We sure had a full house! 12 people in our already too small house made for tight quarters but we had a great time. Family arrived on Saturday the 22nd. My (Brandy) parents, brothers, (Nikki is still in Russia on a mission) and two extra guests: foreign exchange students! Victor from Denmark and Andy from China.
On Sunday the 23rd, we enjoyed church, came home, cooked and relaxed. That night we all joined the Bond family for their Christmas party.
The kids enjoyed a craft. Thanks Amanda and Deanna!
And the kids and adults participated in separate white elephant gift exchange, here is the kids:
The highlight of the night was playing the white elephant gift! I am sure I will never forget Andy's look when he opened a 2 week pill dispenser...wondering what in the world it was and what it did...then to trade it for something else...just to be informed it was a calendar of outhouses! Then watching my mom explain to him what an outhouse was... PRICELESS!
(no pictures...sorry)
Monday we had a crazy day of last minute Christmas shopping, happy meals at McDonalds and in general running around all crazy!
That night we had the joy of Skyping my sister Nikki! It was so stressful leading up to the time...for some reason we had a terrible time getting skype, our computer and the internet to all work at the same time! Isn't she gorgeous!?!
After Skyping Andy took on the task of cooking Chinese food for 12 people! He did a great job and I plan on giving the recipe a go in the next couple weeks. But with a few tweaks of my own...my bacon will be crispy...his was not... and I'm sure my plates won't be as fancy looking as his. He delicately placed shredded cabbage and sliced tomatoes on (most of) the plates. My camera really makes it look terrible but in person it looked much better! It was Chinese Noodles.
Christmas eve we enjoyed watching the pyramid go round and the kids opened a present: the unoriginal pajama gift. (our Christmas traditions)
Christmas was lots of fun! Tons of presents! The highlights: legos, princesses, movies, a tablet for our family to share and new bikes for our 3 oldest kids!
The rest of the day was relaxing and fun.
We went on a bike ride with the kids:
Michael had one great run-into-the-curb wreck, James hit Grandma and Grandpa's parked car (like smack into the back of it and a WOW-where-did-that-come-from kind of look) and Katie fell off a few times. No one was terribly hurt though and we will keep practicing.
That night we had a very intense game of Monopoly... Victor came in first ($1000 every time you landed on his spot...how can you not go bankrupt!?!), Andy second, Robert third...Josh, Joe and I were so far behind who knows who came next! (Joe probably does but he isn't here to remind me)
Robert had the next day off so we planned a fun day. After a few errands we ate lunch and then everyone but me and the kids went to see the new Hobbit movie. They said it was good. (I was had been sick for days so I stayed home and took a much need nap while the kids had rest time.)
That night we went to Dave and Busters. Oh my, what fun! The food was pretty good too!. The kids thought all the games were so great! All of them, including Lilly loved earning the tickets! At the end everyone put the tickets together: 3600! We came away with a full size basketball, a light thing, a frisbee, and a few sudoku rubix cubes!
The next day Robert went back to work and all our company left. But before they did Grandpa had some fun coloring time:
Negotiated with the boys on how much to pay them for the use of their beds. (Michael was pushing for $100...they agreed upon $2 per night per bed, so $10 each. ;) The boys were thrilled!! The girls got a few $$ for giving grandpa a hug!
I was sad to see them go! (PS: My kids stayed with me...they didn't get to go)
These pictures are just for Nikki:
...Mom said gluten free is making me shrink...so watch out!
Just kidding...haha, we are hilarious!
We had so much fun! I can't say that this last week was relaxing or organized but I can say we stayed very busy and had tons of fun!
And if you made it all the way to read this...congratulations! This was THE LONGEST BLOG POST EVER and you survived!
1 comment:
What a fun Christmas! Cute photos!
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