The start of Holiday Season

Thanksgiving

This year we had Thanksgiving with Nana and Papa.  We split up the cooking responsibilities and the amazing thing is it was all super yummy and it wasn't a killer day!  I love homemade pies but this year Smith's had a killer deal on pies - so we had 4 different pies for 8 people!!  I know I made the turkey - it wasn't fancy but it was super moist and best one yet!  My mom made her famous stuffing and all my boys were crazy about it.  See that big bowl of stuffing on the table?  That wasn't even half of what she made - so we enjoyed stuffing for the next week!  It was a lovely and very low-key day.  I love having family close to me!  I love them SO much!

Christmas Parties begin!!

First weekend of December we attended the BYU President's Christmas party for faculty and staff.  This has been a family tradition since Shayne was a baby - and I think we've only missed 2 of these parties in the 15 year of marriage.  One of these days I'll do a post with all the pictures through the years - I've been dreaming about it for years and eventually I'll get to it!

There's always a craft and the boys enjoyed decorating their own rubix cube - they kinda fell apart within the day - but hey, the coloring part was the best part!

A surprise Christmas party

Later that night - Grandma and Grandpa played a special role at their church party as Santa and Mrs. Clause!  We snuck into the party and onto the stage at the end and it was a great little surprise for Santa to have his Grandkids on his lap!  (Grandma had told me the details and we kept it our little secret)  Aren't they the cutest Clause couple ever?!?!

Preschool and China

This year I am part of a co-op preschool with Skyler.  Each of the mom's take a turn doing two days of preschool with a theme we decided at the start of the year on a 5 week rotation.  I've really enjoyed this preschool group.  When I did it with Danny for one year I promised myself to not do it again - I really struggled with it, but this year has been different.  Mostly the fact that the curriculum is whatever I want it to be has changed my perspective and expectations.  This was one of my favorite days I have done this year and I just had to share a couple pics - we learned about China.  I gave them noodles and chopsticks for their snack (that took a while to eat) and we built the Great Wall of China with sugar cubes.  I don't recommend hot glue guns with preschoolers - it was kinda scary - but we survived.  The walls were awesome and it's so funny how they were each so different just as different as the kids are from each other!  We had a great time!