Oh, Christmas Tree

 There were several little things that I wanted to blog about during Christmas and just didn't get a chance, so I'm resorting to a list of things that I want to remember. We spent the month of December:

-taking pictures of the kids with my new smart phone (At Ana's request. Multiple requests.)

-making and decorating paper Christmas trees. Some we kept and some we gave away.

-secret santas.

-watching Christmas movies on TV. At the beginning of each week, I scoured the TV for Christmas movies and specials, and then we watched them during the day and for movie nights all month long.Some of the movies we watched were: "The Santa Claus," Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer," "Santa Claus is Comin to Town," "Frosty's Winter Wonderland," "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation," and, "Home Alone 2." If you've seen the first one, you've seen the second. They're pretty much the same.

-being lazy and procrastinating dinner because I was watching Christmas movies with Ana all afternoon

-having Family Home Evenings centered on service, Christ, and the Nativity story.

-drinking lots of hot chocolate with marshmallows

-looking at the amazing bronze sculptures of Christ at the Visitor's Center. Wow. The expressions on some of those faces brought tears to my eyes.

-wearing new Christmas jammies
-reading "The Night Before Christmas" and "Snowmen at Christmas," an early Xmas present for the kids from Grandma Monk

-following Benjamin all over the house to recover stolen Christmas tree ornaments

-visiting Santa at the mall, the library, and our ward party. Santa was busy last month!

-trying my hand at new Christmas treats; making a HUGE mess of the kitchen

-eating so much junk food and sweets that by the time we got to Vegas to celebrate Christmas with my family, Thad and I were already sick of sweets!