases!

I make them every year for my kids and whichever nieces and/or nephews our family "gives" to. So this year I'm making 7. My kids get theirs rolled up in their stockings. I only started doing this about 4 years ago, but it's a keeper. I got the directions from this site, the only difference is that I don't use holiday theme fabric. I use whatever fun/cute fabric I can find. For example Tyler has airplanes, Thomas, Cars, and BYU cases (Thomas and Cars are from his younger years!).

Here's my pile of my different fabrics cut, ironed, and ready to be sewn together...

And here are some of the finished product (I can't show all of them cause I'm not finished!)...

















Homemade gifts are always a good thing. And these are super easy to make. I'm sure we'll send Anna off to college someday with a stack of 10 or so pillowcases that are all her own.

Christmas traditions #1

I guess it's time to put up another post seeing as how my last one was on Halloween! It's been crazy here since my last post. Bryan was working in California for about a month and a half. He would go during the week and come home on weekends. Near the end he was only home on Sundays. But that's done for now- Thank Goodness! We had a great Thanksgiving at the Haymond's house and I survived Black Friday (but just barley!). So now it's time to move on to Christmas. I thought I would share some of our Christmas traditions.

This first one is all for me. I actually learned it from my sister who got it from a friend of hers. I love it, it helps me not go overboard when shopping for the kids.

I buy each of our kids 4 gifts:
Something they want
Something they need
Something to wear
and Something to read.

Now of course there are exceptions to this rule. The first major one is that they also get something from Santa (so now we're up to 5 gifts). The "wear" item is always jammies. That's a tradition all in it's self. These 5 gifts are just for them, we also get family gifts like movies, wii games, and board games. Another big exception is this- last year they didn't even get the 5 gifts. Instead we were surprising them with a trip to Disneyland. So I think they got their Santa gift, jammies, and a book but that was about it. But it was well worth it, I think it has been our best Christmas so far.

So if your not done with your Christmas shopping maybe this will help!