Christmas Magic

I just got my camera back (Thanks, Erin! She packaged it in bags of marshmallows! She is so funny, that Erin). I don't have time for a full post but I had to put up this picture of Claira. It shows A--how out of control my family can be at Christmas, especially with stockings and B--how magical Christmas is and how much joy it brings to us! I love Christmas!!!

Happy News!!!

A day we thought would never come.........My sister is ENGAGED!!!! We're so excited! Congratulations Erin & Rick!

If you look on my blog history, you will notice that my posts are very few and far between in December. It's because we are just having too much fun! Christmas was so wonderful this year. It all worked out perfectly despite all the craziness. We had a great time visiting Than's grandparents and a fantastic time visiting with my family in Wellington and then went home to have our little family Christmas and then the next day drove up to Oroville to have Hancock family Christmas. It's the Christmas that never ends!!! My kids were so thrilled that they got to open presents THREE times. I would put up my pictures but I left my camera in Nevada! I never do that! And I would never do that since I was supposed to take Kaylee's family pictures! ARGH!!! So, my family christmas I have no photographic proof of, but it was awesome. The kids had the look of magic in their eyes. Santa put his basketball hoop right outside the window behind the tree and when Pacen noticed it, his mouth dropped so wide he was so surprised and he played basketball for the few hours we were actually home. I didn't want to distract him so we watched from the window while he was replaying some game while he played. He was talking to himself and making plays and it was just precious. The girls got lots of dolls and have been playing dolls and my little ponies non-stop. Gentry got a little baby that actually cries (Thanks a lot, Loren! :) ) but stops once you put in the bottle but Gentry hasn't quite nailed that skill down yet. But Camry has the stance down....knees a little bent, hold the baby with one arm, balance the bottle with your chin while you wrap the baby in the blanket with your other arm....I wish I had a picture of that. She looked just like me! I love it. They each got their princess babies that they slept with Christmas night. We had a slumber party that night and stayed up late watching the disney parade that I recorded for us. Pacen & Cam were a little frustrated that they couldn't hear Justin Beiber sing over the high pitched screams of the little girls. Here are some other highlights of our Christmas....

***Spending the night with Than's grandparents. Carolyn has so many nicknacks that the girls loved playing with. Claira was especially attached to these little flowers stuck on the end of toothpicks. She played with those the entire time and Carolyn sent them home with her.

Gentry and Herm have a special relationship. He can always get her to smile and he just got a kick out of watching her "clean" the window. She would dip her napkin in an empty bowl and then go wipe off the doll cabinet. Than is very lucky in that he still has his grandma and grandpa still living and we do try to take every advantage to see them. I'm happy that my kids will have memories with them. Not very many kids get to play with their great grandparents.

***Seeing my grandpa. He's my only grandparent still living and I'm not sure how much longer he'll be alive for. His poor body has been worked very hard in his life and I'm not sure how much more it can take. Gentry is his namesake and I think that he is tickled pink about it. He didn't stay very long on Christmas morning, but I was happy that I got to buy him a Christmas present this year and he seemed to like it.

***Hanging out with the rest of my family. My family is kind of strange in it's organization since my mom's mom married my dad's day (you can figure that out later!). And a bunch of them ended up settling there in Wellington, Nevada so we had my Aunt Nancy and Uncle Mike (my dad's brother), my Uncle Wayne (my dad's brother), Grandpa Gentry (my dad's dad), Aunt Virginia (my mom's aunt) and Janet (my mom's cousin) and the three of us girls and our families. We aren't a large group, but we are a fun group! We play cards and chat and tell (some of us just listen to and laugh at :) ) dirty jokes thanks to Grandpa, and Erin played war and golf with the kids and we chased babies and ate delicious food thanks to Nancy and opened presents and our incredibly over-stuffed stockings and just had a great time. We had to drive a lot this Christmas, but we saw lots and lots of family on both sides.

*** That brings me to hanging out with the Hancock's and all the hancock cousins. We've been in Oroville since yesterday and the kids have been playing non-stop. Than and I miss living in Utah a lot, but we are always grateful that we live in California so that we can be close to family. We had a super fun cousin present exchange and we gave everyone our presents and we're all together and it's just fun. All together we have Walt & Becky and scotty, Sam, Becca & Kyle, Shauna & Ben with Heidi, Kaylee, Daisy, and Blake, Chris & Kaylee with Olive, William and George, and all six of us. What is that....23 of us! The babies are all playing and right now as I type Gentry keeps putting the pacifier in George's mouth and then takes it and puts it in her mouth and then back in his. It's a fun game. And the really fun thing is that Sam is bringing his girlfriend home for all of us to meet her tonight!! Welcome to the craziness.

