'Tis the Season 2014

This post is a general photo dump/musing about what went down during the days of December leading up to Christmas. It was a fun, busy time for us!

I was super stoked to make our Christmas cards this year using our new family photos!

 Our traditional chocolate Advent calendars.

  Ordering soap online to be shipped to ND in winter has its risks...it arrived frozen solid.

 Ward Christmas party. Only Tucker would consent to a photo op with Santa.

People were very impressed with our spray snow window decor.

I made super delicious Symphony fudge and peanut brittle to hand out to friends and Kev's co-workers.

 Kevin and I celebrated our TENTH wedding anniversary on December 11, 2014. We survived a decade of marriage...take that, you naysayers!

 The closet made for a great hiding spot for gifts...I always put off wrapping as long as I can.

 Seeing the light display at Spring Lake park is super fun! My little family loves it and tries to go to as many activities as we can.

Movies at Spring Lake with friends!

Kyan and Tucker had a Christmas concert for school and we couldn't leave Jaxon out of the photo.

The day came that I had been dreading since that call in November. Emily was moving to Houston and we decided to start our Christmas road trip to Vernal a little earlier than planned. Emily stopped by my house before we left to grab bananas and say goodbye. We managed one great photo and then dissolved into sobs. I basically cried until we reached Sidney, Montana. I had to force myself to stop when Kevin threatened to leave me there. 

Utah here we come!

It was a long snowy drive.

 We didn't tell my mom we had left ND earlier than planned but my dad knew. The drive took forever....and right as we got down to the last two hours of the trip, the road was closed due to a fatal accident. Argh. Called dad in a panic, and he rerouted us. It took a bit longer than planned but we pulled in my mom's driveway and called her and said, "Merry Christmas!" as we rang her doorbell....she was VERY happy to see her babies!

 We had to have our most favorite breakfast of fried mush. MMMMM!!

We took Blue to the groomers and he looked ever so much better!

My dad's parents celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary on December 20! I'm continually impressed at their love and dedication to one another. They are such an example to me! We all went to dinner to celebrate and then chatted at their home for awhile.

They gave us a GIANT box of chocolates for our Christmas gift.

We had a cousin cookie decorating party that was super fun! And since we didn't have Little Caesar's pizza in ND we loaded up!

Jax, Tucker, Brenan, Dallen, Kyan, and Connor

My friend Beca came with her adorable baby Bella and Tucker couldn't get enough!

There were Grandpa snuggles galore.

I always try and make time to meet my oldest and best friends for lunch or dinner. We managed to squeeze in a Cafe Rio lunch date!

Sam, Trevor, and Livvy

Blue just lounged in his festive holiday attire...

...and so did I!

The combined efforts of a cute holiday photo attempt.

 
This was the best of the bunch.

All ready for the Christmas Eve shenanigans!

Christmas Movie Party

My amazing, awesome, traitorous lovely friend Emily was moving to Houston right before Christmas and I knew I'd go through Emily withdrawals once she left, so we were squeezing in bits of time together wherever we could! Movie nights had kind of become our thing lately. I'd put the boys to bed and she'd come over and we would attempt to watch a movie between all the talking. One week she spent more time at my house than Kevin did, and he supposedly lived there!

I thought it would be fun to have her whole family over to watch little Christmas movies and have snacks so that's what we did. I think we watched three or so movies including Disney's Prep and Landing and munched on popcorn and M&Ms and Christmas crack snack mix and the leftover hot cocoa from the cookie swap we moms had earlier that day. I told everyone to wear their pjs and they all obliged! The kids cuddled up on blankets and pillows and we all got into the Christmas spirit. I didn't want it to end because I knew it would be one of the last times our families would be together.

 We ended the night with a showing of the new Christmas tree that synced up to my phone and flashed the lights in time to Christmas music. The kids all loved it. When are you coming for Christmas movies this year, Emily???!

The Second Annual North Dakota Cookie Swap!

December in my house always means cookie swap time!! I invited a bunch of friends over to decorate sugar cookies that I made and to swap cookies and goodies that we all brought to share. Our group this year numbered at a cozy six since quite a few gals ended up not being able to make it. We still had a blast though!

Julie Nazer, Lindy Mabeus, Maren Mattson, Nikki McBride, Emily Merkley, and me

We had yummy snacks like Christmas crack, Chex mix, and decadent crock pot hot cocoa, but I only got this photo...boo.

The cookie everyone brought were so cute and tasted even better than they looked!

After everyone left, I let the boys finish up the remaining sugar cookies. They did such a...creative...job!

And it wouldn't be a party without a mess, right??