All I want for Christmas is...

electricity. So the power went out around 10:00 pm on Christmas Eve. So Santa had to leave our presents in the dark. Good thing he has Rudolph's nose. Because we had no electricity the furnace was not on all night and it was about 40 degrees in our house when we woke up. Needless to say we had a cold and dark night. But the kids did not mind, they were too excited.



We made them wait until Mike started a fire in the wood burning stove. After a while that really heated up the living room. In the meantime we put clothes on over our jammies and wore beanies to keep warm.





It was a fun new twist to Christmas morning. We even boiled water for hot chocolate on the stove. Luckily we did not need power for any toys that Santa left. So we cuddled by the fire and played Mousetrap. The kids had a blast opening presents and playing with toys all morning.







Luckily the power came back on around noon, just in time for lunch. I was just glad to be warm again. I would not have been a good pioneer. We had a fun Christmas with just our little family but we were glad we got to see grandparents and cousins just days before Christmas. For Christmas dinner we had Chinese takeout, yum! For Christmas Eve dinner we went to a friends house and had homemade soup and acted out the Navity story from the Bible. Eliza was Mary, she was so excited. Luke was a pirate shephard, that was the only way he would participate. I was the innkeeper and Mike played a wiseman. It was a fun evening. Then we headed home to open our Christmas jammies.



That is when Mike found his IPOD shuffle in the pocket of old PJ pants. It was a Christmas miracle. It had been lost for about a year. He put new songs on it and gave it to Eliza. She loves it! The day after Christmas Mike took the kids the see the new Chipmunks movie while I took down the tree, it was dry and making a mess. We had a wonderful Christmas and realized that we were just happy to be all together and have a warm house with electricity and heat.

Sun Valley Festivities

The Saturday before Christmas we went to Sun Valley for outdoor Christmas fun. We saw Santa, the carolers, and ice sculptures. We also enjoyed the white lights and free hot chocolate and cookies. It was cold but lots of fun.




We also saw Santa at our ward Christmas party. As you can tell Jameson did not enjoy sitting on Santa's lap and Luke did not like the idea too much either.

Sledding anyone?

At the beginning of December we bought a permit to cut down our own Christmas tree. We drove up the canyon and found what we thought was a good one. It looked better on the mountain than in our living room. But we had fun and also did some sledding down the road of the canyon. You surprising got going really fast. I forgot how fun sledding can be.



Eliza again was so brave and did it all by herself.



Mike and Eliza cruised down the road for several hundred yards and then I drove and picked them up.

Hit the slopes

About a week before Christmas Mike took Eliza skiing for the first time. They went to Dollar Mountain in Sun Valley. Kids can ride the magic carpet up the bunny hill for free. Eliza wore a harness and Mike walked behind her. She did really well and only fell once. She said her legs were very tired after. She liked skiing and wants to go again soon. She is so brave and adventerous.




The newest little skiier in town and her proud coach.

Let it snow!

It snowed off and on all day today. But we never did go out and play in it. Maybe the kids are already sick of it. Probably not, they will want to go out tomorrow. We did go out and play on Luke's birthday. Which was the first, of many to come, snow storms for us. I am sure there will be more days like this.

We jumped on the blog wagon!

Better late than never right. I love to read other family blogs and often thought I should start one. This is a great way for you to see what we do here in Idaho. Being that everone lives elsewhere now we can keep in touch better. So it would be impossible to go back and blog about old news, so I will just start with what is happening now. I sure love to talk about my chilren and show them off. So most of my info will be about them. Let's face it, they are my life, so I don't have much else to talk about. Except for my wonderful husband who urged me to start this blog. He is full of great ideas. The big news of the day is Jameson finally has a tooth coming in! Maybe now he can eat real food. He just wants to cruise everywhere, the kid does not sit still. Eliza loves school and draws about 6 pictures a day for me. She is such a sweetheart and a great artist. Luke is 3, need I say more. He whines most of the day, just kidding. But earlier this week I got to play a game with just him, Liza at school and JJ napping, that sure was fun. He really is a sweet boy when he wants to be. This is the most recent picture I have of the 3 kiddos together.