Christmas

Sunday we had a nice Christmas program at church. All the songs were really good. The Primary kids sang "Star Bright" which is a new song that I really enjoyed. Penny also sang "Away in the Manager" with some other primary girls. I like it when sacrament is more songs than talking. After church I took pictures of all the kids in their Christmas church attire. For some reason Lucy looks like a ghost. The light behind her really washed her out. 

Ruby looked super cute that day in Elf pajamas so I had to document her. She can make the silliest faces.

I spent most of Monday morning making our sugar cookie dough for our Santa cookies and pies for our Christmas Eve dinner. I luckily had no last minute errands to run for Christmas so I was able to be a hermit and not venture out into the cold and crowds. Ben was sick and spent most of the day sleeping. The girls had Geli and Luna over in the afternoon and that was good for helping their day go faster.

Tuesday we had Mariah's family and her friends that were visiting over for Christmas Eve dinner. Tyler was in charge of the meat-ham and turkey- and the Christmas punch. I had pies, and 5 cup fruit salad. They had the rest of the sides so I really had nothing major to do that day since I had done everything the day before. I baked the Santa cookies and was just going to tidy up before they came but then with the extra time I decided I wanted to decorate the tables. I did drawings on the 2 kids tables and then grabbed random stuff for the center of the grown up table. I think they turned out cute. I did the decorating while Ruby napped and the kids watched "Red One". I didn't get a picture of the second kids' table but here are 2 out of the 3.

Christmas Eve dinner turned out good. Everything was tasty and the company was nice. Mariah's friends were nice enough, almost a little too grateful for letting us host, lol, and all the little ones didn't destroy our house too much. However no one ate my banana pie except me and that made me feel sad. I guess it's because they brought a cheesecake too which they all ate. The kids did all eat my oreo pie that I made from scratch. 

After they all left we decorated Santa cookies. I only had red and green frosting so the kids made some interesting decorating choices. Everything looked a little crazy. Tyler was nice and doing the dishes so he did not participate in the cookie decorating this year. Ruby looks like she murdered her cookies.

After the cookies we opened our jammies (everyone had a quote from the movie "Elf" on their jammies), got our traditional pics and then went and saw Christmas lights in the neighborhood. We didn't travel far because we didn't have Ruby in her car seat and the Traverse had a broken headlight. We were not the safest.

Christmas day Ruby wasn't up until almost 7:30 and she woke up with a very runny nose. It was the start of a long sickness for her. She is not a happy camper when she is sick. She was able to muster up some excitement for her gifts (signing "please" when she wanted something out of its wrapping) but she began to tank after the gifts and spent most of the day cuddling me on the couch.  

For Christmas Ruby got: a baby balance bike, play dough and play dough "tools", a pretend hair salon kit (the hair dryer noise scared her at first), a Target fisher price play kit, a Melissa and Doug cleaning kit and princess shoes and a crown (from Steven).

For Christmas Steven got: a Lego Minecraft Crafting Table, a case for his oculus, a Steam giftcard and a wooden gun to build. He also got a Groot keychain from Ruby. I think he felt gipped because he had less presents than everyone...but his presents were pricey.

For Christmas Ben got: a Minecraft book, Lord of the Rings Brickheadz, a wooden gun to build, and a smart watch. He got a drawing journal from Penny and a jar full of "Chill Pills" from his friend Andrea (which he literally ate in one day).

For Christmas Penny got: a Stitch Lego set, a Corgi, Harry Potter mini brands, a Stitch watch,some books and orange peelers (because she was complaining about peeling oranges). She also got a Stitch blanket from Lucy.

For Christmas Lucy got: Disney Mini Brands, a candy shop to build, make up, Inside Out 2 Brickheadz, a wallet and a Claire's gift card. She also got a Beanie Boo from Ben (a lion with a horn that they call Ramsey who is  a Lone Wolf)

From the grandparents, all the kids got gift cards to Dave and Busters, a 2 month pass to Chuck E Cheese, an Escape the Crate Game and some money for a future outing with the kids.

A cute picture of Tyler styling Ruby's mullet.

