our christmas

Top 10 for Christmas 2012 (in order of appearance)


1.  Lucy the elf, what's your favorite color?

 "First we'll make snow angels for two hours, then we'll go ice skating, then we'll eat a whole roll of Tollhouse Cookie-dough as fast as we can, and then we'll snuggle."

"Santa's coming?!! I know him!  I know him!"  

"I'm a human, raised by elves"
"oh, I'm a human, raised by humans."
"cool"

"you like sugar don't you buddy?"
"is there sugar is syrup?"
"yes"
"Then YEES!"

(sorry, i got a little carried away.  lucy the elf actually has no relation to buddy the elf but i couldn't help it.  really, she just dressed up to go to Christmas pre-school)

  

2. Ninjabread men

 

the making of the men...

  

when the fun stopped...

 Our own ninja with a goodie plate.  ya know, cause nothing says Christmas cheer quite like the traditional ninjabread man.

 3.  Caroling
I always enjoy caroling.  But one year a few years ago it was disappointing cause we sang at door after door and nobody was home the whole night and we just went home with all our notes and plates.  This year we sort of hit the jackpot and all 9 of the families we went to were home and we got to go in visit with all of them for awhile.  Although it was sort of marathon caroling - it was so good to catch up with everyone AND at some stops we went away with more treats than we gave.  Which gave us a warm fuzzy feeling ... in our bellies.

4.  Mall attractions

So, we actually ended up going to the mall on Christmas Eve day.  We just needed something fun, inside and close.  I'm sure the mall was slammed with people shopping but there wasn't anyone in the little attractions area.  We decided to try everything they had to offer... cause we were like - what the heck, it's Christmas.

The bungee trampolines

The Carousel

 

Cotton Candy machine

 

The Hurricane Simulator  (on the right)

 

 the photo booth

           

  and we even bought Reese's Pieces on our way out with a quarter.  leave no knob unturned.

5.  Old St. Nick

(these pictures remind me of pics of my siblings and I when I was little at our ward christmas parties.  i never had my hair done and was usually wearing sweats and moon boots.)

6. Bingo for prizes

It's a good thing we have Caleb around for Holidays.  I've never met anyone with so many fun traditions for holidays.   He has all these funny stories about his Grandma and shares her games and traditions with us.   "Bingo for prizes" has "major awards" and "minor awards" all wrapped and some put in little advent calendar cupboards.  We could win flashlight rings, mexican jumping beans, candy, punch balloons, growing sponge capsules and even a ball of goo that you can throw and it sticks to anything...even the ceiling...and then never come down.  I mean, this is some serious fun.










7.   Christmas Eve Nativity

 And Joseph also went up from Galilee....To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.  (look at that tired "great with child" face. Nice job Jane.)

And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes,

And laid him in a manger

 

 And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night....And the angel said unto them, "Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people."

8. Christmas Morning 
Luke picked out a record player for Lucy that plays "A dream is a wish..."  over and over and OVER.  It's really good to see your child excited about giving something (even though technically I paid for it, but...).  And later the paper princesses got to have a dance.

  

 our best gift of all is our pixie gift from Kate!  She made... MADE a little kitchen for Lucy.  It's a Hale tradition to make homemade gifts for their pixie.  She found this at a thrift store and stripped it, painted it and made a little chalkboard top to draw a stove top or whatever else.  It's darling and Lucy loves it.

 9. Les Miserables 

Kate & Caleb watched our kids and let us go watch Les Mis on Christmas day (another Hale tradition).  We had been so excited for this movie.  I loved it so much.  It's such a timeless story that I felt was actually very timely in light of the connecticut shooting.   I felt so uplifted and sort of took home the message that no matter how much hatred and misery there is in the world - you can always be strong and choose good. 






10.  Snow
Luke wanted Snow for Christmas so bad and it actually started snowing Christmas night around 7:00pm - right before he went to bed.  The next day he woke up to snow!  Just a tiny bit but enough.

   

I have no pictures and it definitely does NOT make the top 10 - but both the Wilsons and usguys got some form of the flu this year - with it came chills, aches and whining  (me).  I was sick about 3 days but Kate got it the worst and was sick for about 11 days! So, there was a lot of laying on the couch in blankets during these festivities.  Luckily the kids all got very minor cases.

And that's a wrap up for the good ole year of 2012.