Nativity Collection 2011

Here are my nativities.  Zane counted & said I have 74.  

 That is NOT counting any on the Christmas tree.

December Recap Part 3

Tuesday morning was an early one.  Zane had 6 am basketball practice because of the community Christmas program in the evening.

Benjamin had an 8:30 am dentist appointment so I dropped Emmalee off at school at 7:30 (Callum rode his bike since we barely have any snow--just a little here and there where it was shoveled or doesn't see the sun).  Then I drove to IF.  

Unlike his first dentist appointment (see post here about that), he was very uncooperative & I couldn't even get his to lay down in the chair.  He was quite the fighter (arms flailing, legs kicking, and mouth clenched shut--mostly).  We tried everything but he wouldn't calm down--he said he remembers "ow, ow" from last time.  Darn!  So that means day surgery so all his teeth can be worked on.  We scheduled that for Thursday, December 22nd (my dad's birthday).  Rusty will be done with school and Brienna & Zane will be home to help.

 Examples of Ben's fits at home:

Even though Callum also had to have day surgery to get his teeth worked on & everything went well with him, I hate the idea of "putting Ben under"--it's a little scary.  So if you think about, keep our little guy in your thoughts and prayers on Thursday.

After scheduling his day surgery, I went shopping.  I was a bit pleased because I had a little extra time so I was hoping I wouldn't feel so rushed.  I even made it to a couple extra stores.  I needed to get home about 1 so I could go to the community center and start setting up nativities.  So we finished shopping & headed home.  But the van started making a terrible noise when I started getting onto the interstate & I almost felt like I didn't have a lot of power.  I thought it might be the transmission or something.  Whenever I would accelerate, then it sounded like there was either air blowing out somewhere, or there a  clicking sound (like a stick in the spokes of a bike).  But I said a few silent prayers, and felt like I should just keep driving home.  

Ben fell asleep shortly after we started home, and I turned on Christmas music to help me not worry so much about the van's problems. Whenever I tried to go faster than 40, it sounded terrible & took a lot of power to get going.  Although I didn't go much faster than 45-50 mph, I finally made it home.  And it took over 1/2 a tank of gas!  One more challenge in our lives!

But I made it home safely (said a prayer of thanks) & then packed up some of my nativities and went to the community center.  I set a few up, but the other ladies had done a lot already.  So I decided to go home so I could get the music copied & into a binder (music for the Christmas carols--I was asked if I had the music for all the carols, but they were in about 10 books, so I copied them & put them into a binder).  

I then had 2 piano lessons, then the kids got home from school & I had 2 more piano lessons.  I needed to change my clothes & gather a couple of  more things before heading back to the community center.  (Let me clarify about this Christmas program--it started out as our Ward party, but we wanted to involve the whole community & since we have some that won't come to our church building for any reason, we decided to hold it at the community center & involve the Baptist church & others in our community--we only have 2 churches in our town).  Our Relief Society president did an awesome job at involving so many people--it really was a Christian Christmas celebration.

Rusty wanted to look under the van so he needed my help a little--but Brienna & I were supposed to be at the community center at 4:30 to rehearse the program.  So I helped as much as I could & then told Zane to take over.

I helped set up more nativities (people from the community displayed their nativities for others to enjoy).  I think I had about 25 of mine there--about 1/3 of what I have.  They were able to go through the play 2 times & I was able to pop in and out when I was needed.

It was a nice program (not too long & not too short), a lot of friends & "enemies" were gathered together, more chairs had to be set up & some people had to stand, and it was a wonderful inter-faith Christian Christmas celebration.  There were cookies & punch afterwards &  a lot of visiting.  I helped take the nativities down & put the lights/table clothes, etc. away.  Then I took 3 cheer baskets to deliver (most of them had mini loaves of bread, jam, popcorn, ornaments, and a couple of cookies/goodies). 

I was going to post my nativities in this post, but I think I will do a separate post for my nativities.

December Recap Part 2

Monday, December 12th started out busy (but when don't Mondays start out busy--recovering from a weekend!)

I made a double batch of sugar cookies.  Benjamin loves counting how many things I pour into the bowl.  And he holds my arm as I scoop & pour (his version of "helping" me)

After those cookies were mixed, I covered them & put them in the fridge (thankfully we have a second fridge so that I have enough room!)  Then I started in on a double batch of applesauce cookies--I made a couple of pans with raisins in them & the rest had chocolate chips in them.

After lunch I made a triple batch of bread--enough for dinner (polish sausage bread), us & then a dozen mini-loaves for the cheer baskets that went to families/widowers/widows, etc. in our community.

