December 2 - I love to see how Hallie or Molly rearrange the nativity. I guess this time the donkey needed to see Jesus.
Michelle, Nikelle and I took the kids to Christmas Tree Fantasy to Santa Claus. Hallie and Paul were a little nervous at first, but ended up being ok to talk to him. Molly, Michael, and James had no problem making sure Santa knew what they wanted. It was very difficult getting them all together for a picture in front of the gingerbread houses.
December 3 - Hallie had her very first dance performancel. She said she wasn't scared and had fun. It was very fun to watch her.
Molly danced also, she is on the competition team now and she did very well. It was amazing to see all the improvements she has made. Her team actually got first place!
After watching Molly, we dashed to Idaho Falls to watch Annie play basketball. She is so tall, and has improved a lot too.
After the ballgame, I took Maden to lunch at Olive Garden because he was turning 13 on the 5th. After lunch we went shopping at Game Stop, then to the Arcade where he won some Switch controllers. It took a lot of patience and work to win them, but he did! It's so fun to spend time with this young man. He was so polite, opened doors for me, and was very gracious and thankful.
December 5 - Maden is 13!! I love looking at how he's grown! Still is a very cute boy.
We had a Christmas gathering with some of Blake's siblings. Kris was kind enough to host the dinner. We didn't get any pictures of Kris, Marcele, Merralee or Bart, but we did get some pictures of Kris's beautiful cat.
Molly's school Christmas program! It was so cute, and she was really into singing and doing the actions to the song.
December 8 - Finally got the front porch all decorated. I love how it turned out.
December 9 - We took Ryder, Molly and Hallie to McDonalds, then to Lava Hot Springs. They had a great time on the slide and in the other water things, they played hide and seek, and also made up an obstacle course. Hallie mostly had fun watching the other two play and going down the slide. Blake said the hot tub was really hot!
December 10 - We celebrated Maden's and Jared's birthdays. We had Olive Garden take out, pizza, ice cream cake and scotcharoos.
After eating and presents, we played the traditional bingo. Maden won the blackout round and got this awesome lego pickup.
December 11 - Jared's actual birthday. How is my baby 32?!
December 13 - I sure do appreciate Randy coming to plow in the early morning.
March 14 - I got to go watch my great nephew James (sometimes he calls me Grandma) play a basketball game. It was a fun night and I was really impressed with his coach.
I love this tree with the different names for Jesus that Dorine gave me. I thought it went perfectly with this nativity set. It was all sitting on a bookshelf in the living room.
December 15 - Hallie and I got to go watch Ryder's Christmas Program. He did so well and knew all the actions and words perfectly.
December 17 - Remember the lego truck Maden won playing bingo? He got it put together! He said it took 2 days, but he did it. It's really cool, with a lot of moving parts.
Due to a very unfortunate event, that made us all very sad, Brian and Aubrey could not go to the Lindsey Stirling concert they had tickets for. So, they gifted us the tickets and we got to enjoy the show. She does a fantastic job playing her violin while dancing and being lifted in the air. It was a great show.
December 22 - I have learned through the years that when my kids are hurting and sad, then I am too. Cindy had to say goodbye to this beautiful Sunshine cat. He probably developed stomach cancer. It was a very hard but necessary decision. When we were there in 2021, Sunshine was the only cat I got some pictures of. He was a beautiful cat.
December 24 - Another early morning snow plower. This time it's Jared we are thanking!
We celebrated Christmas with most of our family. Ryder was sick so he couldn't come, but opened his presents at his house. Declan couldn't be here until the 26th, but was excited to open his presents then.
All the kids seemed to like their new sweatshirts. I think their personalities show up good in the shirts.
I think they were happy with their other gifts, too.
Cindy sent this funny slime puking ball for all the grandkids and their dads that Annie and Clark loved.
I got this game to keep here called "Tap It". It has 4 pods that light up and you're supposed to tap a certain color. It was kind of wild and crazy, but they loved it.
Molly and Hallie had fun with their gifts after they went home. They used the nativity set that I gave them to tell the Christmas story. Ryder is definitely ready to have Santa stop by.
December 25 - Christmas morning - Randy was kind enough to invite us to Christmas breakfast, the excitement of the morning was that smoke detector kept getting set off. The breakfast was very good even with the extra noise.
Cindy sent me this beautiful paint by number she painted. It is from a picture taken from the front porch at Jared and Nikelle's house. I love it!
We got a present like no other! Penny Kate was born at 4:39pm! She weighed 7 lbs 5 oz and is 20.5 inches long. She's our little Christmas miracle! We love her so much already!
December 26 - Molly and Hallie came to our house and were so excited to show us the unicorn that Hallie can color on! They were so happy to meet their new sister. Brian and Aubrey came to meet Penny. She got to go home about 9:00pm.
December 27 - Getting to know sweet baby Penny. These girls make such sweet big sisters. We had a strange thunder storm that included hail, it was crazy!
December 28 - Lots of snuggling Penny. Jared even found out that he has room for all three of his girls. Penny's bilirubin levels were too high, so she has to be on this biliblanket light for a few days. It's not convenient, but has to be so her levels can go down. Now she's a glowing baby.
December 31 - New Years Eve - Blake and I went to Pocatello to the temple and on the way home we saw this huge herd of elk. There are tons of them. We had a little party with Jared, Nikelle, Molly, Hallie, Brian, Aubrey and Declan. We made s'mores and had an early countdown for the kids.
