Christmas Trip

We went to Utah for a little vacation after Christmas. We stayed at a nice hotel in downtown SLC, that was convenient to lots of fun stuff. Salt Lake has a fun children's museum that the girls liked. We also went skiing (see pictures below), shopping, swimming, and visited Temple Square.

Christmas

We had a great Christmas at home in Fruita. A few days before Christmas, we went caroling with a group of friends. Kayla loved running up to doors and surprising people with a treat and a song.

Kayla's school party included more caroling at a local bank and then back to the classroom for a visit from Santa. Kayla and Chloe clutched on to one another in fear when Santa arrived. They are both terrified of him.







We spent Christmas eve at home reading the Christmas story, eating a special dinner, and baking sugar cookies for Santa. Chloe was liking the frosting!






Christmas morining we woke up to a room full of presnets.Some favorites included anything horse-y for Chloe and anything crafty for Kayla, as well as goldfish (we started with 5, but are down to 2) and a Sponge Bob video game. Andy liked his new jacket. Aunt Gina made some dress up clothes for the girls that were also a hit. (Why Chloe won't wear shirts with dress up skirts is the big question. She is topless most of the time around the house.) We went to Christmas dinner at the Gibb's new house. The food was excellent as was the company. We were only able to stay a short while as Chloe was not feeling well. It turned out that she had an ear infection and strep throat.

Winter Sports

One of our annual Christmas traditions includes sledding at Old Powederhorn on Christmas Eve with a group of friends. As you can see a good time was had by all, including Henry and Gracie.

A few days after Christmas, we headed to Utah for a mini-vacation. Kayla got to try skiing for the first time! After dealing with impossibly long lines for rentals, lessons, lost gloves, etc., Kayla was settled into her lesson, Chloe was in daycare and Andy and I could enjoy a few hours of skiing alone. Despite all of the hassle and expense, we all had fun and it made us realize what a sacrifice it was for our parents to take us skiing when we were kids. Thanks mom and dad!! Despite temperatures hovering just above zero and near white-out conditions, Kayla loved skiing and had more fun than she thought was possible. A highlight was riding up to the top of the mountain on the gondola. Look how deep the snow is... We were at Snowbasin and we can't wait to go back, hopefully in some nice weather so we can get better views of the mountain.

Christmas Spirit

We have been doing lots of fun Christmas-y stuff lately. Unfortunately, I have not had my camera for all of it, but here are a few highlights:

1. Ward Christmas party - pancakes! Andy got to take the girls all by himself, because I had to work.
2. Fruita Light Parade - the kids had a great time watching the lighted floats and collecting candy. It was raining pretty hard, but we were lucky to have a front row seat in cozy back of our car under the tailgate.
3. Annual Christmas party - we got to host the party this year. Lots of fun white elephant gift and good food, friendship, and laughter.
4. Christmas childrens concert and symphony which featured an amazing magician.
5. Painted some holiday things at a paint-your-own-pottery place.
6. Made lots of Christmas treats that the girls loved delivering to all of our friends and neighbors. I think they really got a kick out of the "giving" part of Christmas. It was so fun driving around at night looking at the lights, listening to Christmas music, and dropping off the treats.
7. The first snow. Yes that's a picture of the girls jumping on a snow trampoline (don't freak out Mom!)
8. My birthday extravaganza - some friends took me out for a pedicure. It was the most relaxed I've been in a long time. A bunch of friends also took me to lunch. Today, my actual b-day, I spent with my family. We had a nice dinner at a chinese/japenese restaurant. Kayla surprised us by eating a whole tuna sushi roll herself. Chloe was obsessed with stopping at Sam's Club after dinner to buy me a cake. We started home, hoping she would forget. As soon, as we got on the highway, she realized we weren't stopping at Sam's and she had a tantrum. We had to stop at City Market and they picked out a cute snowman cake for me. What's a birthday without cake and icecream? Chloe, with her insatiable sweet tooth, is a girl after my own heart!

I'm sure we'll have many more fun things in the weeks to come! Stay tuned.