Monday, February 4, 2013

Playing Catch Up: December 2012

December is always a fun, full month! Here we are doing some decorating:

 Instead of gingerbread houses, this year we made a manger scene.  So cute!

 This year we had SNOW in December!  It made me so happy to have all of that beautiful snow!
 Preston just before he went to his Christmas Program.  Burke and I got hit with the stomach flu just hours before the show-- so we missed it.  I was SO disappointed. You can almost see his missing teeth in this picture-- he has been rolling around "toothless" for a while!
 Every night Daddy read us a story out of the "Green Book" one of our advent activities.

I can't find any pictures, I was sure I took some, but maybe not-- but my Mom and Dad came to see us in the middle of December.  It was SO fun.  I kept the kids out of school and we played pretty hard.  We hadn't done Dinosaur Hill or the Monument with them, so we went to check those out, we did a little shopping and went to lunch, visited Burke and generally just enjoyed the few days we were together.  I have missed them so much, I was so grateful to get to spend some time with them!  Thanks so much for coming to see us :)

 Our kids are finally old enough to play a variety of games.  Here we are playing Ticket to Ride on a Saturday morning just before Christmas :)
 Preston is pretending to be asleep here-- he loves it when we read stories to him!
 And MORE SNOW!!  It was so fabulous to be happy and not stressed about the snow.  I loved being home for Christmas this year!
 Snack Time!
 After Santa Came our stockings were stuffed and we had more presents than we knew what to do with!  We were spoiled for Christmas this year!

 Playing Pictionary Jr. sometime on Christmas Eve
 "The Children were nestled all snug in their beds . . ."


 Christmas morning dawned EARLY for Rebekah-- 5:45 to be exact.  She slyly came into my room to tell me, "I didn't go look, but I can see A LOT more presents and something in my stocking.  Can we go see?"  I told her it was too early, but I didn't have the heart to send her back to her bed.  We snuggled for about 1/2 hour and then I knew there was no hope of her falling back to sleep so I got up with her.  She had a bath and sang some songs and read some stories.  Finally at 7 we woke up Preston!  She was more patient and pleasant than I thought she would be in that L-O-N-G wait! 

Here is the Christmas morning Photo Dump:












 We had a beautiful Christmas day and even went out to the park for a while.  We threw snowballs, made snow angels and enjoyed the sunshine!  It might have been my favorite Christmas we have ever had.  It was a nice, relaxing, cozy day.  Everyone was thrilled with their gifts and we thoroughly enjoyed each others company.



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Thursday, January 17, 2013

Playing Catch Up: November 2012




This year we made a Thankful Tree for Family Home Evening early in November.  We spent a few minutes for many days tracing, cutting, and writing on our hands.  It was so fun to see them thinking about what they are grateful for.  I will do this one with them again :)

We spent 9 days in UT/ID at the end of November.  It was so so fun :)  I only took pictures of ONE event-- after a few fun days in SLC (Thanks Claridge's!) we stopped by the museum at Hill Air Force Base near Ogden on our way up to Idaho.  Rebekah was so confused by the name-- she kept saying things like, "So is this place only for Hill's?"  and "We can be here because we are Hill's" I *think* she finally caught on after we showed her the display of the man it was named after, but it was pretty funny. 

Burke and I had read the book Unbroken By Laura Hillenbrand this summer (bawled my eyes out-- amazing inspiring story) and so it made this tour of the aerospace museum that much more interesting to us.  We spent a few hours walking and reading, and exploring the museum-- it was impressive and more interesting to our kids than I thought it might be.  Finally we were starving for lunch and had to leave.  (My picture of Rebekah by the planes wouldn't upload for some reason).




Then we went to IDAHO!!  Where I took (surprise!) NO pictures.  Sorry. 
We spent most of our time with at Grandma and Grandpa Hill's house.  They spoiled us completely.  My kids got to go feed the cows with Grandpa a few times [Burke even got to revisit the glory days and help pull a calf--it died --so sad :(  ] 
We spent a morning working in the candy shop with Great- Grandma and Grandpa Hill and Becky. Rebekah declared herself the official "Taster"and Preston folded an impressive amount of candy boxes (Rebekah helped a little here too!)  There were both elated when Grandpa paid them a dollar for their work.  It was a special morning!
 In the middle of the week, I met two of my sister's in Blackfoot at my Mom and Dad's house.  We had such a fun time!  We played games, crafted a bit, made a few treats and even sang for a minute!  All too soon, we went our seperate ways to celebrate Thanksgiving with our respective In Laws.
 
We were so blessed to have time to go to the temple more than once while we were there.  It was so wonderful!  We even got to attend a session with Sid, Becky, and Grandma and Grandpa Hill. Grandpa bought us lunch afterward at the temple cafeteria :)  So nice!
Thanksgiving Dinner was beautiful and delicious and a nice little gathering. Sid and Becky are always wonderful hosts, Burke's sister Millie was home from college and had a roommate along to join our meal.  Riley still lives at home (Preston will probably be so sad when that is no longer the case) and we also had Grandma and Grandpa Hill. So it was not too crazy, and I really enjoyed having a low key day to give thanks.
Burke and I did a bit of Black Friday shopping (though not the "crazy" hours!) It was nice to get our extended family shopping done before we left so we didn't have to mail it ;)
Saturday brought the amazing, wonderful day of Burke's brother and sister-in-law being sealed to their new sweet son who came to them through the blessing of adoption.  It was such a beautiful experience to be a small part of.  We are so happy to have a new family member and for the good news of the gospel to bind families eternally.  It was amazing and sweet.
After church Sunday (Sacrament meeting with the power out!) we packed up and went back to my parent's house for a night.  They had been in California all week and we were so sad not to have a lot of time with them on this trip.  At least we had a little :) We drove home Monday.  I was relieved to get home, and amazingly with more energy than I have had coming off of past trips.  I am LOVING my new(er) supplements, my energy has been SO much better and I feel so good.  Goodbye Lupus.  You are going away:)

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