Christmas 2010

So rather than trying to do a post for everything we did this month, I am just going to do one GIANT post to highlight a little of everything. We had fun with our calendar, but I didn't take pictures of everything, and some of the days we had to skip due to the general business of our lives. so here is our Dec in a nutshell!

We made Hot Chocolate spoons to stir our hot chocolate on a cold night. Above are the spoons, and below is us enjoying the creamy, chocolatey goodness.


We made these fun foam marshmallow snowmen from Oriental Trading. We agreed next year, however, we are using real smores ingredients rather than foam, so we can eat them up!!!


We made angels with CD wings. Here is the link to the craft idea.

Tyson had his first Musical Mustangs program "Melton the Warm Hearted Snowman"

We went to Grandpa Rick and Grandma Debbie's the week before Christmas for the Larsen family Christmas party. It is so great that everyone could be there. The cousins all acted out the nativity (which was a nightmare to try and get pictures. This is honestly the best one I have) and we got to open presents too! Thanks Grandpa and Grandma!

We made gifts for our teachers -- Cookies in a Jar

We made ginger bread houses and were so excited to each get to make our own!!!!
Brennen's house.

Kaden's house

Aubree's house

Tyson's house

A few days before Christmas eve, we got a TON of snow, so on Christmas Eve, we went with our friends the Timothy's up to Constitution Park to do some sledding.
Kaden and Carsten climbing the hill.

Tyson ready to roll!

Brennen's getting cold!!!!

Aubree trekking back up!

Of course on Christmas Eve, we have to decorate cookies for Santa! (And yes, this is really what Brennen wore. He has to wear a bathrobe and a hard hat every day.)



Cambree just likes eating the frosting!!!!
Christmas Eve, we had our friends the Butchers over for Christmas Eve dinner and then we acted out the Christmas story with them. Mom forgot to take pictures though.

Mom was able to find matching pajamas for the boys and matching pajamas for the girls this year! How fun! Even mom and dad got matching pajama pants, although we don't take pictures of that!

Kaden read everyone "The Night Before Christmas" before we all headed off to bed.

Christmas morning was a lot of fun and everyone got what they wanted along with some surprises! Here is Brennen in the midst of the Christmas chaos with his new Woody and Buzz!

Here are the kids sitting in their new bean bag chairs playing their new Wii games.
We hope every one had a Merry Christmas just like we did and we wish everyone a Happy New Year!

O Christmas Tree

I promise I haven't forgotten about my 25 days of Christmas. This past week has been crazy, and so this weekend we have been playing catch up. I will start posting on those again tomorrow.
This is our Christmas tree. It's not much, but I love it so much! Each ornament tells a story of our lives and our family. I never really wanted a big elaborate tree, just a little homemade tree with ornaments made by my children. And now that is what I have!

Day 6 -- Reindeer Cupcakes

Make a yummy treat that looks like one of Santa's helpers.



I got this idea from "Family Fun" magazine. Here is the link.

This is Cambree. She just had fun eating the frosting.

Day 5 -- Nativity Puzzle

Can you figure out this Christmas puzzle?

The first Sunday in Dec is always the First Presidency Christmas Devotional for our church. I wanted my kids to watch it, but I also know they would have a hard time sitting still. So tonight's activity was this puzzle they could do while listening to the Devotional. I found the puzzle here . We didn't do the scripture part of it, because we have another Scripture countdown we are working on with our family scripture study, but the puzzle was a lot of fun for the kids.

This is actually the puzzle that 6 year old Tyson assembled himself!

Day 4-- Santa

Go and see Santa Claus today! Then come home and write him a letter to make sure he remembers what you want.

Day 3 -- Snowman Gloves

Is there snow on the ground?Make some snowmen out of gloves!


These are kits I bought out of Oriental Trading. They have some fun cute stuff there. i love how everything is already cut out and all you have to do is glue them together.

Day 2 -- Star of David

Tonight is the 2nd night of Hanukkah. Makea Star of David.



I do these every year in preschool, so maybe this was kind of cheating, but any opportunity to pull out paint works for my kids. I put the stars together using craft sticks, then let my kids go to town with paint and glitter. I planned to teach them a little about what Hanukkah is, but after a glitter accident and a meltdown, it just didn't happen. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day.

Dec 1st -- Marshmallow Snowflakes

Welcome to the 25 fun days of Christmas. Make white marshmallow snowflakes to hang on the tree.

So I had awesome directions to make these, but my kids all wanted to do their own thing. As Kaden so wisely pointed out, "No 2 snowflakes are alike Mom."




By the way, not one of these made it to the tree. They were just too yummy not to eat!

Advent Calendar

I am so so excited about this project I have been working on, that I have to blog about it. I am so not a crafty person by nature. As hard as I try, it's just not me. But I saw this idea on parents.com and thought I would love to do something like that with my kids. Each day of December there is an envelope (which I made look all crafty!) and inside each envelope is a fun craft or activity to do together as a family. I hung it on the wall last night after i finally got it finished (it took way longer than I thought) and when the kids woke up this morning I told them what it was and they are now so excited for tomorrow (Dec 1) so we can start. I will (hopefully) post each day with the craft or activity that we do, because I am so being prideful over this my crafty adventure!

Jazz vs Hornets

We were lucky enough to get to go to the Jazz vs Hornets game the night before Thanksgiving. We were clear up at the top, but the kids don't seem to care! They love going to the game and they all have fun yelling and cheering for the Jazz! The team played awesome and beat New Orleans 105 - 87. We love it when they win!
It was fun to take Grandpa and Grandma Guymon with us and even Cambree got into it! If we said, "bad call" she would ball up her fists and make an angry face! It was cute!