Winter Fun '09

Winter is always a busy season, these are some of the things we have been doing to keep ourselves occupied. Unfortunately, we didn't get our Christmas cards out this year. We will next year. I promise. We have had a good time enjoying the time as a family. Here are some of the highlights.

Our family was able to go to the Tolman's for the annual ginger bread making Family Home Evening. I do believe our candy is completely gone now!

Liam had his preschool Christmas production. We were a little nervous because Liam does not like to get up in front of people. But he did great.

While I had some time off of work I decided to clean the carpets. Ethan liked to help by playing with the fan.


The kids had a great Christmas opening present, playing with them, and wrestling Ben and Sam. Every night they went to bed exhausted from playing so much.

Sam, Grammy Marcheschi, Grandpa Marcheschi, and Elisa

Brooke's family came to visit us for Christmas. It was nice to have family here to enjoy the holidays with.

Ben

Brooke is pregnant as ever and enjoying her final month of being pregnant.

1st try

So we had our first attempt at a Christmas card. We are late trying to get it together, but thought we would give it a go. Pretty funny trying to get 3 kids to sit still and "smile" at the same time. Liam, who normally never smiles, was acting like quite the clown, causing Ethan to continually laugh and look at him. These are the best of the bunch. We will try again another time - maybe.

No more artificial tree

Brooke and Ethan walking along in the mud.

Liam was pretty interested in the chainsaw. Elisa was having a flashback to her teen years and going to the old haunted houses. She let out quite a scream when he started it up.


Poor candy cane will be fossilized in the mud of Campbell's tree farm.

Ethan decided to venture off a bit on his own. No I am not a bad parent, I could see him the whole time, and it was only maybe 20 feet. As he was wondering around he turned and supposing it to be his dad was shocked to see that it was a complete stranger. He let out a quick cry and came running back to his daddy.


12 years ago Brooke and I went to SLC to get a fake tree with her Aunt Linda. The tree has served our family well these last few years. But for the second year in a row we didn't use the artificial tree. Since this was the second year in a row without putting it up, I decide we were going to give it away. As hard as it was we gave away a piece of our family, and gained a lot more storage space in the garage.

We all packed into the family van and headed out to get the Christmas tree at a u-pick, they cut tree farm. It had been wet during the past week so the ground was a mud hole, and it wasn't even raining. The boys were completely covered. Ethan tripped and his candy cane that he had just got was plastered in the mud. While carrying the tree back to the car we kept slipping and sliding. We finally got home and began to put up the tree.

After many hours of fighting the crooked cut on the bottom of the tree, a curved tree trunk at the base of the tree, and a broken tree stand I finally managed to take the tree back outside, re-cut the tree base, and put it into a new stand. It was a long afternoon. But we made it! By the time I got it up I had some serious doubts and thought maybe I should have just kept the fake tree. Once the tree was up the kids had fun putting on the ornaments and we have a beautiful tree to show for it, so maybe it was worth it.

Thanksgiving to Christmas all in one day

The day after Thanksgiving Liam was up bright and early wanting to put away the Thanksgiving decorations and get out the Christmas stuff. We did have a nice Thanksgiving though. Elisa came over and we had a nice relaxing dinner. Avery had been working on the design for her fruit turkey for the passed month. She got really into it. Elisa made us a pear tart dessert, it was suprisingly good. I was a little skeptical, but it turned out great. Brooke cooked the turkey and I did the only thing I know how to do - mashed potatoes. It was nice to be here with our immediate family. We were thinking of everyone.

Once Thanksgiving was over, Christmas had begun in our house.