Merry Christmas 2008

We got up this morning about 7:30 to start out Christmas Day. We lined up on the stairs in our traditional fashion. Autumn was very excited.

The Crew. Usually Santa leaves his presents from us out in the living room, but this year he decided to wrap them all so we weren’t in such a rush to get down the stairs. We took pictures and just relaxed and took our time.

Nate wanted to be the one to give Autumn her first Barbie. She doesn’t look like it in this picture, but she really was super excited.

Autumn even helped Dad hand out presents. It was so funny to see her try to bring this present over to me. It was almost as big as she was but she’s a strong little bug and brought it right on over to me.

Santa was really really really nice to us this year. He gave Nate & I laptops! Mine is an HP Pavilion Entertainment Notebook PC. I can record live TV on my laptop and it even comes w/ it’s own remote control! Who knew that laptops even came w/ remote controls?

Nick got a sweet karaoke machine, b/c he LOVED doing karaoke when we went on our cruise a few years ago. Lex & Jon got $ to buy themselves a new TV b/c theirs is old. Dad got a golf driver club and Mom got a painting of a Nativity scene called “In the Hands of the Father.”

I know this picture is crappy w/ the bright back lighting, but here is the whole group having our traditional Christmas breakfast. We had chocolate milk, eggnog, and scrapple. SO GOOD!

Here are Mom & Dad trying out Nick’s karaoke machine w/ a little help from Autumn. They were singing Somewhere Over the Rainbow. We had a blast all morning rocking out on Nick’s machine. Jon is the best one at it.

Andrew got this little pretend chainsaw w/ a plastic blade that moves. He was going around trying to “cut”everyone w/ it. Jon turned it around on him. It’s funny, b/c this was the hit toy for Andrew this year and Dad got it out of the trash can at a white elephant party that we went to! Gotta love gifts that are free and turn out to be the most favorite one.

We got some DVD’s also for us to watch on the projector Dad bought. We were watching A Knight’s Tale when Curt came over w/ a fried turkey for us. It was DELICIOUS and was hot and the skin was so crispy and the meat was so juicy. Mom didn’t even have to cook all day…we just ate the turkey for lunch and then had turkey sandwiches throughout the day.

It was so fun to watch Autumn and Andrew enjoy Christmas this year. Autumn had to try on these awesome purple velvet gloves that I got for her at the Target Dollar Spot. She was letting Dad feel how soft they were.

Curt came over again later on and brought Autumn some earrings. He is so cute w/ her and she just adores him.

Mom & Dad got Nate a laptop to use when he goes to BYU-I in January. However, he was already downloading all his itunes music and movies. MMM HMM!

Andrew got some Thomas the Train DVD’s and he and Autumn spent a lot of time watching those in the back room. Usually they are fighting, but we heard them back there just laughing like crazy. I went back there and found them hiding between the window and the pink chair and playing with cars. It was so cute.

We worked on this killer 500 piece Christmas puzzle. Dad did most of it and we finally got it done at the end of the day.

This was a gift that I got from Dad. One day we were talking about women in the scriptures and Christ. I told him that my favorite story was the woman w/ the issue of blood. So he got me this amazing painting. I had never pictured the woman looking this sick, but now that I think about it, she must have been very ill. I thought this was a very thoughtful and wonderful gift. Thanks, Dad!

Dad got this HUGE painting on real papyrus while he was in Egypt. For those of you who are LDS, this is the picture that is in the middle of the Pearl of Great Price. It’s really cool and that is our last name in hieroglyphics under the circle in the middle. He got pictures like this for about 3 or 4 different families.

He also got Autumn and I one of these w/ our names spelled out in hieroglyphics. He would have just gotten us one w/ our last name on it, but we have different last names, so he just had to get us each our own w/ our first names. Pretty cool!

I gave one of these to Lexie and one to Mom and made one for myself also. It’s President Hinckley’s “Be’s”. I ordered the vinyl through a lady in Dallas and it was here w/ in two days of me ordering it. Then I just went to Hobby Lobby and bought the chargers and put the vinyl on the charger. TA DA! That is it. It was so fast and so easy and so cheap, but I think they look awesome. I will for sure be doing more things like this in the future for gifts for others and also myself.

For my gift to Jason from Autumn I sent her a copy of her blog that I had printed out into a book. I also used my free snapfish book as my gift to Mindi & the kids. I made my snapfish book w/ pictures of Autumn and the kids. It turned out really cute and I hope they enjoy it b/c it was made w/ lots and lots of love. I hope we can go and visit them soon.

We had an AMAZING Christmas and it was so fun to have everyone together this year. I think we wore the kids out.

I am so thankful for the Savior. I am thankful for all He has blessed me with. His birth was a miracle. His life was a miracle, and His atonement has worked miracles in my life. I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, b/c we sure did.