Christmas 2014

 Our December consisted mainly of stress of finals week and fun of having Grandma Anderson and Aunt Cami visit for Christmas!

They arrived on the 23rd. We spent the day cleaning, shopping, and then all of us adults went to see the Forgotten Carols that night. I don't think I have any pictures of that though. But I assure you, it was exciting and we had lots of fun! 

On Christmas Eve we did more cleaning and shopping, made delicious Christmas treats, and went to see the beautiful lights at the Mesa temple grounds. 

Sugar cookie making:

Cookie frosting and tasting:

Temple lights:

When we got home the kids got ready for bed, put out Santa's treats, and went to sleep.

Deanna and Cami were so sweet to help me wrap EVERY SINGLE present in our house, since I hadn't gotten any of it done ahead of time. 

Christmas treats before bed:

Connor wanted to put bows on the cookies, haha!

The next morning we attempted to make breakfast before the kids saw the presents, but it wasn't as easy as it seemed. We spent quite a while opening presents. Connor would excitedly open on then yell "Next present!!!" and Evelynn yelled "WOW!" each handful of wrapping paper she ripped off. 

There were way more presents than the ones shown below, I just tried to put a few that turned out cute.:) Many thanks to Cami for taking all the pictures for me!

 We had a few funny incidents during present opening, while Deanna was so kindly making our delicious breakfast!

Connor really wanted to take a bath to play with the race track that goes in the tub. Evelynn didn't have an interest in a bath.... I though. She had a baby doll in her new carseat she was playing with instead. I walked out for a minute and came back to a soaking wet baby doll, carseat, and a fully-dressed Evelynn in the bath tub with a baby bottle. She sure was proud of herself! 

After the bath, Daddy helped Evelynn set up the baby doll pack-n-play, which Brother decided was a crib for him, not the baby doll. haha!

Aunt Cami tried to drive the crazy coupe car! 

 After we were all fed, dressed, and ready for the day, we went to the park to play.

I tried to get to Skype with my family but it didn't quite work out like I wanted. My mom lovingly sent me a picture though so I could see!

The kids had a blast at the park, like they usually do!

I must add in here that I had the cutest pictures of my parents playing with the kids at this same park just a week and a half before this, but my kids DELETED THEM. 

Now, these next pictures deserve a story along with them. We arranged for a rental car since we don't have enough room in our Jeep for everyone and had things we wanted to do all together.

When we went to pick it up, Caleb drove around in this 2014 Mustang convertible. I took one look and opened my mouth to tell him to march back insdie and get something else (that was NOT what I'd had in mind when we reserved the car!), but he told me the guy said it was his very last option, and that if we'd been late he might not have had anything to give us. 

Well,  that what that. Deanna's rental car was a brand-new convertible. 

I'm sure you can tell that she was thrilled and not the least bit saddened by it! ;-)

That evening we had another delicious meal, and then Deanna, Cami and I went to the temple grounds again to see more lights and see a few things we hadn't been patient enough for the previous night. 

Friday Deanna and I took the kids to walk the temple grounds while Cami did some temple work. 

 Deanna and Cami were meeting up with someone, so I took the kids to sit in the car and play with their new tablets they got for Christmas. 

Caleb got off work early so he arrived home shortly after we did. 

The kids had been a little sick and shared with him, so he took a nice long nap until dinner time.

We went to Organ Stop Pizza (if you've never been there you are sorely missing out!)

We only snagged one picture. They were playing "Let It Go", and every time they hit certain notes there was this gust of air out of the pipes they were standing in from of and Evelynn thought it was hilarious and giggled and grinned! 

When we got home we decorated a gingerbread house.

Saturday was our last day with our guests so went out to see the ghosttown.

We got to take a tour on a trainride, watch a gunfight at high noon, and tour LuLu Bordello's house of ladies (yeah, that's the polite way of saying it). 

Waiting for the trainride tour:

 Waiting for and watching the gunfight:

 LuLu Bordello's:

The kids were so excited about sitting on this old wagon and taking pictures:

this little girl loves her Daddy so much!

 The last thing we did was take pictures by the pool in Santa hats.

I think they definitely enjoyed the weather, although we teased them about bringing the cold with them! 

\

Caleb drove them to the airport and the kids were so sad so see them leave, but we made so many wonderful memories with them and had a wonderful Christmas season!

We hope your Christmas was as wonderful as ours was!