***Walt and Becky got the kids a trampoline!!! I can't wait to get it home and set it up. Or have Walt set it up....it's going to be awesome.

***Than got me a tennis class for Christmas!!! It's for 8 weeks and I can't wait!!!!

***Gentry was soooooo cute when we were opening presents. She started doing this little dance when she gets excited and she was so happy playing with all the presents.

***Camry noticed that Santa's wrapping paper was different than our wrapping paper. She is so stinking observant! We have to be on our toes with that one!

***Claira's favorite thing was this disney fairy stories. She opened that one first and she would go back to it after opening each present. Who knew a five dollar book would be a favorite?!?!

***Christmas pajama's!!! They were so dang cute and so dang excited about them. Once they were on, they were crazy for a few minutes and then we told them it was time for bed and the bee-lined it right to bed and were asleep within minutes. I love my kids.

Alright, there are more things I want to remember but I have to go be a mom again. The movie is over and the chaos has returned. Just the way we like it. :)

Whew.....we made it.

Don't you ever wonder sometimes how you're going to get it all done and then when finally it's all done you're like, How did I even get it all done?!?!? We are on the road right now and we had to get all of our Christmas stuff all ready so we could head out to Nevada to visit first, Than's grandparents and then head out to Wellington for the Pace family Christmas. Erin and Emily are both on the road even as I type and I'm super excited to see them even if it is only for two days. Nancy is so great to host all of us and put up with all of our crazy kids (and husbands! :)) I do feel a sense of relief knowing that everything is wrapped and ready for us when we get home. We wrote a letter to Santa explaining our situation and asked him, if he'd be so kind to deliver our stocking presents to Nevada and leave our bigger presents at our house since they won't fit into our car. He's such a great guy, I'm sure that when we walk in our house on Christmas night everything will be all ready for us!! :) I just love Christmas. I can't wait for my kids to open their presents and every year I have the fear that it won't be perfectly magical but I know that is a ridiculous thought. It'll be great. And for now, we can have a sigh of relief and just enjoy time with family and let Erin run around with my kids so Than and I can have a break. :) Claira was so cute the other day because she was saying the prayer and her whole prayer was about Christmas. It went something like this, "Dear Heavenly Father, Thank you that it's Christmastime. Thank you for Santa. Bless he can bring lots of presents to us. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." I'm pretty sure her prayer will be answered in the way she wants it to. Camry has been singing Walking in a Winter Wonderland constantly. Pacen is my Christmas music put-er-on-er. He is just like ben nettesheim. He's obsessed with Christmas music and it's constantly on in our house because of him. Gentry is just loving everyone being home all day so that they can play with her. They've been having slumber parties on Camry's top bunk the past few nights and Gentry will get up there and hang for a bit and she is so proud that she's so big. We've been having great snuggle mornings...my favorite thing. This makes me think...I can't wait until summer vacation! I love not having a schedule!!!! And hanging out in our pi's wrapping presents all day is pretty fun too. Christmas time is the best!

Cooking with mom.

The other day I had to make a bunch of Christmas sugar cookies for Pacen's class. I was debating about which recipe I should use but since it was Christmas I felt like I couldn't go with any other cookie than mom's favorite that she used every time we made sugar cookies.

I don't use her cookbook very often because the spine is breaking and it's not easy to turn the pages and I don't want to break it, but I love it every time I bring it out. And every time I'm close to tears because she LOVED this cookbook. She used it for everything and in fact, this isn't her original one. The first one was so 'loved' that it was a falling apart disaster and so Loren searched high and low for one to replace and luckily found it even though it was out of print.

So here is the recipe. It's a classic.

But what is even better is that she saved the original page from her first cookbook and has it stashed in the page of the new one. I just think it's funny because I want to say, "You don't need two copies of the recipe! You have the new book, remember!"

But she really did use it so often that it's in pieces and now both of the pieces are snuggly fitted into the pages of that book. And believe me, when I was done I put them right back where they belong. :) It just makes that recipe so special to me. Food is love in my book.

And this is the cookbook where she found her beloved manicotti recipe. It's funny because it's one of my most very favorite things to eat and yet I hardly ever make it. It's like its sacred or something. It's so delicious and I'm making it a point to make it a couple of times a year for special occasions so we can keep it special.

It's all about the homemade noodles people.

And this is why I love my mom....she never made us casseroles. Like typical mormon casseroles. So when I had funeral potatoes for the first time I was like, what is this magnificent food?!?! And when my mom had them, it was like a brand new amazing thing and I found this recipe written out in a very detailed form like it was some delicacy. So I love my mom not because she never made us casseroles, I love my mom for having this new food introduced to her in her 50's and having her think it was the latest and greatest invention.

