New Years Eve

We normally don't do anything crazy to celebrate New Years Eve, just a simple night at home with snacks and games.  In fact, I am very grateful for the computer and online streaming so we can watch New York's celebrations two hours early.  My girls had no idea why we were celebrating, what the party hats were for, or why we kept talking about the ball dropping.  The only thing they understood was that we were letting them stay up past their bed time and they were able to play games.  Jeremy picked up party costumes and after we put them on we were definitely in the mood to party! 

We started off with Twister.  I'm not sure who has the advantage in this game, the super bendy little ones, or the big ones with long reaches.  

Whoever won the round got to throw Jell-O jigglers at the losers.  

From there we moved to Yahtzee.  This time the winner got to spray the losers with silly string.  The first time McKenzie was hit she thought it was the most disgusting thing ever.  "Get it off!  Eew!"  

Cambrie on the other hand thought it was pretty awesome stuff.

  

When it was midnight (East Coast time), we pulled out the bubbly and started counting down.  They were very worried that the ball would break when it dropped.

The girls had no idea confetti was going to be part of the party!  They picked it up and dropped it at least ten more times before we told them it was time to go to bed.  

Happy New Years everyone!

Here Little Fishy!

The kids received passes to the aquarium for Christmas and couldn't wait to try them out.  The best thing about the aquarium is that none of the animals are asleep, and you can get right up close to them.  

One of my favorite exhibits is the otters.  They are also so playful.  The otter by Kelton was doing flips on the glass.  

Even though I took the stroller this dude wanted nothing to with it, and instead wanted to look at everything, which I am perfectly okay with.

The kids were looking for the giant fish in this exhibit.

Cambrie was the lucky one to find the moray eel in the corner.

Another favorite stop, the shark tunnel!

Underwater dome by the starfish.

I have no idea why there is a tiger at the aquarium, but it kept pacing in front of Kelton and he didn't move for at least five minutes.  

Walking on the Tiki bridge.

The shark tank.

McKenzie's one request was to see the mermaids.  We were able to watch them swim and then took our picture with them before we left.  The kids can't wait to go back!

Elsa Crazed

There is an Elsa craze sweeping the nation, and my McKenzie is one of the reasons why.  This little girl loves, Love, LOVES Elsa and anything Frozen.  In fact, when she was writing her letter to Santa she asked, "How do you spell 'Anything Elsa'?"  Yes, I burst out laughing and helped her spell it.  Well, Santa and everyone else obliged.  This little girl is in Elsa heaven and she hasn't even had her birthday yet.  Today we set up her Elsa bedroom, and I had to document the craziness of it all.

Big Elsa

Elsa blanket, pillow, umbrella, Sven, and Krisof stickers, and Anna & Elsa Barbie dolls.

Anna and Elsa dresser stickers.  (Not shown, Anna and Elsa dresses for their American Girl dolls)

Olafs

Anna helping with the toilet paper.

Snowflakes on the light switches

Snow Queen mirror

Sister window sticker, and Elsa with the lightswitch

Big Elsa's train was so long it reached around the corner of the wall.  Check out all of those snowflakes!

Christmas pics

Since all the grandkids were looking spiffy in their new Christmas clothes, Leesa wanted to get their pictures taken.  Here are some of my favorite pics from that night:

The Lights at Temple Square

The weekend after Christmas was incredibly calm and relaxing.  We decided to squeeze in a quick trip to Temple Square to finish our trip off right.  My kids had all of their snow gear, so they were bundled up nice and warm.  Poor Stockton, he doesn't need a coat in Texas and had to borrow one of our extra snowsuits.  He was not too happy about being stuffed into purple.  But at least the kid was warm! 

They seem to be rotating which trees they light up.  The big ones down the main walk way were left dark, but there were still some pretty ones lit by the assembly hall where we snapped our first group picture.  

As we continued to walk towards the plaza we passed a group of sister missionaries singing Christmas carols.  McKenzie refused to walk past them.  She wanted to stay and listen.  After about three songs Leesa asked her if she wanted to get her picture taken with the sisters.  After that McKenzie felt like she was ready to move on.  

We stopped to get some hot cocoa and enjoy them in the Joseph Smith Memorial building.  Kelton seems to be looking at Stockton and asking how he enjoyed the extra marshmallows.  

We took our half-full cups with us outside to finish walking the grounds with them.  This is McKenzie's, "This is too hot!" face.  

Our final stop before walking back to the cars was the reflection pond.  It is always so peaceful there with the light floating on the water and the nativity reflecting in the  center.  

Christmas Eve Nativity

I have very fond memories of the nativity we would do with my Stratford cousins each year.  They know how to have a good time, which sometimes meant that it was a little crazy, but I loved it all the same.  My kids don't have nearly as many cousins as I did growing up, but I still desperately want them to have memories like that.  Since we were at the Rogers this year with the Kings in town, we had almost enough people to cast the nativity.  We were down to two shepherds and two wise men, but it was close.  Cambrie claimed the roll of Mary and McKenzie claimed the roll of the angel. 

I'm not sure if it was prompted or not but Kelton chose the roll of Baby Jesus.  He climbed right into his manger and sat there very reverently for the entire production. 

The script from my Stratford cousins has songs intermixed within the script, and it was apparent after the very first song that my Stratford family was very unique in that they actual know all the lyrics to those songs.  After three or four failed attempts at singing we dropped them out of our version but continued on with the rest of the spoken words.   It ended up being really nice, and I'm grateful to the cast members who participated (even though I'm sure they passed the "I'm too cool for this," stage about ten years ago).