A week at Grandma Whitneys

The day after Christmas we packed up and headed to Grandpa and Grandma Whitney’s house to spend some time.  They had met David and Jacob in St. George to pick them up so we all met and had dinner at Golden Corral.  The boys love that place :)  Then we spent the next few days playing outside, inside, making lots of noise,  getting dirty, going to the movies and playing Wii with cousins.  And I got almost no pictures of the entire event.  On Thursday before we left Josh and the boys helped take down the pool and then the Christmas lights.  Lincoln was way more than a little upset that he was not on the roof with his dad and brothers, so Grandpa helped him up.

Josh says “catch him SheriDawn!”  Link didn’t even flinch he loved it.

Coming down the ladder…totally ticked he’s getting off!

A few minutes later….still ticked off.

 

Fine I’ll just climb back up! And he wouldn’t let go either…that’s why my dad’s climbing up behind to help pry his fingers off the rain gutter.  Funny kid!

Pointing to the roof.  But I want up!!!

At least he’s persistent

The only other pictures from the week at Grandmas

Christmas Eve and Day

We’re doing Christmas Eve and Day together because for me it all ran into each other.  I had to work the night before Christmas Eve as well as Christmas Eve so I spent most of the day sleeping…or trying to.  I only slept about 3 hours and laid there another 2.  It wasn’t very cool. 

At 5 pm we all went to Grandma’s house for Christmas Eve Dinner and the Nativity.  While we were waiting for dinner to start I got to talk to my mom and dad who were just leaving visiting my Aunt Nadine in the hospital and headed over to visit my brother.  Then we had dinner and the kids put on the Nativity.  I got to see them all dressed up and then I had to leave for work.  Lincoln and Kallie were Joseph and Mary, Tyler, Jesse and Tracen were wisemen, Mack was a shepherd and Kole an angel.  Tyler put together all of the costumes while I slept.  These are our attempts at getting them together for a picture…

Come on Mary, we’ll try the stable…

Look we have a baby!

Tracen was sure that the wise men held baby Jesus too.

Mary’s leaving the scene

This is as close as it gets…

Shepherd boy

Link kicked back with Josh

Then I have no idea what happens at the Neilson houses for the next 12 hours.  But when I got home Santa had come.  I’m not sure when he slipped in though because I got updates from Josh at 9,10, 11, 3 and 4 am.  All but one of those times Jesse was having a really hard time sleeping.  One of the nurses came in an hour early so we could get our Christmas done and make it to church.  When I got home everyone was asleep still and I lost the fight with myself…I climbed into bed for an hour. 

We got up at 8, opened all the presents and made it to church (amazing!) by 9 am.  And only the last 15 minutes were rushing around.   We all had a good Christmas.  The boys got really spoiled.  Link found some candy in his stocking and didn’t open one thing after that.  So Tracen and I opened his presents for him.  After a good Sacrament meeting we came home and got ready (I laid down for 40 minutes) Then we headed off to Grandpa and Grandma Neilson’s for more spoiling.

We opened presents and ate lots of food.  Everyone watched a movie and I took Lincoln and we went for a drive home and back to get some stuff we forgot  and so Lincoln could take a nap.  Then I was the party pooper and made everyone come home early so I could go to bed.  I was so tired!

It was a fun and good Christmas.  Next time I work all night on Christmas Eve, though, I think we’ll write a letter to Santa and ask him to come a day or two early!

New Jammies

 

Jesse in his new blue feather boa :)  Ty put it on top of his gift to irritate him.

All the boys got new fleece blankets

Tracen and Link got a new kitchen to play with.

 

Josh got some rings for his gym…Link thinks they’re awesome.

Like a week before Christmas we let Santa know we found a really good deal on a cello.  Thankfully he got it for Ty.  Ty loved it and thanked us and gave hugs out for a week. 

Link’s going to love the car DVD player Grandpa and Grandma Whitney gave them

Then onto Grandpa and Grandma Neilsons where the insanity continued.  We had Crystal and Kurt this year.  Jesse painted a painting for Leah Paisley’s room and made Crystal cry…it was so cute :)

 

The baby made out this year….she also got a backpack to ride in :)

Out of everything I think all the kids liked the snakes on top of Lincoln’s present the best…they had snake fights all day long Tracen and Mack played together really good too.

December

I haven’t done much blogging, and I’m trying to get my blog ready to print for the year so I’m going to do a quick run down on our busy December!

Josh bribed Ty into feeding the chickens and laying down in the snow on a freezing cold night in only shoes and shorts all for $10.  I promised him I would not post the video here or on facebook but I haven’t promised not to share it with everyone I know so if you want to see a hilarious video just ask me :)

We had lots of parties.  It started out with SheriDawn’s work party…no pictures and no kids…lots of fun :)

Then we had the Neilson Christmas party.  The do a talent show.  Tyler played his cello and the piano.  Jesse did Karate and played the piano.  Tracen’s talent was spinning….on his butt…on the floor.  We’re very proud and so is he.  We have videos that are stuck on my phone. But here they are bowing

Lincoln didn’t have a talent but here he is all bruised up.  I guess his talent is getting beat up.  Josh accidently hit him with the edge of a chair.  He also got a board dropped on his arm a week earlier and will gladly show you his “ow”  It is impressive, I thought it was broken at first.

Then we had the ward party.  I had to take all 4 boys by myself and play the piano for the program which the older boys were involved in.  Thankfully Lincoln decided it would be somewhat ok to hang out with my friends husband.  Thank you Travis!  I’m also quite the waitress…I balanced 4 plates and waded through a sea of people successfully.  Santa came afterward and gave out presents

We were really irreverent in Sacrament meeting this week.  We pretty much spent part of every one out in the halls…here is why

At pack meeting we made some cute and yummy reindeer

Jade and Kaylynn gave us a cute advent calendar for Christmas that had lots of fun activities and little gifts.  The boys are making their reindeer from one of those days.

Link just ate the candy canes

We ate yummy pizza one day

We went Christmas shopping.  Whenever we go to Sports Authority Tracen and Lincoln head right over to the dumbbells and start working out…it’s hilarious.  And Tracen also likes kettle bells.

We did a little “ding dong ditching” as the boys call it.  We took some Christmas stuff to a family.  The only reason I mention it is because the boys loved it and wanted to go back to the store everyday to buy more stuff to do it again.

We had a party/lunch at Josh’s work too.

Then the boys (Tyler, Jesse and Tracen) went with my mom to Logandale and went to the Messiah and hung out for a few days.  This was fun for them and great for me.  I was able to get all the presents wrapped and everything finished up and ready for Christmas. 

I think that takes us up to about Christmas Eve