And that lady Bev is a mormon. :)

So, I still miss my mom during the holidays. The fall time is just hard because now it's her death anniversary, then it's Claira's, Gentry's, mine, Than's and Emily's and now Roman's birthdays, then it's Thanksgiving and then Christmas and it just still breaks my heart that she's not here. I was talking with emily today about when it will ever not be sad that she's not here. When we are the grandma's will we not be sad because that is when she would have supposed to have been gone? I tell you what, it's not by the third Christmas because I'm still sad. I can hardly sing or listen to Christmas carols without bursting into tears. I really can just barely get through the songs in church. Her last Christmas, she came with Than and I to church in Julian and as we were singing a Christmas hymn, I can still picture in my mind how she looked with tears rolling down her cheeks as she was singing and now I think, did she know it was going to be her last Christmas? I was reading the dang Polar Express to my kids and I had to stop because I could barely talk I was getting so choked up. So many things make me think of her still. I've been extra emotional this past week and I know that at the root of it all is that I just miss her. I miss what it used to be like when she was alive and I think, holy cow, how is this already the third christmas without her? So I was happy to have a little cooking time with mom. It's funny how a cookbook can make you feel that much closer to someone. I can picture her standing next to me with her glasses on so she can read the measurements, dishtowel over her shoulder and probably a glass of wine sitting on the counter even though it was only 2 in the afternoon. :) Love you mom.

Our Week. It's a good one.

We've been home all week doing super fun things and I really wanted to blog everyday but there are just not enough hours in the day these days!

Sunday (or was it Saturday....It's been too long)....

We decorated our tree. I LOVE letting the kids decorate the tree!!! Pacen made a "Sports Section" on our tree with all of our BYU, Giants, A's, and Raiders ornaments. Claira had a little section all down on the bottom most branch of like 10 ornaments all in one group that were her favorites. It's just a fun time watching them be so excited.

Monday

Claira asked for a smoothie for breakfast. Then (since she is chronically cold like her mother) a few minutes later she asked for tomato soup. It was like 9:15 am when I took this picture!

Then it was time for Gingerbread houses!!!!! I just buy the one from Trader Joe's and the kids really like it. And they really like eating candy so maybe it's just about the candy. :)

Camry really wanted to do her own with graham crackers and so she did. She is my little creative cutie pie! She did get very frustrated when she would just stick the crackers together and they wouldn't stick. Patience doesn't run strong with this one. Nor her mother. :)

Pacen has really been into reading this week. He's reading some gigantic book about dragons and a bunch of his friends are all reading it too and it's been fun to watch him be all excited about reading. Well, this night he was reading his other favorite, Captain Underpants, and Gentry was being cute with him. She'd run over and try to bug him and Pacen would pretend to not notice her and then reach out and tickle her. Everyone needs a big brother like Pacen.

Then she'd run away and he'd read another page.

And then she'd be back....and it'd start all over again. :)

Tuesday.....

The girls painted Tuesday afternoon and that was fun to watch. Claira has little conversations going on with herself with she does everything. And every now and then she gets some paint on the paper. :)

The masterpieces.

Wednesday.....

These were the only pictures that I took on Wednesday. We were playing princesses with Morgan and I was the wicked step mother that turns good at the end. Claira was very distraught that I would be mean and tell them that they couldn't get off the bed so she made sure that I became nice at the end.

And I like that it shows their lights on their beds. They LOVE that we did this. Every night they get all excited to turn off their lamp and just have their Christmas lights on. Pacen has lights, too. We're just festive all over the place!

Thursday....

I don't know what we did thursday. Ummmmm.....oh yes, it was Than's zinch party down in the city. After that, I had to frost a bunch of cookies for Pacen's class. He chose our sugar cookies for his tradition but since we were all busy all week I frosted them by myself and it was actually kind of fun not having to chaperone the kids and just make cute cookies. And I've been wrapping every night and that is so much fun!!!! I'm so glad that I'm not behind this year! It might actually be the first year ever. :) I don't have a picture of Thursday, so let's enjoy my mantle.

Candy made those stocking for my kids and I'm slightly obsessed with them. They deserve a post of their own but I just haven't had time yet. And thanks to becca for giving me the curtain rod idea...and thanks to pinterest for giving it to her. And my other reindeer fell off and I didn't put it back on. I'm not a perfectionist.

