Merry Christmas One and All.....

This Year instead of "Grandpa Claus" stopping by our Family Christmas Party, we had "Cameron Claus" a close descendant. He did a wonderful job, and brought lots of Christmas Cheer. We look forward to our Family Chrismas Party every year. Due to the snow storm, it was just us this year, but we still had such a fun time eatting, playing games, singing and having a special visitor.Steve sitting on Santa's lap. Look a the resemblance.Courtney discovering who Santa is......oh my

Having fun with Santa. What a crazy bunch of kids!Our exchange student Thomas gave us the present of music on Christmas Eve and played the guitar while we sang. He even sang to us in German, it was a magical wonderful night.
Christmas Eve in new PJ's that Courtney sewed, everyone thought they were the hottest!Chrismas morning unwraping presents, Cameron and Courtney shared opening their new cameras.Courtney and Cameron in their new Christmas coats. Courtney loves her green "Jon and Kate" coat that she requested.
Kandace and Courtney in their new hats, ahh don't they look so cute! We all had a wonderful Christmas and we were so glad to be inside safe and WARM while we got 2-feet of snow outside. That is a whole different story!

A "Hustling Bustling" Week

This is the "Blown Glass" tree at the Festival of trees. One of my favorite traditions to attend each year. I just didn't have time to post my pictures last week, so here is one of the trees.

It's that time of year for all the "Hustle and Bustle". Last week we hosted 3-parties at our home, this week we only had two. Friday night we hosted the "Foreign Exchange Students" Christmas social. We had around 100 people, including the students and host families at our home. We played the "White Elephant" game with them. They played way too nice for us, and didn't even steal from each other too much, only a couple of kids took from someone else. Thomas, our student, was all smiles all night. We think he had a great time.

Thomas and Fabian(another student from Germany) find a quiet spot to visit and eat.

The kitchen was as busy as time square.

The excitement of the "White Elephant" Game

As soon as the party was over, Kandace, Courtney, Cameron and Thomas hopped on a flight to NYC. They spent Saturday checking out the sights of NYC. They took Thomas to see the Statue of Liberty, shopping on Canel Street, on the subway, to Central park, Time Square, (which they didn't stay long because it was too crowded) To ESPN to use the bathrooms, a must in NYC. They had NYC pizza, the best in the world. They met up with their cousin Levi and his family at the Disney Store, then went to Rockefeller Center to see the tree. They didn't even go skating because they were too cold and it was too crowded. Here are a few fun pictures of their quick trip. They slept till noon on Sunday, but are back to school and work today.

Thomas on the ferry to see the Staute of Liberty

"Look Mom....we're in Time Square in our new hats!"Having fun in Central Park, or trying to keep warm???

Kandace and Thomas all smiles in Sunny Central Park! Levi and Charlotte in NYC Disney Store, bundled up staying warm.A tired face only a Mom could love!

The "TREE" at Rockefeller Centter, as beautiful as ever!

JHS Christmas Dance..or Event!

Cameron and his "Groupies" went to the JHS Christmas Dance this weekend. They started the 2-day event by taking their dates camping Friday night. Yes, camping in December! Are they crazy or what! The girls were good sports and went along. They had the girls all home by 10:00 AM Saturday so they could nap and be ready for the dance a 5:30 PM. As you can tell by their attire, this was a "Pajama" dance. They all matched their dates pajama's. More craziness. Cameron's date, Sophie is an exchange student from Norway. She was a good sport to go to her first american dance in her "PJ's"

Here is the whole gang after the dance. They all came to our house for dessert, and to play a couple of Christmas games.

The competition was fierce at the "White Elephant" game. Dash walked away with the most coveted gift, the "Ironman" play figure. Eric was thrilled with his "Pig Pile" game! They then played the "Candy Bar" game. We decided to add a twist to the game to make it go faster. We played "Speed Candy Bar Game" We had three sets of dice going at the same time. There were several times that I was almost taken out by a flying candy bar. Once all the candy bars were gone and hidden in their bags, we set the timer for 10-minutes. Things got crazier and louder as they tried to keep up with who had the "Nerds, Candy baby bottle, DOTS, SNICKERS" We never knew 14-teenagers could be soo crazy about finding their favorite candy bar.

Things quieted down again after they had their dessert, then settled in to watch clips from SNL. They all had a great time, but called it a night at the stoke of midnight.

It's Christmas Time!!!!!!!!

After much work and time spent on getting all the decorations ready, not to mention a mom who got up at 5:00 am just to get me a good deal on a Christmas tree we finally got everything set up for Christmas!!!

We put up the nativity next to the t.v. so we are always looking at it. And we put the tree in front of the window so everyone can see it from the outside.

All of my roommates love that our house is so decorated and we have decided to keep up our decorations through January to try and get rid of some of the gloom.

Well Here are our decorations. I hope that everyone has a merry Christmas, and helps spread the love throughout the world!!!!
MERRY CHRISTMAS,
Courtney

We Hit Thanksgiving...Running!

Here we all are, Thanksgiving morning at the "Human Race" 5K. The kids joined me last year and have decided to make this a Thanksgiving tradition. My cousin Sandy and her friend joined us too. This year there were 2000 entries, we got there just as the race was starting and couldn't even move at first from all the people. It was wonderful to see so many families out in the rain walking and running for the Food Bank and LDS Humanitarian fund. We wore our elf hats, and that made it easy to find each other.
This was Thomas's first Thanksgiving, he had never seen a whole turkey cooked. Notice his "Totally Hot" shirt from the race! He liked all the food.

Every year we make a ginger bread house. I gave Casey and Thomas the assignment this year. Thomas wants to be an architect, so this was right up his alley. Courtney and I spent the day decorating the entire house. We now have lights and Christmas trees in every room. We love Christmas!

They worked hard on their house, and I forgot to take a picture of the finished product. I will take one for next week of their We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!