Enjoying the Season

These pictures are from Nov 27-Dec 7, 2016.

We loved having our Christmas tree up with a big open space in the room! All season long, we spent a lot of time playing games, reading and just sitting in here with our tree and each other.

We had a small gathering at our house to drink some Wassail and sing Christmas songs. Doing this on a smaller scale than in the past went really well. My main reason was so that Tanner wouldn’t be so overwhelmed, as I’ve noticed he gets very worked up when we have lots of people over. It sure made a big difference for him. It also was fun this way because it gave everyone a chance to pick a song, sing it without having tons of talking over the singing, and there was some time to visit. Set up and clean up was way easier, too.

Jeremy made the Wassail, and learned that a small group can still drink a lot of Wassail. He had to bring out a second batch!

On Tuesdays this semester, I had a 1.5 hour gap between my morning and afternoon classes that I teach. One day, I was organized enough to make this small window of time a fun family outing. I picked Jeremy up from work, got the boys from Daycare, and we all walked across the street to Grinders, a little sandwich shop. It was the perfect family outing. I’m really glad we did it!

Weather wise, November was a weird month. We were in the 60’s and 70’s at the beginning of the month and negative teens and twenties at the end of the month. Luckily, the dome was up in time for the cold. I have found that taking the boys to walk around the dome for 15-20 minutes after school makes a positive difference in our evenings at home.

I hosted a playgroup service project at church where we made gift bags for the homeless. The moms and church members contributed items for the bags and then we let the kids fill the bags up. Most of the kids really liked it and worked hard. At the beginning, I explained to the kiddos what we were doing and who we would be giving them to, but a few of them, including Dallin, thought the bags were for them, hee hee. Oh well. We made about 25 bags!
The idea is that we keep a few of the bags in our car, and when we encounter a homeless person on the streets, we can give them one of the bags. Our family has been doing this for about a year now, and Tanner loves it when we find someone to give the bags to.

On Sat, Dec 3, we were able to attend the Wonder of the Nativity in Rochester at one of our church buildings (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints). This was our 3rd year attending the event, and we met up with the Hanson family. Dallin didn’t seem to remember much from last year, so it was really fun to watch him enjoy everything as if for the first time.

Dallin loved his treat.

Tanner and Dallin watched the live nativity with lots of curiosity. Dallin and I stuck around for the flute choir performance while Tanner and Jeremy looked at the nativity displays.

Dallin loved the nativity displays! He wanted to touch every baby Jesus.

I made sure to plan lots of time for us to enjoy the children’s room because last year it all felt too rushed. The boys LOVED this room, and spent about an hour in here. We did a craft, played puzzles, and dress-ups, all related to Christ’s birth!

The three musketeers!

After the Nativity event, we went out to eat with the Hansons to Hu Hut. This is me and Tiffany!

The next day it snowed, so after church the boys enjoyed playing outside! I’m so glad they did because the weather got down to negative 20’s for about a week, it was really depressing.