Girls

I love these girls!!!

Cornice Project

Robert and his Dad (Papa) like to work on projects together.  After Christmas, Robert decided to use his Dad's help to redo the main window area in our Living Room.  I bought new curtains for that room about 3 years ago, but it was one of those projects where one thing led to another and then to another.  In order to hang the curtains the way I wanted them, the cornice needed to be extended and we weren't sure how to do that.  Well, Papa knew.  Let's just build a new one from scratch. 

One trip to Home Depot and $90 later, Robert and his Dad got to work. 

By lunchtime, they had a cornice built from individual pieces of molding and I started painting some of the attachment pieces.  Robert's Dad  (Dan or Papa to the girls) taught high school Woodshop for years, so he's pretty much an expert at this stuff.  I love it!!!

Cornice Complete

Look at that amazing craftsmanship!  Thank you soooo much Dan and Robert.!

A new cornice and drapes.  An extra Christmas present.  Thank you!

Christmas

Oh the excitement of Christmas morning!

Emi opening her first of many 'pig paraphernalia'

Brenna finds a Panda Pillow Pet under the tree.  Oh the joy!

Lindsay takes great pleasure in buying gifts for others.  Here she watches with excitement as Aubrey opens one of her gifts from Lindz.  This is truly the joy of giving.

These are the tender moments I treasure.

Em with more pig paraphernalia, oh, and there was still more to come.

Lindz with her bracelet from Mike and Katherine and the boys.  The older girls are starting to get into jewelry.

Grandma Miller opening up a present from Mike, Katherine, Bobby, and Christopher who are in Illinois.

Kayla with a little tote bag from when all 4 of us placed in a race.  Many of Kay's gifts were things she could use on her trip to Europe this summer.

Another gift from Lindsay to Aubrey.  She loves the Longhorns and Bivo the bull.

Robert with Papa sporting his new TDAmeritrade jacket.  That's a good looking duo.

Aubrey opening her rip stick.  She's already a pro at it.

Lindsay opening a special note delivered via stuffed animal pouch.  It is the address to her 1st email account.

Another moment of pure joy.  I love the gifts of experiences and she will use this one a lot. 

Christmas was a great day and somewhat overwhelming with all the new treasures.  We decided to wait a day before the kids opened one final present.  It was a brochure that read:

             Bon Voyage Miller Family with a picture of Mickey and Goofy


The girls just sat and devoured the brochures.  We are so excited to set sails again, and this time with some of our favorite friends, the Disney crew.

These are the days dreams are made are.

On the EVE

Christmas Eve is a special day to us. It is a day wrapped around traditions and symbolism that bind our family together. This year we were able to share this special day with Papa and Grandma. The festivities began with ice skating, which is where our story began. Robert and I went ice skating on our 1st date -March 15, 1991. Even though it was almost 20 years ago, it is still a clear memory in our minds. 

For dinner we usually have cold cut sandwiches on 'Wreath Bread'.  This is a tradition from Robert's family.  The wreath represents eternal life and the endless love of the Savior.  Luckily I have found a bakery here that makes a red and green wreath bread, but you have to order earlier.  This year we had a Candy Cane shaped loaf, or Shepherds Staff as we called it, because the Wreath bread was gone. Lesson learned. But we still remembered our wreath bread and dedicated our sandwiches to the memory of the Shepherds.

Showtime.  Time for the annual Nativity.  In the past we have used finger puppets, but this year we were able to act it out with costumes my friend Becky had sent us, while Grandma read from Luke II.   Robert and I were Mary and Joseph, while the girls were shepherds, wise men, animals, and an angel (yes Em, you were an awesome angel). Papa videoed the production and we laughed at laughed when we saw it.  The acting was top notch, but we had some costume issues with the head pieces.  I guess all the pics of that ended up on Papa's camera.

Jammie time.  Everyone got to open their new jammies.  It's always nice when they like them and they all fit. Yes!  Somehow Mom and Dad didn't get in the picture either. (It was a rough camera day)  We had pretty cute jammies too.

From here, the night started to wind down.  Time to read about Rose and her friends in the "Christmas Orange".  The story was especially meaningful  this year as we could think about our visit to the orphanage in Mexico earlier in the year.  It put real faces to these orphans and their lives.

Luke II. We continued with our tradition of watching Luke II on Dad's computer as we can no longer play our VHS version.  It is such a good recap of that special time and the experiences of all those involved.. The excitement and anticipation of the Saviors birth is so symbolic to our day and how we prepare to meet the Savior.  We are so grateful for this special time of year and especially for this day.

