Old Fashioned Christmas

 Christmas shopping is done. Christmas cards are all sent. Neighbor gifts are finished. NOW we can focus on just enjoying the season!! Tonight for FHE we started by taking around our neighbor gifts. I wanted to something VERY easy this year. The boys helped me so all afternoon we partially dipped some big pretzels in white chocolate and added some cute sprinkles. Then we packaged them up with some cute buckets and ribbon. SUPER easy and really cute.

After delivering gifts we went downtown to the Museum of Idaho where they hold their annual Old Fashioned Christmas Festival. It's 100% FREE and such a great way to spend an evening together! The boys took their letters that they wrote to Santa and dropped them off in the special mail drop.

Inside they have all sorts of nativity exhibits and gingerbread houses. They also have tons of antique Santa's and beautifully decorated Christmas trees.

We saw some REAL gingerbread houses. Maybe I should find out who made this little number and get their royal icing recipe. I'm sure if I had the right recipe we could throw something like this together in no time. ☺

 Now THIS is the kind of Christmas activity that I have been longing to do! I'm not sure what is going on with me....I'm on some sort of an "old fashioned" Christmas kick lately. I even watched White Christmas, Holiday Inn, and Miracle on 34th Street....for the VERY first time EVER in my LIFE this weekend!

Once again all of this small town stuff must be rubbing off on me.......help me Aubrey! Good thing a trip to Boise is in sight! haha!

LEARN from my mistakes....

Saturday night I tried to sign into my blog and it had totally and completely DISAPPEARED! I was calm at first....thinking there was someone somewhere we could call and get to the bottom of the problem. Little did I know there is NO blogger customer service. My gmail account and blog had been marked as spam and so we changed the password and thought that would fix the problem. NOPE.
There is a "forum" that is so cryptic and confusing and THAT is what is supposed to help you get your blog back. O yeah...and it takes up to 2 days for them to review your blog to make sure you really are a "person." The scariest part was reading about all of the other people out there that this has or had happened to. Some people don't get their blogs back. It doesn't matter if you have a public or a private blog. This happens to TONS of people!

Me and my little ol' family blog...such spammers let me tell ya!

I had a bit of a melt down last night. Seriously.....3.5 years of our lives, GONE? I felt I had lost all my scrapbooks to a fire or something. I couldn't even think about all the hours and memories that had just vanished.

Well, today it came back up. I was as happy as Christmas morning. I have spent the last hour saving EVERYTHING. Let that be a lesson to you all out there...if you love your blog, back it up. You never know when blogger may just shut you down.

'Twas the nightmare of gingerbread house building.......

'Twas the evening of Monday, and all through the house

All the children were antsy to make a gingerbread house.

The candy was placed on the table with care

Everyone hoping there were pieces to spare

The children were no where near ready for bed

Even though mom and dad were tired and pretty much dead.

The mother decided to make her own batter

Of homemade royal frosting to decorate and splatter

And then it all started...the boys started to clash

"This frosting DOESN'T work! This frosting is TRASH!"

Then houses were falling, there was much woe.

I've never made royal frosting....I didn't KNOW!

The crying all started and fits of rage started to appear

Bottom line, the frosting just would not adhere.

The mother tried to fix it she tried to be quick

But Parker was so upset he started to scream and kick

Then the father stood up, he was ready to tame

He shouted and hollered and called them by name

Now Dallin, and Parker and Landon and cat!

You stop it right now....you don't treat your mother like that!

All of the boys continued to bawl

The house building had come to a compete stall

"Get to your rooms...you are NOT choosing the right!"

"You all blew it, now it is time for bed and GOOD NIGHT!"

*Bottom line. I'm buying the stupid KIT next time.

Mountain River Ranch

Last night was absolutely and positively MAGICAL! Nate and I had an amazing time at his work Christmas party up at Mountain Valley Ranch. We started out the night with some hot cider while waiting for the horse sleighs to come and pick us up. We went on a 25 minute sleigh ride through little towns, over bridges and enjoyed all of the cute little light displays.

After the sleigh ride we had a FABULOUS prime rib dinner at the little lodge. Seriously....I've never even SEEN such a huge piece of meat! One of the partners at Nate's law firm is a guitar player and his band performed for us. They were absolutely hilarious and yes Kelsey.....they were totally HOKEY! I loved every second!

At the end of the evening various people were recognized including my husband. Wow. I'm at a loss for words for how incredible the night was...especially when I compare it to some of the Christmas parties we have been to in the past. My husband works for a group of amazing, honorable, and really good people. He loves his job. He is appreciated and respected here. He says over and over again how this is the first job he has ever had where he actually ENJOYS the practice of law.

Once again....I was humbled to tears. We ARE supposed to be here...there is no doubt in my mind. Life is so good. I'm proud of my husband, the hard worker he is. It was another full circle moment for me and I have nothing but a heart full, or actually a heart OVERFLOWING with gratitude.



My little comedian

Mr. Landon things he is pretty darn funny. I have to BRIBE him to give me a REGULAR smile lately!
He is also quite the little jokester. Today he said, "Knock knock mom." Who's there? "An orange!" Then he laughs and laughs and thinks its the best joke in the world.

He's growing up too fast!

Family

I found this ugly family proclamation at the DI for $2 the other day.  I decided it needed a little love...especially since ours broke a few years ago. Nate thought I had gone crazy bringing this nastiness into our house.  

