December Happenings.

I love the holiday season! We had a fun and busy month full of Christmas activities.  Here is a bit of what happened during our December.

 Norah found the Christmas tree and was constantly at the bottom reaching and grabbing for anything she could get a hold of.

 We always love having Andrew over on Thursdays. Today's activity was making 'Santa' handprint ornaments.

 Lincoln's new favorite sleeping position.

 Getting kisses from under the mistletoe. I don't think Norah approved of this one from Daddy!

 We love having a fire but haven't had one as much this year because of Norah and her curiosity with it.  So when we have one night we were sure to break out the marshmellows and make some smores.  Yum.

We needed some pictures for our Christmas card, so her are a few from our spontaneous photo shoot.  I love my kiddos.

We were lucky to be hammered with a white December- well at least a white week in December. It started snowing in the morning and kept coming and coming and coming! I love the snow here in St. George because I know it isnt going to last so we enjoy it while we have it.  Lincoln had a great time playing and loved building our snowman.  Adam missed out on all the fun because he had headed to Vegas to watch a wrestling tournament but he found out what the storm had done when he was on his way home and got stuck in the Gorge because of all the snow, ice, and cold!  He ended up spending around 6 hours stuck in the middle of the gorge only after he had to be turned around and sent back to Mesquite.  I-15 had been shutdown both ways due to ice and accidents. He got a hotel for the remaining hours of the night and was lucky enough to make it back the next day around noon and make it to church with us at 1.  So much for his quick trip to Vegas. 

When it first started snowing Lincoln looked out the window and exclaimed, "Mom it is raining Snow!" too cute. He was pretty enthralled with it.

 Here is our little snowman.  I am def. a little rusty on my snowman building because about a hour after we had built him he had toppled over and was just a heap snow on the ground.  It was funny because the next day everytime someone asked Lincoln what he had done in the snow he would say, "I built a
snowman but it fell over."

 I had to take a picture of the snow at night with our Christmas lights because this is not a sight you see hardly ever!  (and you can see our pile of snow that was once our snowman).

 Lincoln wanted to go out and play in the snow more but I didn't want to take Norah in it too much.  So I told Lincoln he could stay right in front of the window and play while Norah and I watched him from the window.  They liked being able to interact with each other from the inside and outside.

The middle of Dec. we headed up to South Jordan to celebrate an early Christmas with all the Butterfields. We had a blast and Lincoln LOVED playing with all his cousins.

 Norah managed to find Grandpa and Grandma's tree as well-- and do some destroying of it as well.

 We braved the COLD and headed to Temple Square with Grandma, Rachael, Bella, Gabi, Olivia, and Mario.  We loved seeing all the lights, the Christ, and the nativity!

 It got so so cold. Norah was lucky to get to cuddle up with Dad!

Grandma with Boston and Norah!

 When we got back from Northern Utah, most all the snow melted and were left with a ton of wet leaves! It had finally got cold enough that all the leaves had finally fallen! So we thought we better get them cleaned up. So a couple of days before Christmas this is how we spent our afternoon! Raking and jumping in leaves.

 Lincoln had to get his little lawn mower out as well.

 The weekend before Christmas we also went out to Tuacahn and saw the Live Nativity and Santa Claus.

Norah was pretty oblivious to Santa. She didn't care either way what was going on.  

 Lincoln on the other hand had ZERO interest in sitting on Santa's lap.  This is as close that he would get--- safe in the arms of Dad- but after we were done with Santa Lincoln started wining saying that he wanted to go sit on Santa's lap and tell him what he wanted for Christmas. I said we would could go sit on his lap again but as soon as we went over there Lincoln decided against it--- it was all talk!

The Thorleys were here from Virginia for a few weeks and Jordan was down from Provo and we LOVED having them all here. So we had a fun Christmas Party were we all had to dress up in some way, played fun Christmas Minute It to Win It games, a money game, ate, and just had a fun time being crazy.  

All the grandkids(Channing, Jackson, Henry, Claire, Isaac, Lincoln, Norah, Rylee, and Andrew)

 Hanging out!  Izzy in her awesome Christmas attire!

 Norah was our little Mrs. Claus!

This was one of our favorite games---Making reindeer antlers with balloons and panty hose. It was hard(for at least my team-we totally Lost). we mostly had fun just wearing the antlers after the game.   

 Heidi, Izzy, Erin, and Jackson.

 Rylee, Jackson, Claire, Henry

 I also made a tape-treat ball that the kids could rip apart and get the treats out of.  A great activity to keep kids entertained and quiet for a bit.  Note to myself though is to not make it so hard to get apart when you have 2 year olds participating.

 Jordan was the lucky winner of our Money gambling game and ended taking home the jackpot of $36!  We each had to bring $3 dollars and played a fun dice game--- Jordan also had a pretty sweet Christmas sweater(although he had taken it off by this point).

Whitney, Claire, Norah, Jordan and Rylee.

On Christmas Eve afternoon we went to met up with Dad after he got off early from work and had some Frozen Yogurt at Menchies! Yum- This may be a new tradition for christmas eve day! 

Lincoln had to get every last drop out of it!

Christmas Eve we headed to Pops and Nanas and had our traditional Christmas Eve Dinner and Nativity. Lincoln was a shepherd and Norah an angel.

The 3 troublemakers (Andrew, Lincoln, and Channing)

Nana and Pops got all the grandkids these adorable Christmas jammies.

Lincoln couldn't resist showing off his cute little bum.

Christmas Morning- Santa came and we had a pretty relaxing and chill morning.

Norah is on her way to becoming a concert pianist with her new Piano.

 Lincoln loved his take apart plane.

Practicing already.

Early morning Christmas nap---

Lincoln was pretty thrilled about his train set as well.

Christmas Day Night we headed up to Pine Valley to the cabin and had fun with all the cousins-- doing their gift exchange.

The next day we did some sledding behind the rhino! Lincoln loved it all.  

Uncle James with Lincoln and Channing.

I think they had the most fun just driving around in the Rhino.

Norah had to join in on the fun as well.

Here is our Christmas Card for the year! 

A few days after Christmas Uncle Jordan and Pops cleaned out the manure from the barn. Whenever Lincoln sees anyone in the backyard on the tractor he insists on going out!  Lucky for him he usually ends up getting a tractor ride out of it! Little boy heaven!

We had a fabulous December- mostly enjoying time with all of our families!