The Beginning of Christmas....

On December 1st there was an advent calendar hung 

 and Santa's lap sat upon (at the ward Christmas breakfast).  

And then on December 2nd our ELF arrived.  He was a day late because he went to our old house!  He didn't know we'd moved, as was explained in his note. :)

The ELF made his way around our house and was found in some sneaky places, including in the cupboard eating graham crackers and milk, in the Christmas tree, eating chocolate from a gingerbread house, and hanging in the boys' room with a paper and pencil in hand after a rough night of not going to bed for the babysitter. :)

The advent calendar brought new activities for the boys each day, one of which was making paper snow flakes.  This was a HUGE hit!  I think I went through an entire pack of paper because of it, but it kept Christian entertained for hours over many different days.  

We made paper snowflakes and decorated their room with them one day.

And the next day the activity was to make snowflakes and EAT them!  So we made them out of tortillas and baked them with butter and sprinkles on top...YUM!!

FAVORITE PIC!

On another day the advent calendar had us painting little trucks for this year's round of Christmas ornaments.  Owen loved the painting part!

Merkley Family Party doing Jack Horner Pie

And the rest of the month brought activities such as gift making, gingerbread house making, story reading, gift opening, service giving, party attending, Christmas card mailing and opening, treat delivering, and more.  And Christian even had his first Holiday sing-along at school that Ethan, Owen and I went to.  So fun!  And for the most part I have no pictures of these because my camera has gone AWAL.  And Jake has put a $4 bounty out for it if anyone finds it. :)  I figure it's either in our house or at the dump.  The last time I had it was Christmas afternoon.  :(

But it was a fun and exciting December.  I cannot believe it has come and gone already.  I am so sad!  We have had so much fun.  I cannot wait for next year!

Waiting

So grateful for a pirate ship play house and free popcorn when we have to wait 2.5 hours to get new brake pads.  These two boys were troopers!

Happy Birthday Melissa!

Melissa had her golden birthday, so naturally we went out for frozen yogurt!  :)

Christmas Tree Hunt 2012

We had a great Christmas tree hunt this year and came home with the most beautiful tree yet!  It was great and successful for a few reasons:

1. We drove in!  And didn't have to hike through knee deep snow across a ginormous field! Our van got stuck momentarily, but we fared all right. 

2. Owen napped at the fire in Aunt Camille's arms while we hunted for the tree

3. Christian and Ethan experienced their first sled run on a big hill and couldn't stop talking about it!  Watching and listening to Ethan tell about how he rolled and rolled and loved it was priceless.  Unfortunately the sledding lasted only a few runs because there were a few too many trees to crash into.

4. Our tree has a double tip.  Pretty cool.

5. Roasting marshmallows and eating s'mores is always good. 

Owen, not such a fan of the snow 

Love this pic

In front of our tree before it was cut

Three three tree-choppers

Owen was much happier after he woke up!

This roasting business in overrated

Speaking of Thanksgiving....

Christian made this turkey as a homework project.  We took a picture before we finally recycled him.  :)  Brothers joined in, of course.  And Christian insisted that I took a picture of the BACK of the turkey too, so we wouldn't forget his name, "Colorful Turkey."  Christian decorated and named the turkey all by himself.  He was definitely the most colorful of them all in the hall!  Cute.

Another cute school paper Christian brought home.

This was our family night lesson at the beginning of November and we added things throughout the month.  It stayed on our fridge all month.

We also did an ABC thankful game on Thanksgiving Day on our drive to Huntsville, which takes an hour.  We each took turns saying something we were thankful for for every letter of the alphabet.  So everyone said an A word, and then we moved on to B and everyone said a B thing they were thankful for, and so on.  It was a lot of fun and we got some really great things we are thankful for and funny ones too.  :)  Here is an incomplete list:
A: Arches National Park
B: Baseball
C: Christian
D: Daddy, Diego (Ethan's), Division 1 Athletics (Jake's)
E: Education (Christian's), Eternal Life, Ethan
F: Family
G: Gospel
H: Happy! (Ethan's), Hot wife :), Hiking
I: Intestines (Jake's)
J: Joy, Jazz, Job, Jake, Jesus
K: Kisses, kinematics (Jake's)
L: Love, Laughter
M: Mommy, Merkleys, Mrs. Hokanson, Mountains (Ethan's)
N: Night time (Ethan's)
O: Owen, Ocean, Outdoors
P: Popcorn!, Papa (Christian's), Potty, Poop (Ethan's)
Q: QUIET (Mommy's)
R: Rizzo, Rocky Shores, Reading (Christian's)
S: Simon, Scriptures, Salmons
T: Testimony, Temple, Technology
U: Utah
V: Velocity
W: Wallsburg, Waterfalls
X: x-tra long kisses :), x-cellent kiddos
Y:YOU
Z: Zoo

Cousins for Thanksgiving!

Over Thanksgiving Peter and Lindsay and their family came to visit for a few days and it was SO FUN to have them here!!  We wish they lived here. :)  But luckily they are now within driving distance!  They have two boys, Joey and Kimball, and it was so fun to have all the cousins together.  We went to the zoo on Thanksgiving Eve, had Thanksgiving together and even had a Los party, with all the Los Hermanos fixins!  On Thanksgiving we spent the day in Huntsville and the cousins played and played outside together, and built a really cool fort out of sticks!  We loved having you guys here!  Come back soon! :)

Thanksgiving Feast at Grandma Froerer's in Huntsvile

Huntsville....ahh, the beauty.
Grandma Froerer's house in the brick one in the distance

Christian, Ethan and Kimball

Los Party!

a cousin dance party, I think

Kitchen Hats

"Look, Mom!  Now the bees can't get me!"

 "Hat! Too!"

 SWITCH!!