Holiday Goings-On

Whew! We have been very busy around here, but I am going to try and give an abbreviated version of what we have been doing- while Emme is sitting on my lap! Yikes!

Here is cutie Emme the Sunday after we put up the tree. Never again will I try to decorate with all the kids at home. We worked for two days to have the whole house all clean, so that we could have a fun day of decorating and then make cookies. But it was terrible!! Alex kept going behind me and undoing everything and the other kids were pulling out everything from the boxes. I was rather cranky the whole time and have decided that it would be a nicer memory for the kids to come home from school and be all excited that Mom decorated while they were gone. Rather than, "I remember decorating with my Mom every year. And she was always so mad!" Lesson learned. Sometimes your "vision" has to be re-adjusted for reality.

Another lesson- Thanksgiving Eve. After decorating, the next day we were going to ring in the holidays with a Christmas movie and popcorn and hot chocolate. I wanted it all to be so nice and the house all clean, especially since the next day everyone was coming to our house for Thanksgiving. By the end of the day, I felt overwhelmed and the house was a mess! I felt so discouraged, that once again, no matter how hard I tried, it wasn't what I wanted it to be. But, I walked away from all the mess, we pulled the couch up close and Danny made a fire, we had hot chocolate and popcorn and watched Mickey's Christmas Carol. And guess what? It was so fun! In fact, afterwards Tristan kept saying, "That was so fun!!" The lesson learned this time- just because it isn't perfect to you, doesn't mean it isn't wonderful to the kids. They really weren't worried about the sink of dishes anyway.

So here is a picture of us as we got under way.

Alex being Santa for Alaina. He wanted people to sit on his lap so badly. And Alaina really took it seriously and thought about it when he asked her what she wanted for Christmas.

Thanksgiving was super fun, relaxed and pleasant. Lots of food, lots of talking, afterwards we watched Jeopardy episodes and laid around. Haley and Dallin came for dessert, and we were all deliciously lazy.

 

See how big Irelyn is? I am going to put on pictures of her right away. She is changing so fast!! 

Ward Christmas Chalet- Emme and Josh hugging beforehand. The best part of the Chalet was- I wasn't in charge of anything. And I was so glad. :)

Christmas party at the Gables. Alex cornered Santa and sang Christmas songs to him. Santa was very accommodating and Alex was very happy.
Their party was great and I wish I had gotten more pictures! Lots of delicious food and singers and Santa and great decorations. I was grateful that we got to go.

Silly Alex. He found a way to combine his two favorite holidays, Halloween and Christmas.

 The kids had over two weeks off for Christmas. They don't go back until this Tuesday. It is really hard to take all 5 kids places by themselves, but we can't just stay at home all the time! So I tried to take them all to the mall to see Santa. It was..okay.... until the end, when I swore I would never take them all somewhere by myself again! But, we did see Santa! (Tristan is behind the poinsettias.) 

Well, this takes us to Christmas. I will stop for now so that you can breathe. But brace yourself, Christmas pics to come soon!! I know you can hardly wait!!

Kattie wedding pics

Here are a bunch of pictures from Kattie's wedding! Sorry they are so late! 

I will let the pictures speak for themselves. 

By the way, it was an amazing, beautiful wedding, pretty much what I wanted my reception to be like, and an amazing couple. I'm so happy for them!!

These are all in totally random order. Enjoy!

Identity

  Doesn't it make you feel weird when something that you think of as an innate part of who you are, is called into question?? Like, if you usually feel confident and someone makes you feel inferior, for no logical reason. Or if you have always thought of yourself as a kind person, and suddenly someone you always kind of looked up to is mean to you, and treats you like you did something really awful to them.. It is disconcerting to realize how shaky your own identity is, and that it is so dependent on feedback from others!

  I am just finishing a book, and it follows POW's in WWII and it is amazing the ramifications of having had their basic sense of worth and dignity diminished for so long. Inflicting humiliation and degradation has always been the most powerful factor in breaking people down.

  It makes me look differently at all the people in the scriptures who suffered so much for so long. It wasn't only the physical sufferings, but the mental and emotional toll.

  I would like to be more like that. Shaken less easily by others, more sure of who I am. The odd thing is, I thought I was.

  BTW- Kattie wedding pics to come soon! (And only 3 months late!!)

Baby pictures!!

I may be two months behind, but our baby is here!! She is such a cutie, sweet baby and all I want to do all the time is snuggle with her and curl up and sleep next to her and hold her.

She was born about 45 minutes after we got to the hospital and the doctor barely made it there in time. Good thing, too, because I wasn't waiting!!

She was born with with very loud lungs, but she doesn't really cry at all now. In fact, every night we can tell when she is ready for the night and Danny wraps her up really tight and puts her in her car seat and rocks her. Once she is asleep, she sleeps until 5 or 6 am, which is wonderful!!!

The kids are loving having her and she loves them, too and gives them lots of smiles, even if being around them sometimes means a bonk in the head. 




Look, here she is, already crying at Alex. It's like she knows......

Here she is sleeping in my bed at the hospital. I just love having them snuggled next to you. Especially when they are as big as she was!! 

 

When Tristan first saw her, he was so sweet and started singing "You Are My Sunshine" to her spontaneously. I think for him, it was the only way to express his emotions.

Emme is sooo baby obsessed, even before the baby was born. Now she just has a real baby, too. But she likes to love, love, love- hit! So we have to keep a close eye on her. Alaina is so motherly and now she also nurses all of her stuffed animals. So, of course Emme does, too. She drops things like small toy spiders, down her shirt and says, "Baby!" and then makes sucking sounds.

This was our first week back to church. We were doing pretty great, and then Danny found Emme in the sink, in her dress, with the water running. Then we were a little late.

Our little baby is already two months old, and now I need to put up newer pictures of her! Sometimes it is pretty interesting with 5 kids, and a little crazy with a newborn baby, but gosh, there is something so heavenly about a baby in your home.

I should probably mention, too, that we are calling her by her middle name, Irelyn. I swore I would never do that again after having Alex go by his middle name, but as she has gotten bigger her hair has gotten redder and she just looked more and more like an Irelyn. And it sounded right, like it fit in our family.  Mmm... just looking at this picture almost makes me want to go wake her up and hold her. Almost.....   :)