Christmas Eve

We did the traditional Christmas reading of the birth of Christ and had the kids act it out. Here is all of the gang minus one cranky angel who's angel costume was "choking me!"

Sheri played...

Ferrel read...

Angels came...

Shepherds came...

 

Uncle Bill with the angel, wise women, shepherds and Joseph, Mary and baby Jesus!

The Stockings were hung by the staircase with care!!

And 10 little children were in bed without a fuss!!!  Yippee!

Manison on the beach

Ok, I finally got pictures from my sis-in-law Amie so I can post on Christmas, I took 188 pictures she took 1000 so I thought I'd wait to see what she had.  Better late than never!!!  It was the first time our family has been to Santa Barbara.  We usually stay in the San Diego area so we were excited when we found this mansion on the beach to stay at in Montecito.  I'm not kidding about the mansion part-- 7000 sq feet, 7 bedrooms, 9 bathrooms, 3 dining areas, 2 fireplaces, a pool bigger than the one at the Hampton Inn in Flagstaff, a 8 person jacuzzi, and a beach house down on our private beach area with all the ammenities and lots of toys to play with like ocean kayaks, surf boards, boogie boards, and  more.  It was fantastic!  We were there from Monday before Christmas to the Tuesday after.  So I will start my week full of posts with pictures of the house.  It was so nice and we loved it!

Driveway entrance to house--easily fit 4 Yukon XL's and 1 Ford extended cab F350 and about 9 bikes.  The bikes are parked in front of the Koi pond.

Front of house--our bedroom was the top right window and I always thought the bathroom water was on because of the fountain.

Private Heated Pool--Heated!!!

View from the pool to the ocean

Path to pool

View from Beach

Private Beach Area

Steinway Grand Piano--Played daily by Malcolm, Sheri, Helen and Mary

 Front room overlooking the ocean

Worst day of church for Lewis--he's a Sunbeam!!

The time has come, my baby is now a Sunbeam in Primary (3 to 4 years old).  This sounds great but, alas, it was the worst day of church ever for the big boy, no more Nursery (18 months to 3 years old).  Lewis LOVED going to Nursery, he could play with toys, have snacks and play with his friends.  Sure there was a little singing and listening to a story or two about Jesus but it was mostly play time.  Now for the reality check, you turn 3 and they expect you to give up the toys and start learning and sitting in a chair for 30+ minutes at a time.  What a bummer.  No more snacks.  No more toys. No playing with your friends.  Now you and your best buds have to sit still and listen to stories and learn songs and none of it involves playing or toys.  Lewis really didn't like church on Sunday and I don't see that changing for a while! 

The class name Sunbeams comes from this song "Jesus wants me for a Sunbeam"

Jesus wants me for a sunbeam,
To shine for him each day;
In ev’ry way try to please him,
At home, at school, at play.

A sunbeam, a sunbeam,
Jesus wants me for a sunbeam.
A sunbeam, a sunbeam,
I’ll be a sunbeam for him.

Jesus wants me to be loving
And kind to all I see,
Showing how pleasant and happy
His little one can be.

A sunbeam, a sunbeam,
Jesus wants me for a sunbeam.
A sunbeam, a sunbeam,
I’ll be a sunbeam for him.

New Year's Baby

While minding my own business, calmly watching the news on New Years Day, I saw the feature of 1st baby born of the new year with the headline "First baby of 2010 has 8 siblings"

I knew someone about to give birth to #9 but what were the odds?....Imagine my surprise when I saw it was my best friend from high school ringing in the new year with baby #9!!!!  I immediately texted her and she said after 19 hours of labor they did an emergency c-section (her first) and Isabelle was born 2 seconds after midnight.  She was so happy to be interviewed from 8-11 am for every news station after all that!  (There were also some incentives like a spa day, $300 gift certificate from Classy Closets and even a week's worth of catered dinners--how do they feel about cooking for 11?--hmm--she had remembered  her makeup and  had a cute outfit for the baby so why not?!  Go KIMBER!  You are rockin it, especially since you are a month away from 41!!!  Please check out Kimber and family here to see the interview!

