Christmas lights at Temple Square

We finally did it. We rode the Trax up to Temple Square. And it was beautiful and cold, and the kids loved it. We watched about half of the Nativity before the kids got too cold and looked through some of the exhibits in the visitors center. It was just cold enough and we were later than we had thought we would be (more on that later) so we didn't walk around outside as much as usual. We did take pictures by that grouping of trees over by the seagull monument that is all red. So pretty! But the red in the trees didn't show. But this picture turned out cute! Seth smiling at his Daddy, Caleb and Felicity doing the cheese, and Joseph making a silly face. Yep, that's my crew! Abigail was bundled up in Farris' coat, she slept quite a bit.

The Trax was quite an adventure. I goggle mapped the address for the closest station...and we could not find it anywhere. We finally stopped at a business and I ran in to ask the receptionist. So we were there a little later than we thought we would be. There was a train pulling in when we found a parking spot, so I grabbed the kids and the gear while Farris ran to get the tickets (next time, we'll buy them online). I grabbed, grabbed, grabbed, managed to get the van locked and we all ran over there...Farris was still in line, not too many people, just really slow people. We eventually found another kiosk, but by this time the train was gone. It's only 15 minutes between trains, so we weren't worried. We waited and then boarded the next train. I sat down next to Seth, and then immediately jumped up again. Seth was missing one white sneaker. We decided that I'd take Seth to find the shoe and just meet them at the Salt Lake station. I ran around like a crazy lady trying to find the shoe before the train left, some sweet people helped me look, but I couldn't find it anywhere. Luckily I had my keys to the van so I ran back to see if it was there. Sure enough, it had fallen off inside the van before he got out. He never said a word as he walked through the parking lot, waited in line, crossed the tracks to the other side, and waited some more. Never said a word. Oh, that crazy kid. By the time I'd found it the train was gone and I figured we'd meet the rest of the family in Salt Lake, but they had gotten off before it left. They couldn't see me at first, and then they were afraid that I had gotten back on without them noticing. Whew. Now we were all together with the right number of shoes, coats, gloves and hats and we waited for one more train.

The ride home went a little smoother. It was fun riding the train, the kids loved it, and we didn't have to find parking downtown, hurrah! I think this will become a tradition every year. But I'm afraid I'll be paranoid about shoes.

Abigail's 4 month picture

Here's our happy girl! Abby turned 4 months old on December 11...and I've so far remembered to take her picture right on time every month. Hopefully that will continue! As you can see, her smile is growing. She is a baby that smiles with her whole body: sparkling eyes, chubby cheeks all crinkled, arms waving, tummy jiggling, legs tucked up and I'm sure her toes are curled under those socks.
She started rolling from back to tummy right before she was 4 months, but she didn't master it until a week before Christmas. She's rolled from tummy to front once, but mostly she plays for a minute, and then puts her face into the floor and howls until someone rolls her over. Bubbles she can do (she entertains her brothers that way) and she just started blowing razberries, too. Her face gets this far away look and she starts blowing like she's too bored for us. But as soon as you blow her one back, she starts to do her wiggle smile. She makes a lot of people smile with her sweet grin. We are enjoying our little cutie!

Hurricanes and lifeguards

Tonight Farris read me a quote from the Reader's Digest, something along the lines of:
What is it like to have four kids? Sort of like if you were drowning and someone handed you a baby.
I snickered, thinking, oh yeah, try five.
Felicity counted up the kids and said "Seth's the forth!" and Caleb lit up. "So that means that Seth jumped in and saved Mommy!"
I laughed out loud at that one. For as adorable as Seth is, he's a little roller coaster of emotions, he can be incredibly demanding and grumpy...oh, he can just be hard sometimes.
But the more I think about it, it's true, and not just about Seth. It does feel like a whirlpool, a crazy spinning hurricane in our house sometimes. But with five kids, there's always one to jump in and save me.
Sometimes I need a snuggle just as much as Seth does.
Making faces with Caleb, just to try to make each other giggle, even in the middle of church...oops.
Joseph's lightheartedness lets me relax my death grip on the to-do list a little.
Abigail's amazement at the whole world, but she still thinks we're the coolest thing she's seen.
Felicity's wild imagination mixed with this incredible practical side that pops out unexpectedly.
I'm so very grateful for the little lifeguards Heavenly Father sent me. I'm grateful He knew what I needed. And I'm grateful for Farris, that we're both swimming through this adventure together.


