Wow. What a month to journal! It started off quite busy... then mellowed out in a major way, once the break set in. Loved spending time with the kids and celebrating the birth of our Savior and the Christmas season. Actually, I'm pretty sad it's all over as I'm writing this. I mean.... it's great to have a quiet, peaceful house, but I'm not ready to end the party... ha!
Highlights from the month included a visit from Aunt Michelle! We loved having her here-- exploring the city, watching highschool soccer games, shopping, relaxing by the pool, walking the trails, eating at Taco Stand (our favorite) and going across the street to the Poway Performing Center of the Arts for a Christmas Dancing with the Stars performance! So fun to have my lil' sis. Hope she decides to bring the rest of the crew next time!
We also enjoyed a sweet little visit from Adam! He stopped in San Diego for a day and a half before heading to his grandparents and then BYU-I so that Blake could take off his braces. It was so cool to have him here for a short time. My boys and my girls ADORE their cousin Adam.
Let's see.... along with visits, we enjoyed quite a few parties and Christmas events! LOVED going with Grandma to see the Orange County Millenial Choirs perform. There is really nothing on earth quite as grand as this Christmas show and Evelyn, Anna and I were SO happy to be there with Grandma! Evelyn sang at our beautiful Stake Christmas music event with our neighbor Rhett. They did an incredible job- singing "Christmas in Zarahelma". I felt like a parent to a celebrity afterwards-- everyone was so impressed and excited for Evelyn. It made my heart burst. We hosted an incredible Christmas Soup, Bunko, and White Elephant Gift Exchange at our home the weekend before Christmas and had about 47 participants in the biggest white elephant you could imagine. Let's just say.... it was fun for about 45 minutes then it started to get a little long... ha! But overall, a super fun night with our dear friends and neighbors.
Loved celebrating Teneil's birthday and enjoying a Christmas luncheon with friends before the break. Loved putting together the office Christmas gifts (Stanley cups plus a trendy mini backpack) and the neighbor/friend gifts: a mini waffle maker with four little waffle recipes- including hash brown waffles, egg waffles and banana bread waffles! This is probably one of my very favorite parts of Christmas- planning out what to get for friends and family. Heck, I even love finding funny white elephant gifts- like this macaroni and cheese candle and pickle flavored car scent!
braces off for Abby!
We did a lot of baking this month. A lot of soups too for some reason. Well... I know the reason actually. It's because I feed a lot of teenage boys and soups are a good, big, easy meal for a lot of soccer playing 15 year olds. One night I made THREE POTS of soup!!!!! One for us, and two for various friends going through surgery and other hardships! Haha! But yeah.... I'm kind of becoming obsessed with soup lately. Along with my soup obsession, I've also spent many a day organizing various parts of our home. My friend Jessica has helped me with this! We did the pantry last month, this month we did the kitchen cabinets and drawers! In January we'll do the laundry room and bar area. But taking all of the ideas Jess gave me- Anna and I organized her room over the break! It doesn't look like anything too special right now- but let me just say, we got rid of SO MANY THINGS! And we are planning on re-doing the room for her birthday. So yes, we've spent some time organizing and decluttering lately and it's been awesome. We even watched a few episodes of Hoarders and that's been a good motivator for Anna and I- the two in the family with the greatest propensity towards hoarding. After the show, Anna's been pretending she's an interventionist to help hoarders. That's her new imagination play...ha!
Let's move on to Christmas Eve. Special night at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Loved being with them and with Aunt Stacy, who sadly, was sick and couldn't sit at the table for fear of spreading germs. But it was a wonderful evening of delicious food: Herb's prime rib, Grandma's potatoes, Dane's Mac n cheese, Aunt Stacy's cookies with Handel's ice cream! Games like our home-made Christmas edition of Balderdash! a mad dash to grab and open a gift before your partner could do so, let's call this the gift grab! A Christmas devotional, beautiful wonderful gifts from Grandma and Grandpa-- we ARE SO excited for our Disneyland passes! And darling ornaments, $$, puzzles, dish towels a beautiful wedding book and darling cashmere sweater for Blake. It was all so thoughtful. Of course we finished the evening by watching the new Jim Gaffigan special and loved that. All in all- it was a beautiful Christmas Eve and we felt so grateful to Grandma and Grandpa for all they did to make it so special.
Of course, we enjoyed so much opening up stockings from Grammy!!!! She moves heaven and earth to put together such a cool collection of stocking stuffers for each of her grandkids! I don't know how she finds the energy, but it makes for an amazing night of surprises for the kids and they just adored opening their gifts and feeling so loved by their Grammy and Papa! We had a very sweet Christmas morning. The kids opened up their trip to Costa Rica which was a huge surprise and made them so happy! Dane had asked for new Nikes and clothes, Ev new Uggs and clothes, Anna a zipline, nail polish and a fake phone (for her new salon), and a doctor's kit! Grant had asked for new Nikes and new scooter parts. The kids were excited about the foosball table! Blake had bought me an electric heated vest for all of the soccer games! I'm SO happy about this! I had bought him mix tile pictures of his office. We ate the Swiss pie and chocolate croissants that Grandma and Grandpa had sent for us! We played all day! We were so busy putting together items, cleaning, playing and such that we decided not to make dinner! We just cooked the rolls and had those with home made jam and then called it a night- haha! We watched Daddy's home 2 and laughed so much at Will Ferrel. It was a great day.