Friday.....Kindergarten Sunrise Hike!!! Every year, the kindergarten does a sunrise hike at 6:15 IN THE MORNING! Than had to drive to Humbolt so I got one of my friends to watch my kids at 6 and then Cam and I were off. It's right by the school and they do a little 'hike' in the open space and then sing in the sunrise for winter solstice. It was really fun, actually, even though it was a pain to get there with her. And it was really cold and windy, but more fun than cold.

Some blurry parents....we are dedicated!

Here comes the sun.....do do doo doo. Here comes the sun and I say, It's alright.

That morning really was crazy trying to get my house out the door by 6:00am and getting Pacen's cookies to school and I had to take in fruit for the breakfast after the hike. Oh the things we do for our kids!

Friday night was tons of fun....I took the girls to the Nutcracker! Just the free one that they offer at Temple Hill but I don't have the pictures yet, so maybe I'll post about it tomorrow since it's almost 1 am now. We had to watch the Jimmer highlights since Than and Pacen went to the game tonight!!!! Go kings!

But, yes, Christmas is in full swing. We have shopped and wrapped and read lots of christmas books and read the Christmas story and done our advent calendars and listened to great holiday music and we are loving every crazy minute of it.

Maui No Ka Oi!!!

That means Maui is the best and it really is. We are IN LOVE with Maui and really need to find some people to invest with us so that we can have a place to go whenever we find a good deal on tickets. We really enjoyed our time on Oahu, but Maui is just so much more relaxed and it our type of Hawaii. Too busy and too many people on Oahu and just more aloha on Maui for us. We got into Maui early Sunday morning, got our rental car and headed to the Kihei side of Maui because we have never been over there. We found Secret Beach and Big Beach and spent the morning reading and napping and swimming.

Secret Beach....

Big Beach....

Sunday was a great day. We checked into our sweet condo properly named "A Little Slice of Heaven." If you ever want to rent it, I'll give you my cousin's number. It really is a perfect little place for just the two of you. Right on the water. Everything you need. Turtles swimming outside your door. The perfect sunset spot. You can see Molokai and Lanai. It's really great. We went kayaking, had some yummy food and lava flows of course, took a nap on a hammock in Kaanapali, enjoyed the sunset. We watched the sunset for a long time and it just kept getting better. It was a great day.

Monday was my tennis with Leslie while Than had his snorkel trip. I think I blogged that day. We went to Napili...our favorite place...and did the walk up towards the Ritz Carlton. Oh man, I love that place. Not a bad place to work either. :)

Ah!!!! That view is killing me right now!

Tuesday was my tennis lesson and it was awesome! I really love playing tennis and I'd love to find time to be on a team or something. At least play more often. It's going to be one of my new years resolutions. Than had his scuba trip to the Lanai Cathedrals and he is really obsessed with it now. To say he's hooked is an understatement. Anyone certified that can go with him!?!?!? I just don't think I could hack it. What else did we do??? I think we had our anniversary dinner that night at Roy's. It's a maui must! I love that we've been married for TEN WHOLE YEARS!!! It was fun to do our annual analysis of the best and worst things that we've done and what we have planned for the next years. We have done some pretty awesome things and done a lot of the normal things which we love just as much. We have four kids. That is crazy. And they are really awesome kids. Like really awesome. And just fun. I had so much fun with them today. I was playing the mean step mother while the girls, even Gentry, were all dressed up like princesses. We have a great life. And Than and I make a great team.

Wednesday was Lanai. Oh, lanai. We were supposed to get on the 6:45 ferry but both Leslie and us missed it. WHAT?!?!?! That was lame but it all worked out. Who wouldn't want to spend all of their time here? We love it there.

On the ferry looking back at those west maui mountains....

We even saw a whale!!!! Well, he was far away, but we did see him and a friend. We are taking our kids back to Maui in two years to see the whales. I can't wait. They are going to love it.

We saw turkeys at the hotel!

And this is what the locals were barbecuing!!!! Now that is awesome and disgusting all at the same time. :)

The last day was great. Than got a free sail when he was scuba diving and so we did that on our last afternoon. We saw turtles, but no whales. :(

And I really don't think that there is a better place to check your cougar board!

We spent our last evening with Leslie before our red eye home. Maui knew to send us off with a great sunset!

Oh, maui really is the best. I highly recommend saving all your pennies and going out there. We'll tell you all our favorite places. You won't be disappointed!

So yes, Happy Ten year anniversary to us. It was the perfect way to spend time together. And I keep saying it, but it really did feel like time just slowed down for us and we could do anything and everything that we wanted to. It was a perfect amount of time and the kids survived...thank you Becca!!! We owe here when she has four kids and needs a vacation!