Christmas morning 2012 line up and presents

Christmas morning line up!
Jileigh

Talon
Angelique

Jaren and his cool awesome new bike!
Safia
Little Beau

And last but not least, my sweet Elody

What can I say, this is Christmas morning. They woke up between 7-7:30am, except for Elody. We had to wake her up and she was not happy about it, but we had to get this show on the road. We had church at 11 am. The picture of Jileigh next to the dehydrator had a clock on top of it that she made in shop class as well at the everyday china holder, a holder for paper plates. She was pretty proud of herself making those.

Elody on my table licking custard sauce off the spatula

My little poser child! She had climbed up on the table and was licking out the custard sauce pan. While I went to my room to get my camera, someone had taken the pan away, but she was still cute standing up on the table doing her little pose.

Christmas eve with Matt's mom - kids in their new pjs

Matt's mom came over Christmas eve and brought the kids and us our presents. The kids all got their traditional present of new pjs, which I LOVE that she does that, and Matt and I got a race track. They got it all set up and played with it non stop for two days.

H family Christmas dinner Dec 23rd gathering

Fabulous dinner! So a day before this dinner Cynthia, Matt's mom, brought me two 15 pound prime rib roast and asked me to cook them. I was very nervous about it because I had never cooked one that large before, more or less two of them. Matt asked around at work and found someone who knew how to do it and gave me the instructions. With Jileigh's help, we browned it on our large stove-sized cast iron skillet, seasoned it, and wrapped it in parchment paper and then aluminum foil and plopped it down on my half sheet. Then repeated with the second one. We were told it should take 7 hours at 250 degrees F, but we checked it after 5 hours and it was already to 147 degrees. I was devastated. It's not supposed to be above 130 degrees for medium rare. Fortunately, it was still quite pink in the middle and tasted divine. I also made the icebox cheesecake. That was addictingly delicious. Candy made the nacho cheesecake dip, from my recipe. :)

The sign is to go on Cynthia's entrance to her property. Amanda, Matt's sister, got the wood and stenciled on the letters. Matt used his router and carved out the words, painted it, and stained the wood. Cynthia loved it.

Elody loved being with Hannah as always!

Christmas Story family home evening reinactment

It was Angelique's idea and planning that brought about our Family Home Evening reinactment of the Christmas story. She was the narrator, Safia was Mary, Jaren was Joseph,Elody was Baby Jesus, Beau and Jileigh were the shepherds, and the toy rocking horse was the donkey. Talon was doing his homework and Matt fell asleep.

They did a wonderful job!

Jileigh's choir concert and Angelique's orchestra concert

These are some pics of Jileigh's choir concert and Angelique's orchestra concert. Sadly, I forgot my camera for Talon's guitar concert. Jileigh got to introduce a song title, that's why she is standing up there.

My first attempt at Mexican pizzas - dang good!

A friend of mine, Shari, always makes Mexican pizzas during the Christmas holiday season. I thought I would give it a try. They were very yummy and very filling. Matt took one to work the next day and all the other employees in the cafeteria were rather envious. He ended up sharing a fourth of it with his boss. It was a lot of work though. I won't be doing it again for a while.

Safia lost her two front teeth just in time for christmas and princess dress up

Sariah and Hannah came over for an afternoon and played princess dress up. I also wanted to get a picture of Safia. "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth!" She hated it when we would sing that to her. :)

Dec 10th Ward Christmas party breakfast and meeting santa

This year for our ward Christmas party, we had a breakfast instead of a dinner. We brought a yummy breakfast egg casserole and a gallon of custard sauce to go on the pancakes. The custard sauce was a hit. Several people asked me for the recipe. I just ended up bring the recipe to church the next Sunday and made a bunch of copies for everyone.

The kids each took a turn sitting on Santa's lap except for Jileigh. He siblings literally took off after her. Tackled her down, and carried her to Santa where she finally complied and sat of Santa's lap. Elody wasn't too happy about sitting on Santa's lap either, but Beau was. He hopped up on his lap and gave him a big hug. It was so sweet. Unfortunately, it happened so fast, that I didn't get a picture of it. At least I can write about it.

Common sense

You would think my kids had a little more common sense.

This morning I left to Choir practice at 9:25am and Talon left shortly after I did on his bike to meet up with the other Deacons to collect Fast Offering. At 10:55am he shows up at church (our ward starts at 11am) and comes and tells me he's cold. The kid didn't even wear a jacket. He was out it in the 35 degree cold for an hour and almost a half without a jacket on his bike. Really Talon??? By the end of Sacrament meeting he had warmed up fortunately.

Then this afternoon while the adults were napping, some of the kids made bows and arrow and were playing outside. Angelique got Talon's real bow and arrow and SHOT AN ARROW INTO THE AIR! It went over the neighbor's back yard, over their house, and landed in the rocks in their front yard! Fortunately their grandkids were playing in the backyard and no one was in the front. Really Angelique??? I guess Anne Oakley needs some more weapon safety lessons.

Matt the Mechanic

Matt's an electrician, not a mechanic, by trade. But, over the recent years, he's had a bit more guts to dive into solving his vehicle's mechanical needs. This past week, he took the truck bed off to find where the truck was leaking gas. He found the hose that was cracked. He called the local parts store and they wanted $180 bucks for the part. So he went on ebay and found it for $44.80 with free shipping. Problem solved!

Then his air conditioning was stuck on heat. So he pulled the WHOLE dash off and found the broken part. He super glued it back together and fixed it and put the dash back together. Problem solved!