We Wish You a Merry Christmas!

Jenkins Cousin Gifts

We opened our Jenkins cousin gifts tonight.  They were all a big hit.  Griffin got Star Wars Legos--a must have for the big guy.  Lewis is all about trains and was thrilled to get 2 new engines!  The girls like webkinz and got 2 each plus iTunes cards--lucky!  They were all thrilled with their gifts and appreciate the cousins sending them out for us! We also got a family gift--a jar full of Family Home Evening ideas.  What a time-saver that will be!  Thanks everyone.

STARWARS LEGOS!

Webkinz and iTunes

FHE Jar

Peek-A-Boooo!

Newest Brace Face

Helen got an early Christmas present from her orthodontist, Dr. Hilgers, yesterday.... braces on her top teeth!  She is soooo not excited and her teeth are killing her today so she is on a soup and protein drink diet for a couple of days.  I told her she should have chosen red and green bands for Christmas but she went with her favorite color-blue.  So if you see her sad face just know she isn't sad just sore!  Merry Christmas sweetie!

Red Crayon

We have some friends who are getting married today--yeah Kristin and Shelby--and my parents offered to watch my children so we wouldn't have to get a babysitter for 8 hours for the wedding and reception which is in Scottsdale. So, last night I dropped off my children with my parents in Camp Verde--a little over 1/2 way to Flag but my parents had so much snow it was better they didn't have to go all the way to Cordes Junction.

So here me and Brad are--childless for the first time in about 2 years and we are really going to party it up with dinner and a movie and maybe a little romance when I got home at 7:30. I just needed to check the laundry since I washed all the bedding from our bed and it sometimes gets bunched up in the dryer and doesn't dry. As I pulled out the white sheets and mattress pad I noticed A-LOT of red. Yes RED CRAYON!!! Red Crayon. RED SWEAR WORD CRAYON!!!! When the sheets were thrown downstairs they must have picked up a red crayon off the floor and saved it for the drying process. So now our dryer had melted crayon all over it and so do the sheets. UGH!! I had a load of clothes in the washer which we were able to take over to our friends for some laundry service and then we went and got some dinner and came back home to party.

1st--Taking apart the dryer. Luckily Brad is super handy and he was able to take it apart so we could get into it to remove the crayon with the crayon.com recommended WD-40 which worked great!

2nd--Clean the dryer. Let's just say there was a lot of lint build up which required lots of vacuuming and wiping down. Next we had to really wipe down the barrel of the dryer with 409 to get rid of all the oil residue from the WD-40 so the next load wasn't covered in oil.

3rd--Putting the dryer back together. Lots of fun but luckily the Internet had detailed instructions on how to take it apart and how to put it back together.

4th--Getting the ReD CrAyON out of my sheets. We went online and found a secret recipe--tide-borax-white vinegar-shout. Just equal parts of each and put it on as hot as your clothes can handle it! I was skeptical but--miracle of miracles-after 2 washes--no more red crayon! Hallelujah!!!

5th--get rid of every crayon in the entire house! I swear Satan created them. I hate them. They ruin walls, carpet and romantic nights for 2!

By now it was 1:30 a.m. and we still had no sheets for our bed so we did what any self respecting parents who were dead tired would do-- we slept in the kid's twin beds. We had had a fantastic time on our 1st night alone in 2 years! Aren't you jealous?!?

Family Photo Shoot

Here is our family in our latest photo shoot. Our friend Beckie took some fab pictures of us and we even found one we liked for our Christmas Card. Thanks Beckie!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! Aren't my kids so cute? I thought so too! We had a great time seeing Santa, Lewis kept petting his beard and saying

"Hi Santa!!! Hi Santa! MY LOVE U SANTA!"

He loved Santa so we had to pick the picture where he looked the cutest but I think they all look great!