Christmas Eve and Day

Gotta decorate those cookies for Santa!

The kids painted ornaments for Grandma and Grandpa's tree.

more cookie decorating...

On Christmas Eve, the kids each opened a gift from a cousin and new pajamas. Kendra was content just sitting on her gift. It's a fun grocery cart/walker that she's played with everyday since Christmas.

All the kids(minus a sleeping Presley) in their matching jammies.

Auntie Terra got these 4 cute girls personalized aprons with cooking utensils. The girls have been "making" a lot of food around here lately.

Auntie Terra holding Kendra and Baylee, who are 9 days apart and just as close in size.

After cousin presents, the cousins(minus the babies) all slept in the family room with blankets and cushions everywhere and even a canopy above them. Surprisingly, they all fell asleep watching The Polar Express and stayed that way until shortly after 5am.

While they were sleeping, Santa got busy! Quite amazing how many gifts there are for 26 people, 14 of them being children.

Kendra tried climbing the present mountain.

One shot of the present mayhem and wrapping paper-palooza! I never could get a shot with everyone in it at the same time!

Little Kendra girl was pretty tired on Christmas morning and just wanted some Mommy snuggles.

Mikayla asked the man in red for a Zhu Zhu pet town and boy did he deliver! She's got tunnels and a wheel, an elevator, a salon-- what more could a fake hamster want?!

Kendra was pretty excited to open her Tickle Me Elmo, she has no clue who Elmo is, but hey, Santa got it on clearance for 5 bucks!

Another happy moment, was hen Santa found a bunch of Halloween costumes on mega-clearance after Halloween at Wal-Mart. I mean, really, Santa brought lots of joy to a 3yr old Super Megan with this and several other costumes for $4 a piece.

Later on that day, Kendra plopped down in Bailey's new doll stroller and Baylee followed suit and pushed her across the floor.

Then, they traded places! So cute!

I had to take a picture of this. I never realized the fascination that Canadians have with Dill Pickles until this trip. For snacks, we had dill pickle chips, dill pickle dips, dill pickles in garlic and regular flavors, and other dill pickle oddities. They love it all. I assume it's because I didn't grow up with it, but I really don't. I'm not gonna lie, the ketchup chips are good though!

Trent with the cute 14 month olds.

We really had a great Christmas. Everything about our trip to Canada went better than we'd hoped for. The kids were GREAT on the drive there and back, they played well with their cousins, we loved playing games and staying up talking with siblings, and just enjoyed being all together. We haven't had a Christmas with Trent's whole family together in 7 years and it was really, wholly, wonderful.

The girls right now...

Kendra is 14 months old and walking everywhere now! Over the past few weeks she's walked a little here and a little there, now all she wants to do is walk! She has 6 teeth and is a happy, almost 19lb. little girl. She eats almost any and everything and has a laugh that I wish I could bottle up to listen to forever.

Megan is 3 1/2 and is turning into quite the charmer. She has a pretty funny personality and prefers to be called, "Super Megan." And yes, those curls are natural. Lucky. She loves going to preschool everyday and loves putting on makeup, jewelry, dress-up clothes, lotion, hairbows, etc.

Mikayla is 6 1/2. She loves playing with her sisters, helping mom in the kitchen, and going to school. She is missing her two front teeth and from how it has changed her looks, I miss them too! She also has natural curls, but refuses to let mom put any product in them to shape them. She's a no-fuss kind of a girl who also refuses chapstick, lotion, and any other scented body anything. We think 6 years old is a great age and would love her to stay this sweet and innocent forever.

Our Graduate!

Trent graduated from Samuel Merritt University with a second bachelor's degree in nursing! It was an exciting day for our family to go downtown to the Crest Theatre for the ceremony and watch dad cross the stage.

Every new nurse gets "pinned" by another R.N. and Trent chose a favorite professor of his, Dr. Grace Cox.

We were happy to have Grandma D come down from Canada to be here for his special day. It meant a lot to Trent for him to have his mom there with him to see him get his degree.

My dad came too, so here's the whole gang right after the ceremonies.

Rather than get the man a bouquet of flowers, we made a bouquet of gift cards, lollipops, and chocolate bars! We stuck long lollipop sticks into the different candy bars and wrapped the bouquet in cellophane. A much more man-friendly bouquet if you ask me.

I wasn't quite prepared for the enormity of the ceremony to come crashing down upon me.

As the various speakers spoke of the intense studies endured this year, time away from families, and hard work that was involved in the 12 month accelerated bachelor's program-- I cried.

When his name was read off-- I cried.

When the slideshow played of pictures from the year of all students performing nursely duties in scrubs-- I cried.