After school, I had 3 piano lessons, then we had dinner & I went to a friend's house to practice a song we were singing for the community program on Tuesday.  There were 5 moms singing to our daughters as they sat in little rocking chairs (or on the hay) holding their baby dolls.

Then I came home & we cut out sugar cookies for FHE.    I am 100% positive I took pictures of the kids cutting them out, but I cannot find them anywhere!  Zane missed out, though, because he had his first basketball practice.

I also (in my "spare" time), finished putting a booklet together for Brienna.  She was in charge of getting a group of youth to sing carols for 15 minutes or so at the beginning of the program on Tuesday.  So she needed a booklet with the words of a lot of Christmas carols.  I never realized how hard it was to put a booklet together and get the page number correct,  and if there is more than one page, make it work when you turn the page. 

I finally cut & pasted (not on the computer) until I got one to work--then I went back to the computer and cut & pasted so I could print it out.  Then I went to the church to make 20 copies.

When I started this post, I really thought I would get a "recap" of most of the week in this one post.  But it looks like this one post is plenty long, so I will publish it now & work on Tuesday!

December--Part 1

Christmas is almost here, and so much is going on in our lives.  

Here is a re-cap:

Sunday, Dec. 4th we made homemade ornaments out of salt dough.  (Rusty had left over dough from his Primary lesson.)

 Ben loves play dough so he thought this was a blast.

 We let them dry overnight & then got ready to paint them (& other plaster-of-paris ornaments I bought).

 I think Ben had just as much fun painting his plate!

 Callum painting his ornaments.

 We had great intentions of sending a few to Ethan, but they never got into his package we sent (sorry, Ethan!)  I guess we'll have some for him for next year!

 I even jumped in & painted a couple.  I usually don't care too much for painting little things, because I don't have a very steady hand at painting fine details (faces, etc.)  But I had a lot of fun--plus I needed the practice because I helped the girls paint ornaments at Activity Days later in the week (Thursday).

 Benjamin went over to Callum & helped him "paint"--his plate, that is!

 Here's a dark picture of Zane painting his ornament.

 Nice, Zane!

 Rusty painting his ornament (I couldn't get rid of the red-eye!)  During the week, I baked a lot of cookies.  I needed cookies for the teachers on Sunday, and I wanted some to send to Ethan, so I made ginger snaps & applesauce cookies.

 Thursday after school, I helped the older girls in Primary paint ornaments for cheer baskets.  Their leader was out of town, so me & another lady helped them.  I took all my paints for them to use.  Then we cleaned up, I came home & got ready to go to the school faculty dinner/party.  I took some of the cookies I made earlier in the week.

 Friday, the 9th of December, Emmalee & Callum were able to make gingerbread houses  at the school.

 They had a lot of fun--and I had to take a picture before they ate all the candy off the houses!

 Callum looks like he isn't too excited--but he kept blinking or closing his eyes.  I took 10 or more pictures and this is the only one with his eyes opened.

 He finally said he didn't care if he had his eyes opened or closed--he wanted to eat his candy!

Rusty took Zane to town to get basketball shoes. I took the kids to town on Friday to get their school secret-Santa gifts & finish some shopping.  

 We didn't get home until almost 7, and still needed to get the cookies decorated for the Primary teachers.  Thankfully, Brienna "rescued" me (since she is a pro at cookie/cake decorating!) & frosted all the cookies for me.

Sunday, Dec. 11th, was the day we introduced the 2012 Primary theme to the teachers.  We had the young women come to Primary & do sharing time & singing time while we presented the new theme to the teachers.  The theme is Choose the Right, so we had cookies & milk for the treat.  The teachers got their new manuals & a gift (I didn't take a picture of the gift--I'll have to do that some time).  

Then Monday, I made (more) sugar cookies & we cut them out & baked them for FHE.  I remember taking pictures of the kids cutting them out, but I cannot find them!  (I even went through all the camera memory cards I can find!)  

Christmas Tree 2011

For Family Home Evening, we put our Christmas tree up.

 It is nice to have the older kids doing most of it, and then everyone putting ornaments on.  I hand out the ornaments.

 We had to dig out the Santa hats and Ben pretty much has been wearing one since.

 "Where's my hat?"

 It's looking pretty!

 Zane was playing Santa & the kids all sat on him.

 Zane putting the angel on top (so here is "proof" of who put the angel on top this year, so we don't need to argue about it next year).

 Sisters!

 Brothers

 And this is about as good as it gets--seems like one of them had a funny face, eyes closed or looked away!

 Gotta love Emmalee!

 Our lovely Christmas tree.

 Then Ben gave Dad the camera so he could get some pictures of him sitting in front of the tree.