For Christmas I got: my nose and ears pierced (and a bunch of earrings too), a new bag for church, a sweater, Lego flowers, and shoes. Keshia was my secret santa and bought me wooden flowers to build and Tara was just nice and bought me a pair of earrings and a jewlery dish to put them in. 

For Christmas Tyler got: 2 wooden guns to build, 2 Harry Potter Lego sets, a Minecraft Building book, and a D and D cookbook. Tara was his secret santa and got him a "dumb" shirt and a metal star wars ship to build. He got a lot of gifts to build.

Below is how I spent most of my Christmas- cuddling Ruby and reading a Christmas book. I did not get to build my things during the day but that night I did finish my Christmas Advent puzzle and I built one of my wooden flowers. The kids spent most of their day building all their things and watching movies. It was a very relaxed day.

Here are some of the things the girls made that day and the next...The boys are hard to get pictures of...

Thursday I spent most of the day taking down the Christmas decorations and gettting things back to normal. It honestly feels so good to get out all the clutter. The kids were not as happy about it though. They wanted the decorations up longer. That afternoon Lucy and I went and checked out the after Christmas sales. We got some good things for next year- socks, colorful ornaments, crafts, Christmas pants...

Friday morning we took the boys to a local bank to set up savings accounts- it's taken us far too long to do this. Ruby was still very sick and sad so we didn't want to leave her with the girls so we brought her along. It was a rough time with her there, she was so miserable. One of her eyes was swollen and boogery so I am sure the bank lady was not happy with us sharing her germs. I don't think it was pink eye though because the next day it was all better.

Friday afternoon Steven had his first date. He had talked to us about asking out Renee from our Ward on Christmas day and so we had helped him figure out the details. (I later read in his texts that he was nervous about talking to us about it but I think it was really awesome that he did) He ended up taking her to Marvin's Mechanical Museum and then they went out to ice cream in Milford. It seems like they both had a good time. I'm not sure exactly what inspired him to ask someone out but I do know that his friend Max had apparently checked with Renee to see her interest level before. After the date, him, Ben and Lucy went to the Stake Roller Skating Activity...where he hung out some more with Renee....

Saturday I started to feel under the weather and so did Tyler. It seems we are all getting the disease. That morning I took Penny to the eye doctor because she has been having trouble seeing things far away and sure enough, she needs glasses. She picked out some pink ones (of course) and will join the glasses club in a couple weeks. That afternoon I hit a few more shops for after Christmas sales and found a few more thing. Then that evening we watched Mariah's kids and her friends' kids (7 total) so they could go out. It seems we had shared the bug with them already and they were all boogery too but they were much less fussy than Ruby. I spent the first half just holding my fussy Ruby and then I was able to be more helpful after I put Ruby down for bed. Overall the kids were pretty easy to watch- the one baby would go to the door and ask for her mom but she was still in pretty good spirits. Also one of the friends' kids broke the "slide" on Ruby's Pikler Triangle thing that I got her for her first birthday. I know he didn't do it on purpose but that was an expensive thing for him to break.

That night, after they left, I was exhausted and went to bed but it was a horrible night. First I was woken up by someone shouting for their dog outside- I thought it was Ruby shouting at first. Then I was woken up by chills alternating with sweats. Next Ruby decided to wake up and would not go back to sleep. Tyler was nice and took her after an hour but then the power went out and someone's home generator kicking in woke me up. It was a lousy night. Thankfully the power came back on at 7:30 so we didn't have to get ready for church in the dark.

Graham Cracker Houses

Monday and Tuesday were the last days I had the girls homeschool before their winter break. It is a relief to be done for awhile but at the same time now we have all this extra time to fill. Monday afternoon the girls went to Grace's salon to get haircuts. Lucy has decided to grow out her hair so Grace only trimmed the back. Penny cut a lot of inches off and her hair looks so much healthier. She wanted to add curtain bangs but I don't Grace really had time to do them so she just gave her a couple pieces of shorter hair in the front. Maybe we will have to come back when things slow down for Grace. 

Monday night Lucy had the family versus kids volleyball game. Tyler played and Mariah came and played too. I think Mariah really enjoyed getting to play. I spent most of the time trying to keep Ruby from running onto the court. We were in the auxiliary gym and there was nothing blocking her from getting onto the court. The adults ended up winning the game- the only "game" Lucy's team lost this sesason ;) We are so grateful they come out to support her.

