'Twas the week before Christmas

'Twas the week before Christmas
And all thru the house.
All the creatures were stirring,
But we didn't see a mouse. (thank goodness!!)

The stockings were hung
On the sign with care,
In hopes that St. Nicolas
Wouldn't hear the arguing and would soon be there.

The children were nestled all snug in their car seats, I mean beds.
While visions of getting home danced in their heads.
With ma in her running shoes and pa in his shoes.
Just settled down for a week of errands, too.

This was the week I was looking forward to.  Nothing to do.  I had 2 things on the calendar.  My Aunt has a great big Family Home Evening at her house each year that we look forward to with great delight.  She put it off the normal week so we could visit with her son who was visiting from Texas.  That was one think on the calendar.  The other was going to the temple for our monthly Sealings visit.  It ended up being one of the craziest weeks yet.  Here's a synopsis:

Sunday:  We went to my mom's house to celebrate A's 11th birthday.  We decided this would be about the only day we could celebrate with the cousins.  So we started the week out with a bang!!  I also accompanied a small singing group at church, so I had been working on learning that song the week before.

Monday:  We went to my Aunt's house for Family Home Evening.  Last week, A played in a violin recital at one of the local nursing homes.  She was trying to carry all her stuff off after her performance and she dropped her violin.  She broke the bridge.  Luckily that was it.  The hubby (being the perfectionist and great artist he is) was able to glue the bridge back together.  A's violin teacher helped us put the bridge back into place after school.  A also had some stuff to pass off so she could be eligible to go to a party.  So we spent WAY too long after school working on these.

Tuesday:  I found out on Monday that the play A's class had been working on was going to be done at night for the parents to watch.  It was going to be Tuesday.  Thank goodness we had an open schedule!  So after scouts, we hurried and at and ran to the school for A's class play.

Wednesday:  I took pictures for my mom's preschool classes.  I also was in charge of A's class Christmas party (that I found out Friday that he wanted to have!!  CRAZY!!) so I came up with a little craft for the students to do, and found some willing moms to help with a treat and games.  It was crazy.  We felt a LITTLE rushed that day.  The good news was we actually had NOTHING going on that night (unless you count a birthday.) so we could actually sit back and enjoy the company of the family. Plus it was A's birthday, so we gave her some birthday presents.

Thursday:  Thursday was the first day of Christmas break.  I had the kids clean the house.  And we went and copied our Christmas cards and worked on them so we could mail them out. (nothing like waiting till the last minute!!)  Fun day.  Then we went to the temple that night.  Aunt Bigleman watched the kids for us.  It is good to sit in the temple and enjoy silence.  And no distractions.  And do service for ancestors.

Friday:  The hubby's cousin randomly called us earlier in the week to invite us to his house for dinner.  And he actually picked a night we had nothing going on!  We were excited!!  And since he lives only about 10 minutes for one our family's FAVORITE stores, we held off buying sibling presents until Friday.  So right after the hubby got off work, we hopped in the car and drove to the store to buy for our siblings.  The shopping didn't take nearly as long, the store wasn't crowded (its a small store, but we LOVE it, and the one that USED to be in our town closed down.  So we had to drive 30 min to get to it.  but it was worth it!!) and we got out of there pretty darn fast.  Then we went to the cousins house for dinner.  It was good food, good company, good conversations, and just good times!  I'm not to familiar with these particular cousins.  But they went out of their way to include me in the conversations and make me feel comfortable.  We had a lot of fun.  And came home late and stuffed.

Saturday:  I decided that I really should get my Christmas program finished.  I needed to find willing people to read stories for me.  I spent the morning on the phone finding people to help me.  I had success and figured it all out.  Then we went down to my big brother's house for a traditional Swedish Christmas table.  On our way to his house, we stopped at 2 good friends houses' in Ogden.  They were both home and we REALLY surprised both of the families.  It was good to visit with them, even though it was a VERY short visit!  At big brother's house, we had the traditional 3 course meal.  YUMMY!!  We had joined their family for this tradition while we lived in Ogden, but we haven't done it since then - scheduling conflicts.  But I'm so glad we joined them again this year!!  We had a lot of fun.  We came home a little later that we were supposed to, watched a Christmas movie called Joy to the World, then went to bed.

Sunday:  Another crazy day!  The kids actually slept in.  We did your Christmas morning things.  Santa found our house.  I still have to put the pictures from the camera onto the computer.  One of these days I'll do that!  We went to church (I was in charge of sacrament meeting, being the ward choir director, so I was really worried for this!!  I was also accompanying 4 of the 7 songs, and leading the other 3.  It was a scary meeting for me!), then came home to spend the rest of the day with Nana, Papa, Uncle J and his girl friend.  We played games, ate, and visited.  Another busy day!!

Now we're to Monday.  We had cousins coming to town, plus I Uncle Gordon and my big brother wanted to go try out their guns.  So we went to Grandma's house for the day.

So now I sit here. At 5:00 in the morning wishing I could sleep, but I can't.  Today we have our Family Christmas Party.  We are going to the temple to do sealings again, then to my mom's church to play, paint, visit, eat, and do all sorts of fun things.   Hopefully the rest of the week will be spent at home playing a new wii game we got for Christmas and just siting at home.  I love family and seeing family, but I'm really excited to not have to be somewhere!!  And our church schedule is first thing in the morning next year, so I SHOULD be able to continue a "weekly" update to our crazy life.  Here's to a happy New Year!!