Christmas

We have had a great few weeks with alot of snow finally. It is really frustrating that they don't use salt or alot of sand here. The streets in our sub-division are horrible. I guess I just got so used to living the midwest with all the snow and them being prepared. Here they seem to concentrate on the mountain roads the most.



We finally got the rest of the decorations on our huge tree. We only put up half the ornaments though. We only put up our handpainted ornaments and our special yearly onaments. We have started a tradition of buying one ornament a year that showed something significant we did that year. We were doing really good until this year. We are still looking for a Jeep ornament.




We have had great adventures with Elli (Nick and Anne's dog) When we leave her home alone she seems to bury stuffed animals. We had a packet from the library with a monkey theme. It had a curious george stuffed animal and it went missing. I looked and found one stuffed animal but not george. Julie looked and found elmo's eyes sticking out of the dirt and one other stuffed animal. Still no george. Leif went out with a spade and found nine stuffed animals. Some we don't even remember them having. Still no george. Saturday afternoon george appeared on Leif and Julie's bedroom floor covered in dirt. Elli must have realized we were really mad and it was going to cost $30 for a small stuffed animal.

We spent last Saturday night with Nick and Anne. I let them open presents early since Jay was there. This was Anne's first time where she could really open up presents. They were so cute. We got Nick his first laptop and his first game. Anne got a doll and stroller. She is such the little mama. We got Elli this cool puzzle because she loves squirrels. It was a little tree stump with three squeaky squirrels in it that she had to figure out how to get them out. And of course by Monday they were all buried. After presents we went out to dinner, then we came home and played our new game with Jay. Nick calls it flashlights. We turn off all the lights, they have flashlights and just chase us around. Nick had so much fun and laughing that he threw up when Jay jumped out at him.

We had our Christmas tonight. We are headed up to McCall for Christmas. We did the same thing last year and took all of our presents too. It was a little too much to carry up there. We decided we would open everything but one present. Poor Jay had a rough year this year. My best friend Jasmine and her family got us a dual controlled heating blanket. He had gotton something similar for me but a little smaller. So he returned it. He had given the last few ideas he had to Julie and the kids for my present. So he was out of ideas. He just started buying things and everything else he bought kept being on sale so he kept having to think of ideas. He did a great job but most of it was the wrong size. I felt so bad for him.

Well I really should get to packing up. Of course check out our phanfare website for more pictures. I will try and post McCall pictures as soon as I can.

I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.