Christmas Gifts Galore!

This is a bench that I got a week before Christmas for our front Porch. I thought that Matt was going to buy this but asked me to go get it instead. Matt thought it would look good in place of the backyard swing that is sitting on the porch. And it will. But I really like it in my bedroom too, I would just have to recover the back pillows because they are the wrong colors.

This is my present from Matt and the kids that was hiding in the side yard in the back. I love this bench and had seen it 2 weeks before at Urban Renewal. Matt had told me that it was too expensive when I called him about it. What a great surprise I received after all the other presents were open. This is going on the front porch also, but on the side of our checker board and whiskey barrel (like Cracker barrel the restaurant has.) It will be really nice to sit on the front porch and play games.

The kids went to bed Christmas Eve in Devin's room and woke up with their beautiful Duvet's keeping them warm. I thought it was a really nice touch to have them wake up to them, (like on the little Princess, when shirley wakes up from her "what a nice dream!")

Devin's room with his great flannel Duvet cover and his "Property of the Redsox" throw, (that he got for Christmas also,) that matches the rest of the Redsox decor that he is going for. The other side of this blanket is Navy Blue.

Kyler's Duvet turned out the best. It could be because his was last or because I really like the colors. The back of Kyler's flannel duvet is also Navy Blue. It has all the Snow Canyon High School Warriors (or his baseball team,) colors that his room has. The Duvet turned out snugger than the other two, which is good since Kyler is the one that really wanted the Down Comforter. Kyler is the only kid in the house that doesn't have a phone in his room. Urban Renewal ( a consignment store,) has a goofy phone that he saw and loved when they bought my rocker and so I am going to pick it up for him since it is only $10! I hope he is surprised.


What little girl doesn't deserve to have the princess treatment? Mckenna's cotton Duvet cover was the hardest to do because it has Lime green fur on the backside and it kept getting stuck in the sewing machine. But eventually it worked out, she loves it and the boys love how soft it is...

Mckenna also got the phone that is sitting in the left hand corner from Santa Claus. She really loves it but says that she now needs caller ID. I love Mckenna's room, she has had lots of great stuff to decorate with like that bulletin board that is sitting on the wall next to her bed that she also got for Christmas and was the first one done when we started changing the colors in the house. Maybe because it was so dark before, but it is really bright and cheery now!

Devin and Kyler picked out their colors in their rooms, even thought Matt didn't want to do the red in Devin's room since it is so bright, but it is so Devin that it is perfect! Kyler's room is a little dark, but it is really what he wanted and I love how Matt added the green and gold stripe.

All these rooms were done right after school started and so I had a lot of fun getting Christmas stuff that goes with the feel of their rooms. Usually they say pick out the bedding and then decorate, I did it the other way around and it worked for us!

Hope you enjoy the pictures!

notice the cute little girl asleep in her bed?

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Ah, the Night before Christmas and all through the house not a creature was stirring, not even me.....

Boy did I have a busy 2 weeks before Christmas, what with Matt's work parties, Mckenna's Beauty and the Beast performance, Devin's Wrestling and Kyler being a true teenager of not communicating where he was going, what he was doing and coming home way to late for his own good. I guess some one has to be the teenager!

But the last week was absolutely trying. I got the brilliant plan of making Duvet covers for the the kids down comforters that they were getting for Christmas. Now, I have never made Duvet covers or anything else that needed a pattern and was very leary about the process. But smart person that I am I decided to make them without a pattern, and eyeballing the Duvet cover that I had on my bed. This entailed fabric purchasing, button buying, and the almighty pinning of all materials together. But after a day for each Duvet cover being sewed (3 days,) and then 2 days to figure out how to do the button holes and buttons, they were finally done! whew!

I have to admit, they turned out great and so on the next blog you will see the final product on the beds of those that received them.


Christmas evening was a joy. We read the Night Before Christmas (read by Mckenna,) the Nativity Story (read in rap by Kyler,) played Carrom (thankyou Finlinson's it is an awesome present!)

We also watched videos of the kids in Christmas' past, which Kyler always loves because according to Devin is because Kyler is a tight (cool,) little kid. He is so funny with his innocent questions and facial expressions that he just makes you smile.

Which he still tends to do.

Here are pictures of What Santa brought before the kids woke up. (and according to Kyler he was going to sleep in and not wake up to early- but he still woke up at 6:30 a.m. Mckenna at 6 a.m. Ouch!)

Some stockings where hung by the Chimney with care (and other's left on the ground because they were too heavy for the stocking holders.)

Merry Christmas to all and to all a goodnight!

Decorating Gingerbread houses

Today, we went to my friend Andrea's house for Family Home Evening. We had a lot of fun decorating gingerbread houses, talking to good friends; the Hatch's were there too.








Mckenna making a Gingerbread house.








Breanna, Mckenna, Ashley and Kyleigh making Gingerbread houses.











Kyler sitting with the little kids, helping them.









The final product from Mckenna and Kyler.

Christmas Tree design and the Holiday House Trappings

Our Tree after leaving the Forest with all the dressings.










Matt, Kyler, Mckenna and Devin decorating the tree.









Our dining room with the kids art work from over the years.








