The best gift ever!

The best gift giver ever award goes to... drumroll please.......... ME.  Yup, me!  

I was sneaky this year.  I managed to buy Mike a 4 wheeler and hide it successfully until Christmas without him finding out.  Then on Christmas morning with plenty of snow outside, I presented him with this!  He was one happy man.  

Santa found the rest of us too...  Bikes for the boys, although Miles' bike isn't pictured.  Funny story, but I'll spare you too many details...  It had something to do with Santa's elves loading  too big of a bike in his sleigh, and Santa not realizing it until it was too late.  So Santa left a note and promised to send the right size the following day.  Miles was a good sport about it.  

Will got one of those cool little bikes with no pedals...  He loves it!  

A bookshelf and book for Meg!

And a kindle fire for Morgan.  It has already been a great thing for her, and the parental controls are awesome.  She loves to read and email her friends so it was the perfect gift.

We've had tons of snow over the past few days.  The kids have been in heaven!

Poor little Meg has to watch from the window.  She wants to be big so badly.  Trust me Meg, it's warmer inside!  

Mike has been in heaven with all the snow.  He has spent over 9 hours in 3 days going around plowing all the neighbors driveways.  I knew he would enjoy having it, but I had no idea how much.  The kids love to tag along on the back and I love that they get to see their dad serving our neighbors.  I do have to say that I'm glad the snow finally stopped so he'll stay home with us for a bit. 

I really love Christmas, but I think I love the week after Christmas even better.  The kids are home from school, everyone is playing with their new toys, the stress and busy schedules are over, and Mike hardly has to work.  Yup, the week after Christmas is the best!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was a little different for us this year... We had nowhere to be and nothing planned.  At first  I was a little sad about it, but it ended up being the way to go!  We slept in and had a lazy morning before heading out to an all you can eat pizza buffet lunch.  

Morgan was excited to see her class picture in the lobby.  Pizza Pie Cafe awarded her class a pizza party during red ribbon week and they hung up the class thank-you note for all to see.  She thought that was pretty cool!  

After lunch Mike took the 3 older kids to see Monsters, Inc in 3D while I put Meg down for a nap and wrapped all the presents.  I was nice to get it done during the day so I wasn't up all night.  By the time they got home I had everything ready for Christmas.  

Then we went back to tradition and dressed up for the nativity.    

Will wanted to be a wise man.  

Joseph and Mary...

Gifts were given...

The donkey read the story... 

The angel appeared...

The baby was loved.  Watching the kids do the nativity is always a special treat.  I hope they remember that this was always a part of our Christmas.  

Then there was a knock at the door. Christmas jammies were here!  Morgan and Miles got robes and Will got a spiderman poncho blanket.  Then we tucked them in bed all cozy and waited for Santa to come.  

Our Danish Christmas

My mom's "thing" is Christmas Eve.  She loves it.  She always has a houseful of grandkids and since my mom was born in Denmark, she has carried on the tradition of putting on a Danish Christmas party just like my Grandma did for us when we were growing up.  We had the party the week before Christmas Eve this year so more of the grandkids could make it.  

We start off with the kids placing their shoe under the bed.  The shoe is left there while we all go eat dinner.  While we are eating dinner, the Julenisse places a present in their shoe... (Or under their shoe since most gifts don't fit inside).  After dinner the kids line up youngest to oldest and then they go in to see what they got.  

Here's the older half of the line...  

Here's the younger half of the line.

As usual, the Julenissa did not disappoint.  

There is so many people in one room. 

Another Danish tradition we have is searching for the whole almond in the rice pudding.  Everyone gets a little dish of rice pudding and whoever finds the whole almond wins a prize.  

Brenda found it for the adults this year...  What a bum!  I wanted the prize of yummy mint chocolate thins.

Mike had no luck...

Morgan found the almond for the girls prize, although she wouldn't eat one bite of her rice pudding.  I actually don't think anyone eats it, everyone just sorts through it looking for the almond.  I think it's gross too.  Sorry Mom.  We do love the tradition of it though, even though it tastes bad :)      

There were fun little games for the kids to do.  One of them was guess the amount of candy in the jar.  Will's guess was closest (thanks to Morgan!)  so he came home with the prize!  

Grandma read the kids a story.

This was just a sweet moment I caught of Mike and Morgan having a cute conversation.  Mike is so good with his girls!    

Then the cousins exchanged gifts.  

Meg didn't like being in the spotlight and refused to open her present.  Once it was open she loved it, but knowing everyone was looking at her was too much to handle.  Just wait until next year, she will be all over those presents! 

Family Picture 2012

I wish I was better about family pictures, but they are just too stressful for me.  And I am not really a fan of pictures that are too posed and where we all have on matchy-matchy outfits.  I am more of a "hurry and ask someone to come out and snap our picture before we eat Thanksgiving dinner and the kids get their faces and shirts all dirty" kind of girl.  No thought before hand and no pressure.  Unfortunately, that means you end up with pictures with only two of the four kids smiling.  At least everyone is looking in the same general direction, right.   

See you next year, William

William has gone back to the North Pole and the kids are so sad. Here's what he was up to during his last few days...

At least he left a nice note and promised to come back next year. 

December going-ons

Our Ward Christmas party was earlier this month.  Meg had the worst pink eye and was a wreck.  Too bad I was helping put on the party and couldn't keep her home.  She was a great little trooper.

My tall, beautiful friend MaryAnn and I.  

Seeing Santa at the ward party...  Miles was positive he wasn't the real Santa, but he wanted a candy cane so he went up on his lap anyway.  

Mid-December we meet up with our friends The Nadauld's and took the kids on a "carriage" ride to the North Pole.  The ride was kind of lame, but we had good company so it didn't matter.

I wish I had taken my camera so all the pictures weren't blurry phone pictures...  bummer.

Meg sitting on Santa's lap for the first time.  

Miles asking Santa for a bike and an OSU pennant.

Morgan not knowing what she wants.

Notice Will isn't in any of the pictures.  Just the mention of Santa freaks him out.  He stayed at the back of the room and screamed if we came close to him.  He was worried we were going to make him meet Santa, so we just let him sit in the back and watch from a distance.  Funny little guy!







Morgan was in the school Christmas choir again this year.  She was so much more animated and smiley this year. She loved it and was adorable doing all the little dances.  Here she is with her 3 best friends that are all in her same school and primary classes.  Morgan is so tiny for her age, but her personality
makes up for it!