Wednesday, to celebrate the start of break, we went to the Outdoor Adventure Center in Detroit. We hadn't been there in a long while. When we got there, we were literally the only ones there for awhile, that was really nice. This was a fun place for Ruby to play and explore things. It was maybe a little less entertaing for Lucy and Penny at times but they were good sports. Lucy and Penny seemed to like the play kitchen and the airplane you could go in.  They have a place with water and stepping stones and Ruby kept trying to get in the water, instead of stepping on the stones. Ruby also really liked the bridge and a little pretend vegetable garden they had. At the end, a nice worker gave me some BOGO passes for next time and said I would need to be sure to have that doll of mine (Ruby) say "hello" when we come again. Ruby is just so popular. It was hard to get a good picture of her though, she never stopped moving.

Thursday the girls and I did a little more holiday shopping and then we went to Wendy's for lunch. Sharon was kind and had given us some Christmas money so I thought I would use it for a lunch out. I tried out their salted caramel frosty and wasn't a huge fan. A bit too sweet for me.

Thursday evening the boys had their holiday archery competition. I came with Penny and Ruby to watch. Lucy said it sounded boring and did not want to come. You have to be quiet when the archers shoot and Ruby had a couple of tough moments where she wanted to be noisy but overall she did really good. Ruby was just so excited to her brothers. She would shout "bro!" and would run up to where they were standing between shots. 

Friday we woke up to a good amount of snow so the girls all went outside and played in it. Meanwhile the boys were disappointed that there wasn't enough snow for a snow day. Lucy made a pretty great snowman and Ruby liked the new friend. Ruby seems to like the snow but she hates the gear and she refuses gloves so her hands are always red and cold.

Friday evening we had our annual Graham Cracker House Party. We had our usual attendees, the Farquharsons and the DePlonty's, and this year we added the Towne's (Mimi's family). Andrea was also over so she got to join in. Unfortunately, Steven had to work and he did not want to get off so he missed out. I was bummed that he didn't come and I think his friend Evan was bummed as well. We started off with the kids building graham cracker houses while the parents chatted. Tyler had spent the last couple days working on the trophies and they turned out quite nice (although they still smelled like spray paint and so did our house). After an hour I told the kids the time was up and we all voted. Lucy was so excited that she finally won a trophy- she won most "Epic". She had built a pretty great castle. Then Evan won most "Beautiful". He had a house with a mini nativity in it's yard. It really was nice. And Andrea won most "Creative". She had made a house that looked like Santa and was being pulled by magical unicorns. I really like how much the kids get into the contest. Well all the kids except Eva...she didn't participate and didn't seem particularly happy about being at the party. And Ben was not doing a very good job of including Beck so he seemed uncomfortable. I wonder if they will want to come next year.

After the graham cracker house making, we played a Christmas Trivia game. My prizes were tricky prize boxes with money inside...but 1 out of the 4 boxes did not have money in it. It's funny that some of the questions I thought were going to be easy, ended up being trickier and vise versa. I was terrible at knowing who raised their hand first and probably offended some people but we had a variety of winners- 1 from each family- Ben, Mimi, Beck and Evan. Unfortunately Evan got the empty prize box. 

The next game was Left, Right, Center- the kids used Lego blocks and whoever got them all in the end, won a small Lego set. I had given them too many blocks (8) and the game lasted way too long but I think maybe they were still entertained? Evan won. And then they played again and Ben won. After that the kids goofed around (smoking peppermint stick candy canes and doing other weird kid things) and then everyone dispersed. Ruby had way too much candy and was up way past her bedtime but surprisingly slept like a champ that night. Meanwhile I spent the night overthinking everything I said. Ha, I have issues! Besides my crazy, I think everyone had a good time and I think Mimi's family was a great addition. 

Saturday was a lazy day. That night Tyler and I went to a grown up party at Grace's house with some other couples. There were 2 couples I hadn't hung out with for awhile and it was honestly really nice to shake up things. There was yummy food and we all just chatted the whole time. The conversations were pretty fun and I actually didn't go to bed that night overthinking everything I said, lol. Maybe because we didn't get back until late and I was pooped, ha.