Recovering

Well I hope all of you had a very merry Christmas. I know that we did. Our Christmas Eve was a little eventful this year. Sunday night, I went to cook dinner for the fam and our oven wouldn't turn on. We don't know much about gas stoves, so we thought maybe it was the pilot light. We called our landlord and he said that he would be over the next day to take a look. So Monday he came over with his repair man, and we didn't have a pilot light on our stove, it was an ignitor. Apparently the stove was completely gone. It needed some parts, and there were no stores open on Christmas Eve. Our landlord decided to just get us a new stove, but he said he couldn't have one until the day after Christmas. Well, that wasn't going to work for us since we were feeding four missionaries on Christmas Day and I had already bought all the food. I was pretty upset and asked if we could just call Lowe's or Home Depot and see if we could get a stove. His repair man said that he had a truck, so they decided to go to Lowe's and buy a new stove. Needless to say, I was able to cook my Christmas meal without a hitch. It is nice to have a new stove.

Whew! With that out of the way, we had a wonderful Christmas. Emma of course recieved too many gifts, but we enjoyed her reactions. Everytime she opened a gift she would say, "Ooooooo!" I also want to say thank you to everyone who sent us gifts. Emma loved every one of them. I of course loved the gifts for the baby as well.

Speaking of the baby, right now the baby is breech so I am upset about that. I sure hope it turns it butt around one more time before he is stuck in that position. I am really trying hard not to have to have a repeat C-section, but odds are not in my favor. I will be getting a blessing here soon, so I am hoping the Lord will help things out. Whatever will be, will be I guess. I hope that you all have a safe new year. Keep in touch.

Merry Christmas!

Welcome!

Christmas is almost here, and I hope that everyone has had a stressfree holiday so far. Hopefully all the shopping is done, and you can sit back and enjoy a Christmas movie or two. I don't have much to write, but I wanted to at least touch base.

The past two weeks have been a little stressful. Thursday the 13th I believe, I was having some cramping. I called the doctor and they wanted me to go to the hospital to get monitored to see if I was experiencing any pre-term labor. I was there for about 3 hours, and I did end up having a bladder infection which is why I was cramping. I feel a lot better, but that same weekend Emma decided she didn't want to sleep anymore. Sunday she didn't take a nap, and then Sunday night would not go to bed either. She finally fell asleep about 2 a.m. Monday was the same way. No nap, and went to bed extremely late. Tuesday she finally gave in and took a nap, but had problems going to bed. She has finally decided to get back on schedule, and I am grateful I can get some sleep now too. I have to say it is a little unsettling waking up and having my daughter standing at the end of the bed staring at me. She has startled me so many times lately.

Today Cameron's family is having their Christmas party, and I am sad that we can't be there. The white elephant gifts are always the highlight of the party. Someone has to tell us who had the best gift.

We love all of you, and we wish you the merriest of Christmas's. Keep in touch.

Terrifying

Well hello again everyone. Hope everything is going well for all of you so far this month. We had our ward Christmas party Saturday, and it was fun. We had a soup cookoff (no mine didn't win) a talent show, and of course Santa Clause. Emma seemed pretty excited to see Santa, so I thought that it would be fun for her to go and sit on his lap. I wish I had a camera to capture the look of sheer terror on her face. She did not like Santa AT ALL! I have never really seen her so upset by something before. Well, I guess we can call it a bust for this year. At least Emma is enjoying the other aspects of Christmas. Candy, cookies, lights, snow, and Harry Connick Jr's Christmas cd. That is all I can ask for I guess.

I just finished typing up our Christmas letter, and for the majority of whom read this often will get one. We just got a new camera, and I am trying to figure out how to delay the camera so we can all be in the picture. It won't be hard, and I like playing around with stuff. I made sugar cookies, wafer cookies, and fudge yesterday. I felt like I was in the kitchen forever. It doesn't help either when it gets dark at 4:30 p.m. I also wrapped Christmas presents so I can get them shipped to Idaho and Arizona before the big rush hits the post office.

We did finally get our first snow. It was last Thursday, and it was fun to have for the 20 minutes it snowed. The weather is interesting here. Here is an example. On Thursday morning it was raining, then it snowed, then it rained, and then it was freezing rain. I guess freezing rain is the big ticket item here. More than snow. Michigan had a horrible ice storm this weekend, and so did part of Missouri. I need to stock up on some items such as a window scraper thingy for our car. I didn't think I would need one since we have a garage, but when I was at Enrichment it hit me that I may come out of Enrichment with my car frozen over. So that would be a good investment. I also need to get a battery powered heater for our home. I guess they had a couple of serious power outages here because of the storms last year. So I guess I should be prepared. That is the Mormons motto is it not! Ha ha.

Well enjoy the Holidays! I know that we are.

Tis' The Season

Merry Christmas! I wonder if you all heard the Christmas devotional on Sunday. Hearing the prophet speak about Christmas made me very excited for the Holiday. One of the church buildings in our area held a Creches and Carols event this last weekend. For those of you who don't know what a Creche is, it is a manger. They had a room full of porcelain Creches, a room dedicated to Modern, African, Asian, and any other manger you could think of. It was wonderful! They also had people performing in the chapel as you walked through the church. They had a children's room as well where children could make crafts. I volunteered on Friday night to be a Hostess, and greet people as they came in. It really made me excited for the holiday season. I am in the Christmas spirit, but I am having a hard time finding the energy to do the things I would like to and need to. I love to bake, and shop, and wrap, and get Christmas cards ready. I find that as the weeks go on, I have less and less energy. I need that energy though, because I keep stuffing my face with sugar cookies! Yum!

I have also decided that I think I will avoid Walmart, and the mall on the weekends. I went to Walmart on Saturday to pick a couple of things up, and I could barely get throught the doors. I couldn't believe it! I am glad that I am a stay at home mother now, so that I can go during the week to avoid crowds. I am excited about the gifts I have bought though. I hope Ashlyn, Addison, Tyler, and Janae all enjoy theirs. By the way, they will be sent soon.

The weather here is cold. I also keep forgetting to put on a coat or jacket before I leave the house. I always open the door, feel the cold air kick me in the face and then I remember. I guess I keep forgetting that I don't live in Arizona anymore. The weather has a nice briskness to it, and although it is cloudy and rainy there hasn't been any snow. I have heard though that snow here is not very common. People have told me that it maybe sticks a couple times throughout the winter season. Sunday was very cold, and it made me want to go back to Arizona.

Well, we miss all of you back in Arizona, and I hope that your Holiday season is going well also. Hopefully we might see you come summertime. Don't forget to send us Christmas cards.