Pancake Fest

The girls made pancakes while we went for a run.  Looks like quite the set up for pancakes. I think 'Buddy the Elf' would like to have breakfast with us.

AZ Cousins

Our cousins from AZ are here!  Yeah!  All of the snow almost kept then from getting beyond Beaver, but after going 25 miles per hour for many, many hours, THEY MADE IT!  And we couldn't be more excited! They don't have any of this cool white stuff in 'Desert Land'.  We went sledding, snowboarding, chased Odie through the snow, jumped on  the snowy tramp, and tried to make a snowman.

Indoors there was lots of talking, lots and LOTS of talking, and purse carrying, and Wii playing, and chasing, and hugging.

Aubrey and Jayden liked skateboarding together.  He didn't seem to mind that he was surrounded by girls.

We love you guys!!!!!

More AZ Fun

Al getting Jayden ready for his snowboarding lesson up at Brighton. He is such an awesome skateboarder, that snowboarding came easy for him.

A little wrestle time.

And hug time. Kyana almost always had some type of bag or purse on her, and she would fill them with treasure, including shoes we couldn't find.

AZ Goodbye's

Kyana's 'Ray Charles' Moment.  It was even better when she was rockin' out on the piano, but it takes awhile to grab the camera.

An early Christmas.  Emi and Lindz loved seeing the presents they had picked out for their cousins.  Robert got a new bright yellow Lakers shirt, though I'm not sure I want him wearing it to the Jazz/Lakers game on April 1st, as I will be seating right next to him.  We are a house divided - Lakers/Jazz fans.

Final hugs before we send them back out onto the snowy roads.  Though we hear the drive home was sooooo much better than the drive here.

Two tired sisters.  We stayed up burning the midnight oil, but when your time together is short, you do what you gotta do.  It was so fun to have Team Williams here with us.  We love you guys and look forward to our next warm weather adventures together. Love you!

Come Sing Along

Tonight was the annual Larry H. Miller Family Christmas Sing-A-Long. This is our 2nd year spending the evening down at the ESA. We learned a few things from last year and adjusted accordingly. No taking TRAX (Lindz calls it the smooshy, evil Tram) , arrive earlier, be ready for lots of singing.

Lindz had our printed program with all the songs words, but we mostly just followed the printed words on the jumbo-tron and other large screens. I never knew that Jingle Bells has like 7 verses. We'll just stick to the ones we know. We also enjoyed seeing Jon Schmidt play the piano with his toes, nose, and upside down on the bench. He's a great performer! We always have a great time. Thanks you so much to the Larry H. Miller Family for putting this amazing event on every year and for all the free Jazz and Bees tickets. Much more fun to come with those!

Waffle Party

Brenna and I stopped by Lindsay's Christmas Party at school this morning. Lindz has a really fun class. One of the things about year round school is that most kids stay on the same track year after year, so you usually have the same kids in your class every year, with just a few exceptions. I guess that could have it's pro's and con's, but both Lindz and Emi have grown up with really good classes, and as parents we know each of the kids pretty well too, so it's fun to spend time with them in the classroom. Today they were making waffles with all the fixins (and it was pajama day as well, so that added to the special breakfast atmosphere). Lindz shared some of her waffles with Brenna, who ended up with a whipped cream mustache. Most of the kids have known Brenna since she was a baby and make her feel very welcome in their class.

Next the kids played a game where you had to unwrap and eat a Hershey's kiss using oven mitts. Here's Lindz working on that task, which she did get. When it came to be Brenna's turn the kids were very supportive and cheered her on. I am really grateful for such a great school, with great teachers, kids, and really great parent support. It makes a big difference.
Then it was off to the 6th grade hall for Kay's Science Fair.

KJ Science Fair

Kayla loves big projects in school - Science Fair, History Fair, Plays, Debate, etc. She chose her topic way back in September and has had her project sitting in the living room for weeks waiting to turn in it. (those of you that know her are not surprised) Her idea was to see if chewing gum after eating was better than doing nothing, if you were not able to brush your teeth. She talked to her pediatric dentist, Dr. Moffat, about it over the summer and got dental disclosure tablets from him for the experiment. Long story short, YES, it is better to chew gum than do nothing, but it needs to be sugarless gum that contains '[Xyiufghjj???' some special chemical. She won 1st place in her class and now goes on to district science fair in February, so I guess the poster will be living behind the living room couch for a few more weeks. Good job babe!