Finishing 2014

I'm back to finish my catching up!

So, December started and was full from beginning to end. Makes me tired to think about it!

The first week of December (after Thanksgiving) was filled with packing and more packing. That weekend we went to my parents...or the airport nearest my parents....

My brother David came home from his mission for our church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints). He has been in Canada for 2 years.

And we welcomed home his luggage the next morning.

Then we rushed back home the next morning to pack up everything we could between Saturday and Tuesday. (And Sunday is a day off, so it doesn't even count.)

By Monday night, things were pretty packed up.

Tuesday night we loaded up the truck (in the dark - this was our first...and hopefully only...December move - I had forgotten that 6 pm in December would be so hard to pack up. Not like we really chose - it's just how it happened.)

We slept in sleeping bags and air mattresses Tuesday night.
Wednesday we closed (sold), went to church for youth activities, and slept in my brother's (half empty) apartment. (He moved the weekend our brother came home from a mission - yeah, crazy busy!)
Thursday we closed (bought) and moved into such a wonderful house. We still feel so overly blessed to have a house with 4 bedrooms and a garage and a FROG (finished room over garage) for playroom...it's so perfect for our family with it's extra little oddities...you'll see what I mean.

My mom and dad came to help us move in - they were SO fast at getting so much done with us. Mom even got our house decorated for Christmas!

And life continued on like normal. (I did have a few teachers cancel homework for my elementary kids. Middle school was uncooperative.)

The next week, Seth had his first cello strings concert. They sound so good for middle school kids in their 2nd year only.

We mostly unpacked before Christmas, but there is still a lot of organizing, sorting, "decorating", re-organizing, etc.

 We're not usually huge fans of the "Santa visit", but the kids thought it would be fun when we saw Santa at the zoo. (Annual zoo lights trip - part of our membership - we make time for free.)

THEN...yeah, the month isn't even to Christmas yet...we had Christmas with the Venus family (Rob's mom), after-Christmas vacation with the Edwards family (Beth's), and new years with the Baileys (Rob's father). So much fun...and so much exhaustion when January hit - full of stuff...

Just look through the pictures!

VENUS Christmas

Between us and Rob's parents, Seth got this AWESOME lego robot thing set (Lego Mindstorm) and he and Rob were set for the day...the robe is also from the venus family - Seth lived in it for the day. :)

EDWARDS Vacation

 I love my parents. :)

 Family pictures are always so fun...

Everybody look...over here!

What's an uncle for if it's not to aggravate you?

 I love my grandparents too. I'm glad they could join us. My kids don't see their great grandparents as much as I saw mine because they live farther.

 We may need to convert the toy playroom to a grown-up toy playroom some day - the ping pong and pool tables were a hit with my kids!

We have currently lost the hat (only 2 months after Christmas) but he lived in it for those 2 months. We had to remind him to take it off in the house or he would eat dinner wearing it!

Too much sugar probably happened on vacation. He thoroughly enjoyed every treat his parents let him have!

I wish I'd taken a video of us trying to get this picture!

Youngest and oldest (for now)

And then Bailey time...

I really should have taken more, but my in laws are big picture takers, so I'll just wait for theirs :) - I did get these shofar blowing in the new year pictures - it was totally awesome!

And it's school pick up time, so you'll have to wait for later to see us in the new year! Stay tuned - I'm slowing catching up! ;)