Christmas Traditions

I'm sad to see this Christmas season end! It was a fairly quiet Christmas because we opted to stay home and spend Christmas in Arizona, but it was nice to spend time focusing on our little family. 

One of my favorite traditions for Christmas is new church outfits! My mom and I saw this ruffly black fabric and I new that I needed something made out of it. I made a skirt for myself and my mom took the leftover fabric and made a dress for Sadie, Eve, and Molly. Yes, Sadie not only matches her baby sister, but her american girl doll, too.

  

One of our favorite Christmas traditions has been decorating a gingerbread house.

I am pretty sure that more of David's candy ended up in his mouth than on the house. 

 And my new favorite tradition: our elf Chuck! We officially have successfully named something Chuck, and will no longer have to use it for any future unborn children. Of course, Chuck got tangled up in some yarn his first night at our house.

On Christmas Eve we decided to start out the day at the Zoo! David made a new friend, Jet Stream. He just sat down and got in the face of this goat and chatted away. 

What handsome men!

David was thrilled just to be sitting in one of the tractor seats.

We finished up Christmas Eve with a trip to the temple to see the lights and some new pajamas!

We also started a new tradition for Christmas Day. We were bummed to be away from our families on Christmas, but settled for second best and invited 2 of our favorite families (who also were sans familia) over for a yummy Christmas feast. We love our friends here who also fill in as family.

As a side note, I also attempted to add the Nutcracker into our list of Christmas traditions. I have fond memories of going with my mom to see the Nutcracker performed by the SF ballet. Well, Sadie was much too young. She got bored with it once the party ended (1/3 of the way through) but some how we made it through the whole show. I think I will wait a few more years until I try it again.

Scottsdale Train Park

We went to the train park last week with a group of friends and had lots of fun. I can't believe that we've never been before. 

 Sadie driving the trolley car.

  For some reason my friend Kim and I thought it would be a good idea to go in the cattle car with our kids for our first ride on the train. We were pretty squished in there. I don't know how Kim fit, she is a good 4-5" taller than me! As you can see, the kids where having a great time.

 Sage enjoying the ride.

 My little buddy.

 Devin and Tatum on the train on the second ride.

And we finished up the trip on the Carousel. I'm so grateful that Eve is such a good baby because she just goes along with anything, but I think I will have to bring another adult to help me next time we go. 

Our Little Angel

The Holiday Season is in fill swing here! We had our ward Christmas breakfast on Saturday morning and Sadie was the angel in the nativity program. In the photo below you can see that there was a stable  and manger set up on the left (which kept Chris up until 2:30am setting up with another member of our ward but that is another story altogether) and on the right there was a choir with the rest of the primary kids. When Sadie made her grand entrance as part of the program ALL of the girls in choir said, "Aaaw!" She did a great job.  I only had my camera phone on me,  but the set up was amazing.

And at the end, Santa made a brief appearance. I'm not really a Santa fan, but I guess it was worth documenting.

Christmas Tree Fun