When they played a Taylor Hick's song in the background of that slideshow and the words said:
My heart is full
Of endless gratitude
You were the one
The one to guide me through
Now I can see
And I believe
It's only just beginning

[Chorus:]
This is what we dream about
But the only question with me now
Is do I make you proud
Stronger than I've ever been now
Never been afraid of standing out
Do I make you proud

I guess I’ve learned
To question is to grow,
That you still have faith,
Is all I need to know,
I’ve learned to love,
Myself in spite of me,
And I’ve learned to
Walk on the road I believe.

-- I cried. And yes, honey. You make me proud. Very, very proud.

It was a long year. To say the least. Dad had a lot of school, a lot of homework, a lot of clinicals, a lot of work, a lot of church responsibilities, a lot of daddy responsibilities. And he did it all. After 8 years of marriage and 3 beautiful daughters, we are ready for the next chapter of our life.

So from me and the girls, "Congratulations! You did it! And we couldn't be more proud of you!"

We celebrated with a trip to our favorite ice cream store, Tops Yogurt.

And then back home where Trent got a pretty super-neat present from my parents: a Wii! We are all having lots of fun with Daddy's gift!

The Polar Express

As the Ward Activities Director for our ward at church I was in charge of planning and putting on the ward Christmas party. Well, my goal was to be un-traditional. I tried to do something different than had been done before for each activity I've planned. This was no exception. Rather than a dressy, ham dinner with a program full of carols, I opted for a more kid-friendly, casual and comfortable evening.

As people arrived they were given a ticket to ride the Polar Express. Tickets were punched upon entering the gym where everyone then found a seat. We had a fabulous tri-tip dinner with green salad, rolls, and homemade mac 'n cheese. Everyone was to come in their pajamas as they do in the movie/book.

I made a ton of these 3-d snowflakes to hang from the center of the room and basketball hoops etc.

My friend let me borrow her 18ft. train that is part of her yard decoration for the holidays. We had a short program after eating. All the children were invited to come sit on the floor and we had a conductor reading the story of the Polar Express aloud. He stopped reading periodically for a few musical numbers. The Young Women and I did a dance to the song, "Hot Chocolate."

A group of girls, including Mikayla, sang a very sweet rendition of "When Christmas Comes To Town," also from the movie. And my friend Sydney sang a solo to Josh Groban's "Believe." I was able to download karaoke versions of those songs so we didn't need a piano accompanist and were able to use the actual music sans vocals to back up our musical numbers. After the program, the big man in red showed up with bells on! He also gave the children a bell on a necklace in keeping with the tradition of the Polar Express story as well. Megan loved sitting with Santa and telling him just what she wanted for Christmas--Barbies, Tinkerbells, princesses, and things of that nature. Kendra, on the other hand--

--did not. Oh well, maybe next year!

We fed 190 people at our activity and all in all, I think it was a great success! I was completely stressed in the weeks prior to the activity with all the planning, food buying/preparing, phone call making, decorating, practicing of songs/dances, etc. etc. I had NO idea how much work goes into a Christmas party for that many people! I can honestly say there are things I would do differently next time, but I think for my first one, I did a pretty good job.

I broke out with 3 zits from the stress of the stupid thing. I was mighty happy as soon as the activity was over to be washing the 23 tablecoths and adding up receitps to know that my sanity and complexion would soon be restored.

Cowan Craft Fair

I made these post-it note holders. It's an easel-type frame so the post-its will rest on a desk surface ready for the using.

I then packaged them in cellophane bags and attached little bag toppers to them, ready to be given as presents.

Here they are all lined up on my booth at the fair.

I made these nugget tins as well. Each is filled with 12 assorted Hershey's chocolate nugget candies and each candy is wrapped and then a decorative band is glued on the tin. Each one was slightly different, though I used coordinating Christmas papers. They are great little teacher gifts, coworker gifts, or stucking stuffers.

I made 9 nursing covers with an adjustable d-ring closure around the neck and flexible boning in the front to allow you to still see baby while nursing, but discreetly enough so that no one else sees any part of you!

I made a bunch of covered baby wipes cases as well. Each is a Huggies travel case with 18 wipes inside and is covered with fabric to co-ordinate with the nursing covers.
Here's my table all set up with a special little helper behind it. Mikayla helped me set up and sat with me while waiting for her school choir to perform. The Craft fair is a big fundraiser for the school and there were 31 vendors this year with everything ranging from hairbows, jewelry, clocks, blankets, chocolate pretzels, puzzles, homemade knick-knacks, pottery, and on and on.

Would I do it again? Probably not. Yes, I enjoy crafting, but in the end, I don't think the hours of time every night for weeks, all the sewing, hot glue gun burns, cost of materials, trips to the store for more supplies, and stress of figuring out the "right" amount of stuff to make was worth the $200 I made. I am chalking it up to another item checked off my bucket list of life. I'm glad I did it. But I think I'll craft for me and friends in the future. I was glad to help out the school with a fundraiser, but think I will politely excuse myself from participating in the future!