FYI...

Just wanted to point out that I've updated the links in my "Useful Stuff" list. Between Eden and Adrew's super-excitement (and lots more questions) this year about Santa and some discussions I've had lately, I decided to do a search on LDS.org for "Santa Claus". There were a lot of stories and some opinion sort of articles- I found it pretty interesting, so maybe you will too. About the same time, I got an e-mail (maybe some of you have too) again about how Target doesn't support veterans and troops and is owned by the French. Usually, I ignore these type of forwards, but I had heard it from a few people and even found out one of my neighbors won't shop at Target. I really like shopping at Target, but had a little bit of guilt floating in the back of my head about it. Anyway, I've become a fan of the SNOPES website, so that's where that link will take you. And lastly, I've finally put some of our picasa albums on the web, so if you really want to see even more pictures, click on that. I'll try to update it monthly, since that's how I organize our pictures in Picasa.

I'm sure some of you are having a good laugh right now about how much I use the internet, oh well. It's not like I'm Sandra Bullock in "The Net." I did do about half of my Christmas shopping in person at the stores this year.

Our Merry Little Christmas

We had Christmas at our house this year, and were lucky enough to have Robin Fred and Shaun stop by on their way to Denver. On Christmas Eve we did a little nativity play with the kids. It was a shortened version from the Joy School manual that worked pretty well. Eden wanted to do it again, but Shaun and Andrew weren't interested, so I read it again while Eden did her part (Mary of course). I didn't get any pictures of that, but I think/hope Robin did. On Christmas morning, the kids enjoyed their Santa gifts for a while then we ate a breakfast including sticky buns, company strata, and of course, pigs in a blanket. Then we took turns opening the gifts from under the tree. Andrew and Eden were a little too excited and helpful for Shaun's presents at times, but it was a fun day. The race track that Santa gave to Andrew was a pretty big hit with all the kids, and I think Scott and Fred enjoyed it too.

Shaun loved the plush bear from Grandma Finley. He ran around hugging it for a while, and in Denver it joined the club with his other favorites.

One of Eden's favorites was the "Barbie as the Island Princess" movie that we gave her. She was also pretty excited about the Rosella and Prince Antonio (characters from the movie) dolls that Santa gave her (her first Barbie dolls). We (or maybe just me) debated whether Eden was old enough and whether we wanted to do the "Barbie thing," but eventually decided to draw the line at the Bratz dolls (they're on the other side of the line of course).

The kids loved playing with and moving their gifts all over the house. Christmas evening we had a ham dinner. Here's everyone ready to eat (Andrew didn't want to change out of his Christmas Pajamas). I've never done a ham before, but I'm a fan of it now (the pre-cooked and seasoned variety anyway- just heat it for a couple hours and its all ready to go!). We hope you all had a fun and Merry Christmas too!

Christmas Songs and Santa Claus

This past weekend we had our ward Christmas Party. Eden sang "Shepherd's Carol" with the rest of the Primary and got to be one of the chime-ringers. If you look close, you can see her nose is all red. She's had a cold for about a week now, it hasn't slowed her down much, but she's gone through a whole forest of tissues, so her nose is pretty sore.

The kids were so excited to see Santa, Eden made sure she got close to the front of the crowd, so Andrew and I were separated from her, but we came back later to get a picture of the two of them with Santa. Eden has been asking tons of questions about Santa, so I finally explained to her that the Santa she was seeing tonight was one of the real Santa's special helpers since Santa is so busy this time of year that he can't come to all the Christmas parties and malls before Christmas. When she asked who Santa's special helper was at the party, I told her we don't know, but we call him Santa because that's his special job. Now she thinks that someday I will grow into Mrs. Claus and Scott will grow into Santa Claus. Maybe she's been watching "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town" too much. When she asked about our lack of chimney, I told her it was magic. Eden decided that means that Santa makes a magic chimney at the houses that don't have chimneys. I hope I didn't give away too much too young, but I was running out of answers! Andrew only got close enough to tell Santa what he wanted and grab a candy-cane, he did think it was pretty terrific that he got a BIG candy cane.

Christmas decorations

We got our tree about a week and a half ago. Growining up, I thought I'd never have an artificial tree and gave my parents a hard time when they got theirs. But, then we moved to Hawaii and a fresh tree just wasn't practical. And I grew rather fond of my pre-lit, perfectly symmetrical and easy to care for boxed tree. So, it was with some hesitation that I agreed to go with a fresh tree this year. We thought about going and cutting one down, but a big snow storm came through and we didn't want to wait or bother with getting the tag. So we all crowded into the pick-up and headed for "Mom & Dad's" tree lot, just up road from our house. It's run by an older gentleman who stays in a converted bus with tons of Christmas decorations. It was dark by the time we went, so we just had the lamps at the lot to see by, plus it was super cold. So we didn't take any pictures. We didn't walk around very much before we decided on a frasier fir. The kids and I went into the nice warm bus for a few minutes while Scott got the tree situated in the truck. It had some snow on it, so we shook it as best we could then put towels down to try to contain the drippings after we got it set-up. We thought about leaving it in the garage overnight, but figured since it was cold enough for there to be ice under the van, it probably wouldn't help a whole lot. The next day we decorated it and took our family Christmas picture in front of it. Of course it smells so good, I can't believe I almost didn't want it!
The other pictures are ones that Eden took (without me knowing) of some of our other Christmas decorations- some plush decoration/toys that I put downstairs for the kids, a close-up of the three wise men in one of my nativities, and close-up of the top of the table-top tree we sent to Scott in Iraq last year.

Andrew is 3!

Andrew's birthday was on the 12th. We had dinosaur chicken nuggets and french fries (Andrew's favorite) with the missionaries, followed by ice cream cake, of course. Scott just happened to sign up to feed the missionaries that night, but Andrew thought it was special just for his birthday. Then, on Saturday, we had a little party for him with a few of his friends. More dinosaur chicken nuggets & french fries, this time followed with a store-bought dinosaur cake. They played pin-the-horn-on-the-triceratop and had fun with Andrew's toys and balloons. I can't believe he is three already!

Andrew loved the singing Shrek birthday card Grandma & Grandpa Dixon sent. He kept opening and closing it so he could dance around to the music. We finally had to hold it for him so he could open his other presents.

Happy Birthday to Scott!

Scott turned the big 3-0 on the first of December, but since he was out of town (for the third year in a row!), we decided to celebrate on Sunday, December 9th. We didn't have 30 candles, so we used candles to make the number 30. There were chopped-up Oreos on top of his mint chocolate chip ice cream cake, so when he blew the candles out the crumbs went everywhere. He got them all in one try though! Happy Birthday Scott!

More Snow! and Swim Lessons

This is what it look like outside our house on Saturday morning. The smaller tree in front is the one Eden really wanted us to have as our Christmas tree. She thought Daddy should go out and chop it down and put it in our living room. The space between that tree and the one behind it to the right is the road that runs in front of our house.

The kids really wanted to make a snowman, but the snow was too dry. I'm sure it would have been perfect for skiing. The one on the left is Eden's snow angel. The one on the right is Andrew's attempt. Scott laid him down in the snow, but he wouldn't move his arms and legs. He probably thought it was too cold!

Eden has been taking swim lessons for a while now. The pictures from her class time didn't turn out (she was too far away). But, I got this one just before he class started. She's learning to trust the instructors enought to jump too them and that its OK for her face to get wet. She really loves it even though she's pretty cautious.