After Christmas, the break turned a little less magical! It was super cold, rainy, we caught colds, and over-ate quite a bit of junk food. We did enjoy an awesome little outing to Pelly's Mini golf and the Taco Stand with friends one day. And Grant enjoyed the skate park here and there, Dane met up with friends at the high school fields to play soccer, Evelyn worked A TON and Anna played hoarders and doctor's office! Though not feeling 100 percent, we headed to Brianhead for our ski trip and enjoyed a few days of REALLY cold skiing! Let me rephrase that... we enjoyed a few hours of really cold skiing! Haha... we didn't last long in the storm, but we had fun enjoying yummy St. George food, shopping around, watching Sing 2 and getting away for the weekend. I'm not sure Evelyn will ever forgive us for taking her away from her New Year's Eve plans- but we'll work on that!
Good news for the month: Grant got his cast removed! He remained in the boot for the month, but it was amazing for him to be off crutches. Sure am proud of Grant for making it through a tricky challenge the past few months. Through it all, he remained mostly upbeat and positive. He recognized the opportunity to spend time with friends he didn't usually have time for (since he typically lives at the skate park). One friend in particular who is going through a difficult challenge, he spent a lot of time with- even gave him his Marvel advent calendar when he realized he loved legos so much and could use some cheering. (By the way... Louie also received an advent calendar full of cat treats!) Grant's word for the new year is: Mindful. He wants to believe in himself more and care what others think of him-less.
Dane's good news: he made the Poway High Freshmen soccer team as the starting striker! He's SO excited and is loving it. He loves the pasta parties, the games, the practices! He is still the most social of our entire bunch. After school every day he comes home with a pile of kids. One of his cute little friends even gave me a darling gift of a handmade note with a few boxes of wrapped cereal since they eat cereal everyday. So sweet. Dane spent a lot of the break trying out new recipes like home made Mac n cheese and carmel brownies. Loved that Dane's teachers quorum went to support the girls from the ward in the Poway High Choir concert. Of course, they only half way wanted to be there, but when the choir director invited audience members who were alumni and had sung in the choir in years past, along with audience members who were familiar with Handel's Messiah up on stage, we had a good laugh when half the boys from the quorum headed up and "sang" in front of an entire theater full of people . Luckily they were wearing masks so no one knew that they were fraudulent singers. Ha! It was funny. Dane's word for the new year is: Confidence. He wants to do more working out and less junk food.
Anna's good news: she started basketball with bestie Kate! So fun to see her out there working her hardest to defend and score. She is loving it. Anna and her friends participated in so many fun Christmasy activities this month: they decorated Christmas cookies and made Rice Krispie trees! With Kate gone half the month, Anna had to find a new friend and she did! Ruby (Evelyn's new boyfriend's little sis) Anna enjoyed Crafts and Cocoa at the school with Maddy and Kate. She LOVED watching Nora and Millie in the Nutcracker. She tried egg nog for the first time and LOVED it. She graduated from Daisys to Juniors in the girl scout program. So proud of Anna this year for trying new things- like Girl Scouts and THREE dance classes and basketball! Her "word" of the new year is: Never Give up. Haha... last year's "word" was Try Hard. She wants to do more reading and less eating junk food.
And Evelyn's good news? She worked enough to earn $1,000 over Christmas break. She's pretty pleased with herself and we are proud of her too. Ev has had a busy month full of dates with her new buddy Eli.... dates to the temple, to the Christmas lights, making gingerbread houses, movies, and cooking challenges. It's been a fun month, however, he's sort of a fly by the seat of his pants kind of guy and she's more of a planner- so it's been interesting for her to let go of the control. I love watching my kids have all of these new and interesting experiences: jobs, friends, boyfriends, etc. I was lucky enough to be an observer in seminary last month when Evelyn was scheduled for devotional. So proud of her for expressing her testimony so eloquently. Ev and I enjoy walking almost every day. When she isn't exercising or working, she's planning a fun excursion with friends, or playing the piano, or baking fun Christmas cookies. She's definitely not cleaning her room or helping with household chores- ha!
And good news for me: I FINALLY received my CA credential! So I will be joining forces with our friend-Dr. Tony Kuleto! Blake helped me set up a business license and I'm currently taking a class to become an IEP advocate. I'll be a member on his team to help kids with mental health issues receive diagnosis, intervention and medication management. I'm SUPER excited. Once the children are diagnosed, I'll deliver executive functioning curriculum and attend their IEP meetings as an advocate to get them the therapeutic interventions they need to succeed in school and at home. I am super excited! I've always wanted to do something like this. I sure hope it works out. My word for the year is: gratitude. I want to do more meditating and less complaining.
Oh- and as for Blake. His word of the year is balance. Poor guy is trying to do SO MANY things! He's actually doing a marvelous job of it all in my opinion. When asked on the spot during FHE what he will do more and/or less of, his response was, "what are you, my lawyer?" Ha! So I answered for him: He will do more agreeing with his wife and less assuming he is always right. The kids got a kick out of that. Happy NEW YEAR !!!!