A mock-up of our house in Georgia.
I did this for one of Kyler's 3rd grade Choir performances.

Toy soliders that the boys made when they were in 2nd grade. It's funny though, because they went to 2 different school in different states and still did the same thing in the same grade.

Plant shelf in entry way.

Entry way view from staircase landing

Our house with the Christmas lights on.

Walking to the Front Door

Another Bit of artwork from the kids; this time Mckenna's reindeer story.

Mckenna's hands

Kyler's hands, and the Gingerbread people the kids made a few years ago
(all of this is in the Dining Room.)

Our Entryway

Our family room.

Our Fireplace mantel.

Matt and I at the age of seven.

The Kids at the age of 6 weeks.

Christmas tree hunting, friends and family love!

We went Christmas tree hunting on Sunday because Matt and I sat down trying to figuare out when we could go and that was the only day we didn't have major scheduling conflicts. Oh, Okay church is a major conflict, but if I had known that it would take an 1 1/2 to drive there and finding the tree, and drive back, we couldv'e gone to Church too, but usually it takes 3 or 4 hours to go find. It was fun because we had Madison with us, she had spent the night after her parents were gone until late Saturday night and she had never been to the Pine Valley mountains and so we were fortunate to be the first to show her the mountains! We love the mountains and so we hope to help her to love them too!

The sad thing is that on our way home we passed Angel for Animals ( the place where Roxey is,) and so Matt pulled over on the road so we could see if she was out in the yard, when we couldn't see her, Devin asked if we could pull into the parking lot. I said absolutley not, and Matt explained to Devin that if Roxey saw us, she would have to readjust to her environment there again. I just started crying because I have so much guilt about not taking care of the dog ourselves. I have nightmares about her getting out of the yard, getting hit by a car or being adopted by some really mean people. But when I hear what the Angel's lady says online about her being able to go out into the main perimeter with all the workers I guess I feel a little better, but I still feel really sad about not having her here at our house. I guess I loved her more than I would give my self permission to when she was with us...

After Lisa came and got Madison we put ourselves into high gear because we had company coming over. Our friends the Warrens have had us over to their house for dinner many times in the last year, they have each been in a play that our family has been and Sarah and Devin have become really good friends. Devin actually had a crush on Sarah about a year ago. He gave her a valentine gift last year, it was really cute, since Sarah is a year older than him. We had a yummy dinner; roasted Chicken, pork roast, mashed potatoes and gravy, salad, broccoli and delicious drinks. we had two main dishes because there were 11 of us and the chicken was really little, I wanted to make sure that we had enough food. I really worried about them coming over because they have 2 little children that are really rambunctious (they are 8 and 6 years old and yes, dad, I do worry about kids touching our stuff.) Emma and Luke were really good, they didn't touch anything without asking, they played really well with Mckenna and we didn't here from them for the whole evening. Having them over was really nice. We had great conversation, Matt and George watched NFL Football and Maleka, me and the kids laughed and laughed and laughed over the weirdest things. We will definately be doing it again soon!

I hope that you enjoy the pictures, I love the one of Matt giving me reindeer ears!

Christmas Tree hunting
friends
and loving family~ Priceless

Mckenna on stage finally!

Mckenna was so happy that the next day after Kristy's recital was the Dicken's Festival so that she could dance her little heart out, and yet, she said it still wasn't enough!

The cute pink hats the girls are wearing in their hip hop Christmas dance, I made for everyone. I had very sore hands that week since I made 20 hats! But they sure turned out cute for the girls and they loved them....


I was sitting to far back to get really great shots and most because of the movement was very blurry, but this is a look at a few that turned out okay....

Kristy's College Recital or Mckenna aching to dance on stage!

Mckenna attended her Ballet teacher's college dance recital today.
During the middle of the show, Mckenna said, "Mom, I just want to get up there and dance!" This was a performance that a lot of Mckenna's dance team decided to attend and we as mom's went also. It was fun because Kristy is also our neighbor and her sister and brother play the violin with Devin in a quartet that her mom put together as a favor to me, to get Devin to play more....

Kristy is an amazing dancer and we are sad that she will be leaving our studio to attend school at SUU in January. Mckenna is wondering who her new Ballet teacher will be?!
Thanks Kristy for helping Mckenna to have a stronger core and help to realize that she actually likes Ballet! 

Thanksgiving pictures

Turkey! Yummy!
But where is Sandi?
Well, her picture didn't turn out, it was blurry!
Sorry.

Family, TomKat weekend and Men in Black Movie night!

On Sunday Kyler decided that he wanted to watch Men in Black. The kids looked so cute laying down on the blankets that I had to take a picture. During the commercials the channel always gets changed to something else. Since it was the weekend of the TomKat wedding, Spike was playing all day Tom's Movies. So we also watched Days of Thunder. But only a few minutes since it is not a kid movie.

How does everyone feel about Tom & Katie Holmes getting married?
Does it bother you that he married after she gave birth to their baby, do you think they would have gotten married if she hadn't had a baby? Or does anyone even care. I find it very interesting that TVGUIDE channel has covered this for 2 weeks now: the preparations week and the wedding week. How many people have actually watched that channel- I scanned it for a second and then grew bored. Really who cares!
What are you feelings?