p.s. Tarilynn, that poem of yours got me feeling all sentimental-ly ;)

BYU Family Christmas Party

Every year, BYU hosts a family party for all their employees. It's become one of our favorite traditions. The kids love the carnival games, the doughnut, the crafts, and the boys especially love to get a picture with Cosmo. Seth had just woken up when we put him on Cosmo's lap. I was afraid of a sleepy-head- meltdown, but apparently waking up with a cougar dressed as Santa is a good thing. We might have to keep that in mind. I love how Joseph is looking up at him with so much admiration.

One of the favorite games is the pinata. I love how Caleb looks all Star Wars Light Saber in this picture.

Seth could spend the whole time in the balloon pit. See, balloons=FUN. Always.

This year they also had a free movie, The Muppets Christmas Carol. I'm ashamed to say I have never seen it, but here's one of my favorite parts, I really liked this song (and now I know why one of my roommates used to always count down to Christmas with sleeps)

And now that I'm caught up, it's time for me to get some of my own sleep!

Our Christmas Nativity

One of the countdowns to Christmas we are doing is an activity advent where the kids open a bag a day with a different activity. On Monday they were supposed to act out the Christmas story. They threw themselves into it with enthusiasm and presented it to us for FHE. They even rounded up their own costumes, with only a couple suggestions from us. I handed my robe to Caleb, but he was kind of dubious. He thought it looked a little "like a girl." Joseph loved being the angel, but he had problems keeping his halo up. Life imitating art, or art imitating life...?

The cast was: Mary played by Felicity; Joseph played by Caleb; the angel played by Joseph; the innkeeper played by Joseph; and the tiger (yeah, I know) played by Seth. Baby Jesus was played by Raggedy Ann and then for the photos, Abigail.

It was beautiful to see them put it together, no fighting and no need to teach them a script. Felicity even made a star out of K'NEX. I was very proud of my munchkins.
But every performance has a backstage story, and in our case I'm going to share some of the more comical moments, before and during:

Caleb to Joseph: Felicity needs to get a pillow, because pregnant ladies are kind of fat.

Felcity: Joseph needs a hollow.
Me: A what?
Felicity: A hollow.
Me, with a light bulb above my head: Do you mean a Halo?
Felicity: Whatever.

Joseph, practicing: There's no room in the inn!
Seth: Yes there is! [rather indignantly]

Felicity: Seth can be a Shepard.
Seth: NO, I'm a tiger.
Farris: You could be a sheep.
Seth: I'm a tiger. [As you can see, Seth is very firm in his opinions. And, yes, this is why our pageant includes a tiger]

During the performance:
Joseph (Caleb) protectively puts an arm around Mary (Felicity). He then turns to us, somewhat embarrassed, and says: "What! In the movie Joseph does just like this."

Felicity: Here Seth, you can be a sheep with our donkey [she hands him our stick horse]
Seth, taking the horse: No, I'm a tiger.

Joseph, puffed up with the importance of his roll, announces in a loud voice: I'm the innkeeper! There's no room in the inn!
Caleb: But my wife is having a baby!
Joseph: A baby! A baby! [then he dissolves into giggles]

We had so much fun doing this, I think it will have to be a tradition from now on. And maybe next year we can find a robe that's not so "girly."

