Christmas Time!

I love Christmas Time. We always put the tree up for my birthday. We start listening to Christmas carols when the Halloween decorations go up! It is nice to have the spirit this time of year brings to our home. It just seems to be a little more peaceful even though there is lots to do. We had a nice Christmas this year and the highlight was getting to talk to Peter on the phone. We had a hard time getting through and had to try several times before we could reach him. We tried for several hours on Christmas day and kept getting a "the country you are trying to call can not accept calls at this time" message. It was very frustrating. We finally got through with a bad connection late that night and Peter had gone tracting. The missionary we spoke to told us the phones were more reliable early in the morning or late at night. We tried several times the next day and finally just stayed up until midnight to call. Peter answered the phone that time and we had a really good connection. It was good to hear how happy he was and hear about some of his experiences. He bore his testimony in Marshallese so that we could all hear him speak the language. It was about 7:00 at night were he was and we talked to him about 45 minutes before he had to go to an appointment. It was a very heartwarming experience and at least for me the best part of the holiday.

The elementary kids had a nice program. Adam's class dressed as cowboys and did a western jig. Caiti's class were angels and sang a beautiful song called "The Angels Sing". They also sang "Christmas through the Eyes of a Child" as a whole school. It was very nice, ran smoothly and one of the best school programs we have ever been to.

December also brings lots of basketball. Both Jake and Alex had games against Panguitch during the break. It is fun to watch them play and to be part of all the small town basketball hype. My camera took lots of pictures but it didn't do a very good job in the weird gymn lighting.






After school got out for the holidays we went to St. George and had a nice dinner then went to Tuachan for the Live Nativity. The kids enjoyed the live animals especially the camels. My favorite part was when one of the little shepherd girls took the baby Jesus from Mary and took her back to were the other shepherds were waiting and let each one see the baby up close and kiss Him on the cheek. It was a very reverent depiction of the Saviors birth and we all really enjoyed it.



Caiti dressed up for dinner on Christmas Eve. The rest of us were very casual, but she is used to being the only one in our family who is "fancy"!

One of things we enjoy doing every Christmas are "The 12 days of Christmas". The kids like picking a neighbor or ward member to take a nativity set to one piece at a time and ending with the baby Jesus on Christmas Eve. This year the snow made sneaking a way a little challenging but we all had fun and it really helps brings the spirit of Christ into our celebration. Every Christmas Eve we also make sleighs out of candybars, candycanes and tape and have our own sleigh derby races. We usually slide them down slippery slides to race them but this year we tried it out on the snow. We also made our traditional reindeer cookies. (Peanut butter cookies with pretzels for antlers and m&m faces.) Then just before bedtime we reinacted the nativity story while Chris read from the scriptures. Our shepherds and wisemen are a lot taller this year then they have been in years past.