Christmas Time

Christmas time brings letters and pictures of loved ones. This is one of our favorites. Noah's German friends Lara and Luc. We miss you, guys.


Christmas time also means that dear friends come to town. This year Natalie and Thomas came and we met up at Jen's house. We love you, guys.

(in case you can't tell because Noah's sword is covering her face, Rubie is absolutely adorable)


This Christmas we took Noah and Max to Temple Square to look at the beautiful lights and the gorgeous temple. Neither Noah or Max had ever been, so we were excited. We took the Trax from Sandy to avoid insane traffic and parking and to make it more fun, which it was.

Here is Noah in the train. I had to post this picture since this is the only one we took all night. Oops. The lights were really pretty though, so was the temple. Noah, however, was disappointed that we had come all this way just to look at some lights. Thus, we spent a lot of time in the Visitor Center which he loved.

Afterwards we were hungry and found a little Christmas Market with German food and Belgian waffles. That made the ride back more pleasant since it was getting late and the kids grumpy.
Note to self: Next year we will start this adventure at 11 in the morning. Not at 3 in the afternoon.


Christmas morning brought many presents, especially to Noah. We had been successfully hiding the big box from Germany that made it here in time. Thank you!

Here is Noah trying out the new finger puppets for Max.


Before we could go to Grandma Becky's, Noah wanted to take a bath and try out is new coloring soap. I would say it was a success. He used it all up in just one bath.


At Grandma Becky's we all got spoiled. Among many other things, the boys got this huge present. Everyone loved unwrapping it. In it was a wagon for Noah and Max. We can't wait for warmer weather and for Max to be able to sit up, so we can use it every day.













Then we went to Grandma and Grandpa's house and got spoiled some more with more presents , good food, and great company.

Christmas time is also play time in the snow. We loaded up the car with Noah's new skis, Karl's skis, two sleds, snowshoes, the chariot plus skis and pulling harness, lots of warm clothes and boots, snacks, etc. Then we tried to squeeze in with all the stuff and headed up to Big Springs. Karl and Noah sledded and skied while I was holding Max. I can't wait to take Noah up to Sundance and attempt to teach him how to ski. I had so much fun skiing as a little kid.



After lunch we put the boys in the chariot and took off for some snowshoeing. Here is Karl working hard pulling about 80 lbs. up the hill. After taking the picture, I helped him by pushing in the back and we took turns pulling. We decided to go somewhere with less hills next time although it was a good workout.


Here they are all bundled up. Max passed out the minute we put him in there and Noah (in the sleeping bag he has had since he was 12 months) shortly thereafter. If Karl and I had not been breathing so hard getting them up the hill, we could have actually had a meaningful conversation...


After our adventure, we met up with the Ellis family at their stake center where the kids brought all their new and old vehicles (scooters, bikes, skate boards, unicycle, etc). Noah had a blast riding his bike and new scooter around the gym and racing the other kids. Because he learned how to balance on his pedal-less bike, he is amazing on his scooter already.

The next day we went up to the Ellis cabin for more fun. We did a lot of sledding right outside the cabin and built this good-looking snowman. Since we were already up there, Karl and I took turns skate skiing at the Sundance Nordic Center and loved it. Then we played inside by the warm fire.


We did many more fun things (which we did not take pictures of) such as

• spending an afternoon with the Marre family. We loved catching up with them, meeting the twins, and playing with Max and Ada.
  
• taking cousin Spencer to the Lehi pool and going down the big, dark, green slide many times.
  
• spending New Year's eve with Eric eating chocolate fondue. After the kids were in bed, Karl and I hopped on our trainers and watched the movie we had gotten in the mail that day: "Steve Prefontaine". Then we went to bed. Nerdy, I know.
  
• joining Kenny and friends on his New Year's ride up the snowy/icy road to Squaw Peak.
  
• painting a tea pot at ColorMeMine. Now we finally have a safe place for our boiling tea water, since we can't use our Nalgenes anymore. (Thank you, Emily, for the gift certificate)
  
• ice skating at Seven Peaks with Nate and Jesse.