How Lovely Are Thy Branches

I was going to title this "Oh Christmas Tree", but I figured that had been done before. This is one of my most favorite Christmas/Thanksgiving traditions. Although much of the last nine years I've stayed in a warm van with a little baby for most of the trip. Maybe Farris, who trudges through knee deep snow dragging a prickly tree wouldn't agree. But I'm glad he still does it! There is a wonderful smell up in the mountains in the winter, you can't get it anywhere else. Here's Farris about ready to set out. He packs kids in, hands them off to aunts/uncles and then packs trees out. This is how he can eat lots of pie and stay thin.

And here's our tree all put together! Our tradition has been to set the tree up and decorate it for FHE the first Monday after Thanksgiving. My tradition is to light the tree twice. Once when I take all our working light strings and get 2/3rds of the way up, and then again after I unwrap the lights and try again. Last year Farris bought another package so I wouldn't have to wrap it twice...and then we got a bigger tree this year. Our tree will never win awards for being the trendiest, or even have matching ornaments, but I love that each year we build our collection a little more so that as we bring them out of the boxes the kids can say "oh, I remember that one!" Someday I want to have a snowflake tree too, all silver and white and blue, but I think we'll always have a kids tree.

Felicity trying to get her favorite ornaments up high away from Seth. It's a week after we originally decorated and more ornaments are getting moved up higher. The bottom third of the tree is getting empty. Although there is plenty of ornaments scattered on the floor around the tree.

Farris getting in on it. We mostly let the kids go crazy, but sometimes we step in so one branch doesn't end up with 12 ornaments.

Happy he found one of his! We try to give the kids a new ornament each year. And I try to buy them in the after Christmas sales. Love Target for that, by the way.

Now that our tree is up it feels a lot more like Christmas. We just need some snow...please?

Abby's 3rd and Thanksgiving

I am determined to catch up! And in this busy season, that means, little words and many pictures. So here's the first picture. Isn't she adorable? I've been trying (and succeeding, so far) to take a picture of her, her blanket and her rabbit stuffed animal on each of her monthly birthdays so I can make... something entirely cute out of her first twelve months worth of pictures. I was startled with how much she has changed from her second to her third. And now it's almost time for her forth, sheesh, she's growing gangbusters. Love her cheeky grin. And those chubby legs!

Thanksgiving was wonderful. I didn't take a lot of pictures, but I did eat a lot of pie. My family didn't perform as usual, however, we only had 17 (if I remember right) pies. We usually have much more. We spent Wednesday night in Burley with some of Farris' family, and then after dinner (so funny...Judy used to raise chickens, so we always have chicken instead of turkey. Joseph's kindergarten just had their Thanksgiving Feast and very loudly kept saying things like "What's Thanksgiving without a turkey?" Kindergartners think they know everything, and they usually voice that opinion emphatically.) we headed to Richfield for Pie Day. Pie Day is closely related to Thanksgiving Day, and tends to run into breakfast the day after. And sometimes later. We brought four pies this year: Peach, Apple, Chocolate Egg Nog Swirl Pie, and Cream Cheese Pumpkin Cake (basically a rectangle pie). Yummy. My favorite pie for this year though was: Rob's Raspberry Cheesecake with Oreo Crust. Wow. And there were too many second place contenders to mention. Anyway, there is more to Thanksgiving than pie (although my nephews would argue that point), and we had much visiting and laughing and a great after-too-much-food walk around the farm. On Friday when many people are being pushed and pepper-sprayed (what was that about, anyway?) at stores, we went up to the Sawtooth's and cut down trees. Farris picked out a bigger tree than usual and it's beautiful. More about that in the next post.

Here's Joseph enjoying the snow. We walked through about two feet of it, and were finishing loading the trees when another storm rolled in.

Caleb all bundled up. I'm not really sure when those teeth of his are going to grow in, but he does love to sing "All I want for Christmas is my THREE front teeth."

Sethy is too cute. He loved the snow...until he got to where it hadn't been plowed and then an adult had to carry him the rest of the way.

We had a great Thanksgiving. I am so grateful for two wonderful families that we have to spend time with every holiday.

And obviously, I can't do a post without many words.