December 2009

December was such a fun month full of parties, shopping, family visitors, and holiday celebrating.

At the beginning of the month, we went to a friend's surprise birthday party. Our kids were with us and had fun yelling out "Surprise!" as the birthday boy entered the room. It was great to hang out with other families in our neighborhood and get to know them better. Plus, I tried a new treat, White Christmas Popcorn, which is my new favorite. (I posted the recipe on this blog recently). Our Ward Christmas Party was fun. All of us met at the church in our best pajamas for a pancake breakfast (served at dinner time). They had a hot chocolate bar, a cookie decorating room, and we sang Christmas carols.

Christmas shopping was time consuming. I tried to get a little bit of shopping done each week when I went out grocery shopping. I had all of my shopping done and gifts wrapped by December 11th, which is my goal every year. It's always nice to have the Christmas shopping and wrapping done. We took the boys on a couple car rides to see the Christmas lights around town. It's fun to hear them "oooh" and "ahhh" over the light displays.

We let the boys open an early Christmas present... Polar Express in 3D. Here are my boys before the starting the movie:

The weekend before Christmas, we had Grandma Hallstrom over for dinner. Later that evening, my cousin, Ryan and his girlfriend (now fiancee), Jessica came for a quick visit. It was fun to see them and chat. The last time I had seen Ryan was when he was 12 years old and I spent two weeks visiting his family in Georgia. Ryan showed me his fancy new digital camera and even let me hold it. (If you know me well, you know that I love cameras. I was secretly hoping that Ryan would forget his camera and that I'd have to babysit it for awhile). Ryan and Jessica are currently students at BYU-Idaho and are engaged to be married in the Seattle Washington Temple this April!

I enjoyed decorating for the holidays. The snowman arrangement above my kitchen cupboards will stay up all winter. Sam bought me these beautiful poinsettias on Christmas Eve.I spent most of the day on Christmas Eve cleaning our house before all of our holiday visitors arrived. My sister, Amy came late on Christmas Eve and spent the next couple of days with us. Christmas was wonderful. It was fun celebrating Christmas for the first time in our house. Amy's boyfriend, Mike joined us for Christmas dinner. We made up my mom's homemade macaroni and cheese and had a couple side dishes. After the kids went to bed, the four of us watched Sam's new movie, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince."

Sam's parents and younger sister, Laura arrived on December 27th. They came bearing gifts. They spoiled us. The boys' favorite gifts were their new walking/growling dinosaur toys and their coloring books and puzzles. Sam and his dad built a combine out of Legos with the "help" of Brian and Tyler. Sam and his siblings bought the Lego combine for Fred's Christmas gift. Sam was very proud of his Lego man that he built. We watched a few movies while they were here, played with the kids and their new toys, played a new game we got called Buzz Word, and ate good food. My favorite meal was my Manicotti Formaggio with Chicken dish I ordered at the Olive Garden. It was too bad that I didn't get to sit and eat it all at the restaurant. Brian and Tyler were super fussy and we were in a rush to go pick up my sister, Emily at the airport. We're so glad Sam's parents and sister were able to spend a few days with us. We can't wait for Sam's parents to move out to Utah.

Emily was here when Grandma Hallstrom had surgery to get her thyroid removed. We went to visit her in the hospital a few hours after her surgery. We brought her flowers and some music to listen to. Grandma's surgery went well and she's home now taking it easy. Emily was a big help with my kids. They loved hanging out with her. Brian nicknamed her "Bud." It was fun having Emily here to celebrate Tyler's birthday. (She was in town for Tyler's 1st birthday too!) On New Year's Eve, Sam went to bed before midnight. Emily was tired and wanted to go to bed too, but I insisted that she stay up with me. She was a good sport and layed on the couch and chatted with me while I made some cards for Card Club. I hope she had fun visiting us even though we didn't get out of the house much.

So now all of our holiday guests are gone. We gave the house a good scrub down and are starting to get back into our normal routine.