December 2016

Cross country meets, holiday Christmas parties, winter band concerts, hunting for Christmas trees, a quick trip to CA and Christmas! That's the month of December in a nutshell. Jason's work had a Christmas party and since we got all dressed up figured it deserved a few photos. Some with flash, some without, some inside, some outside. The wind was REALLY blowing that day, it was unseasonably cold that evening. We had a nice dinner and I got to meet some new people.

Darik performed at several elementary schools with his band and had a ton of fun. I actually chaperoned this event and ended up tending to a student in the choir, who was traveling with us, after she passed out during a performance. After we finished at the three schools we went to the mall to have lunch before returning to Brookside.

We got a new car for the family. The VW bug was not passing inspection and was going to take too much money to do as such. We decided to use the money we would have spent on repairs on a down payment instead and bought a 2015 Nissan Versa Note that had 58 miles on it. It is a stick shift (per the kids' request) and no automatic windows or locks. But it does include hands free phone which is a nice feature for teens and cell phones. It also has 5 seat belts instead of 4 which is a huge plus with only 5 kids living at home.

December 10th we visited a Christmas tree farm not far from our house. We have gone there before and had a wonderful time and this year was no different. We went on a hay ride, had hot chocolate, looked at animals and played around before heading home with our Nativity Tree. (Each year I have two trees, one live and one artificial. The live one is used for my collection of ornaments that are Nativity themed.)

The 12th was another XC meet for Darik. He enjoys running and we enjoy cheering him on. Even with his extra height over his peers he is not the first one to the finish line but he isn't the last one either.

The night's activities continued with the winter concert for Anna and Jaron. They looked very handsome and played wonderfully. Darik's concert was the 15th and we had a great time attending that one also.

The 16th of December was the beginning of an incredible experiment for our family. The kids had school until noon but Jason and I flew out for San Jose, California that morning. We hired a young woman from church to come spend the nights with the kids but she had a job during the day and only came over around dinner time and left the next morning. So the kids were on their own for the daytime. They did a FANTASTIC job of getting along, getting to church, working together and having fun together in our absence. Jason and I visited his aunt and uncle in Santa Cruz Friday afternoon and they graciously let us stay the night with them. Saturday morning we traveled back to the Oakland Temple to be present for "Sister Robinson" aka Monique's wedding at 11. Then we headed south to Modesto for her reception. After her reception we drove one hour north to Madera to visit my grandfather. We arrived late Saturday night and left early Monday morning for our drive back to San Jose and our flight home. It was so great to see family that we hadn't visited with in such a long time and to be present at Monique's wedding. We really came to love our Sister Robinson while she was serving here in Friendswood and to see her so happy marrying her best friend was a real treat. Lunch along the coast Friday afternoon.

The people we saw.

We returned home the evening of the 19th, Caleb had a piano recital on the 20th but I can't find any pictures to prove that. I worked the 21st, 22nd and 23rd. This year was my year for Christmas off so I had the 24th and 25th off. We had a great Christmas Eve and Day with the highlight being our evening Skype session with our missionaries!! As family and parents of missionaries, this is one of the most anticipated days of the year (Mother's day being the other) as we get to either talk to or Skype/Facetime with our missionaries. We had to coordinate our sessions so that we had time individually with each of them and then as a group. Fortunately, they were both in the same time zone and one had access to Skype and the other to Facetime so we were able to make it happen without too many challenges. It was so great to see them and hear from them!

Then back to Six Flags for one last Hurrah! And this is the only picture I took. Notice that neither boy has his glasses on? We're slow but teachable!

On the 30th we took a short trip down to Galveston Island to visit Moody Gardens. They have an extensive light display there along with ice skating! Ice skating is hard to come by down here. There are very few ice rinks that I am aware of. So that was a fun activity. It wasn't very good ice because it was so soft and easily melting. We only had one injury and that was Jason. He hadn't intended on skating with the kids but changed his mind and then fell, in shorts, so the outcome was a little more brutal.

We closed out the year 2016 well.