 A little mod podge, scrapbook paper, windex, and spray paint and VOILA! Come on Nate...have a little VISION will ya??

 Tonight we made some cookies. We've made a tradition of making cookies the night of the annual Christmas Devotional. They aren't too pretty but they sure taste good!

Time to snuggle up and enjoy the devotional. Nothing like kicking off the holiday season in pjs with my family listening to the prophet. Grateful for my family.

Christmas Ramblings

Well, it's DECEMBER! We've got advent calendars going throughout the house. We've got paper chains, chocolate doors, Christmas stories a day, and magnet countdowns every where you turn!

The tree is up. And YES....this is the 9th year of the same $30 tree. In annual Christmas fashion, we complained and griped throughout the entire tree building process. Nate and I have agreed that year 10 will be the year of the upgrade tree for us. But for now, we're still putting each branch in and stringing our own lights.

We've got our Swedish lights up. Once again we have neighbors questioning our religion. "So, are you guys Jewish? We saw the Hanukkah candles in the window." 

A couple of years ago Nate's Grandma Whitaker gave us her little Christmas village. She gave it to us the year before she passed away. We absolutely CHERISH this gift. There is no other Christmas decoration that the boys get more excited about. And its nice that the boys are all old enough to know not to TOUCH the village if they know whats good for them. ☺ 

We have no lights on our house. Frankly, I don't think its going to happen this year. We have so much SNOW here it is crazy to me. There is no way Nate is getting up on the snow covered roof and all of the bushes and little trees have been completely covered in snow for weeks! I heard Boise received 8 inches of snow and school was canceled. Nate and I just laughed and laughed. There is probably a foot and a half of snow here and is school closed? NO WAY! Are the streets plowed? HARDLY! The roads are pretty much a huge ice skating rink. Oh...and no one gave is the neighborhood MEMO that here in Idaho Falls everyone has a 4 wheeler with a big plow on the front. Its the only way to keep from spending 2 hours shoveling your walks. Sorry Nate.....just think, you're getting some good exercise! ☺

So, I am juuuuust about done with all of my Christmas shopping this year. I've decided to get it ALL done so then I can focus more on fun activities and making memories with the kids. I'm trying to find ways to help the boys understand the true meaning of Christmas. If any of you have some ideas out there...I'd LOVE to hear them!

Speaking of gifts, I've come to the conclusion that there really is a HUGE difference between dollar store wrapping paper and wrapping paper from Hallmark. Hallmark paper is heavenly. It reminds me of the good old Customer Service days working at the BYU bookstore. I came across some good coupons in my magazines so I was able to snag the Hallmark paper for free this year! SCORE!

I love Christmas! I'm so looking forward to all of the fun things we have coming up in the next few weeks. It's such a magical and special time of year.

Jack Jack on the other hand.....is NOT a huge fan of Christmas: (or at least his Santa hat and collar)

Hey, if we're going to have a cat we have to find a little bit of joy in torturing him a bit right? 

Jack Starnes

Remember Jack the cat from a few posts ago?? Well, Jack is now officially Jack Griswold (yes, we gave him a middle name) STARNES. Yes, we are now officially weird cat people.

Jack kept coming over to our house. Jack was starving. Jack was freezing. Nate and I are softies so we let him in, fed him and kept him inside from the -12 degree temps. Foolish? Probably. But really, we felt we had no other choice. I don't really like animals but I won't sit back and watch one freeze to death.

Last night we talked it over with the neighbors. They said they didn't want Jack anymore. They have two other pets that didn't get a long with Jack and so he needed to be an outside cat. Well, Jack is declawed and has his man parts removed so obviously he isn't holding up too well as an "outdoor cat." He has come over to our house multiple times with scratches and cuts from other animals.
The neighbors said that Jack would probably die from exposure or they were going to take him to the pound. Well, with 3 little boys who ADORE this feline, what were we to do?

So, I guess we have a cat now.

I'm having a deja vu moment here:

"I'll NEVER get married at 19."
"We'll NEVER live in Eastern Idaho."
"I'll NEVER shoot a gun."
"I'll NEVER drive a mini-van."
"We'll NEVER have a cat."

Sometimes I think the big man upstairs has a major sense of humor. ☺

Thanksgiving.....and blowing up our TV.

Thanksgiving was a great success! We actually ended up having James and Sierra join us which we were thrilled about. We moved the table into the family room so we had some more room for our turkey feast.

That night Sierra, Kelsey and I went and did all of our black Friday shopping! As always it was a HUGE hit and we got everything (except for my waffle maker) that we wanted! Good deals, good laughs....SO worth the lack of sleep! Not too much drama this year which was also a plus. ☺

Friday we went up to the foothills of Idaho Falls and Logan taught us how to shoot guns. I can't believe I actually did it and actually enjoyed it! I did cry when first handed the gun. Guns seriously scare me to death.The boys are still talking about how AWESOME it was to shoot a gun. Honestly...what is going on here? The Starnes family is morphing into a bunch of eastern Idahoans??? WHaaaaat?

Here is the video of us shooting the TV (fire and fuel added) that has been apart of our marriage since the beginning. After 9 and a half years it finally decided to die the day before Thanksgiving so we took it up to the mountains and used it as target practice: We really ARE great examples to our kids......uhhhhhh, maybe not. Watch this video...it really is pretty sweet. And yes...that is MY husband doing the little jig at the end!

Awesome weekend....until BYU and BSU killed it for us.