This week was Christmas!!  Monday was Christmas Eve.  We were expecting Grandma and Grandpa Elton from Las Vegas, so we waited anxiously as the snow fell and whited out and fell some more.  We were so happy when they arrived safe and sound!

That night we went over to Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik's for Christmas Eve Candlelight Dinner.  It was lovely and so, so yummy!  Afterwards, the girls had a Christmas recital for us, playing Christmas music for us on the piano and violin while Bethany danced.  Grandpa G. read us the story behind Rudolf, too.  Then we watched as the kids did a reenactment of the nativity.  Finally we played bells and sang some Christmas songs and opened presents from Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik.  It was a marvelous Christmas Eve!

After we got home and the children were snuggled warm in their beds, Kevin and I had some major construction to do in order to make the train table for Ben and Beth's Christmas.  At one in the morning, we finally got it done and went to bed!

The next morning, the kids roused us at 7:15 exactly with very excited whispers and laughter.  Grandma and Grandpa were ready, too, so we headed in to uncover what Santa had brought in the night!

Then Kevin made us a wonderful french toast breakfast.  After that we went into the front room for the rest of the present unwrapping!  Bethany made me laugh.  Everytime she got a present she would say, "I've been wanting this for YEARS!"

A great time was had by all!

That afternoon we went back over to Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik's for another wonderful dinner and wonderful visiting!  It was a lovely cap to a lovely day.

Grandma and Grandpa Elton decided to get back on the road that evening since the news said that another storm was coming in.  We were sad to see them go, but so glad they could spend these two important days with us!  They were right about the storm, too.  It started snowing in the night and didn't stop until Friday around noon!  Yikes!   That's alot of snow!

So . . . Friday in the afternoon when the sun came out, we went sledding!

Mariah was the craziest of all, and Ben slept in the car for most of it, but we all had fun!

On Saturday, we had another treat!  Grandma and Grandpa Skinner drove down and brought Christmas to us again!

They got each of us a sweatshirt that says "Skinner School of Hard Knox."  We love them!

Saturday night there was a youth dance.  It was supposed to be the New Year's Eve dance, but our area held it early.  It was Megan's first dance!  Savannah, Sarah, Megan, and Sarah's friend, Allyson, all went.  Meg was a little unsure at the outset, but ended up having a great time.  They all did!

What beautiful girls!

It's been a very lovely Christmas week!  We have felt so blessed and full of the love of Christ!  We hope you all had a very merry Christmas, too!

Before this week, started, we made some chocolate covered pretzels to give out to some of our neighbors.  We try to give the girls a chance to give something to their teachers and leaders in the ward and also to be a part of the making of the gift.  Chocolate-covered pretzels seems to include everyone at once and is still pretty simple, so that is why it is our neighbor gift of choice.  It was pretty fun to make them, but our week was so busy, we didn't get a chance to deliver until Saturday!  It's a good thing we made them Sunday night.

Monday night was Dad and Megan and Mariah's last game with their Mapleton team.  They had a great game and won by eight points!  Go team!  They had a great season and had a great time!

That night Sarah also had a game, then Meg had practice with her Springville team, and Mariah had practice with her Bantam team.  Kevin coached both practices.

Tuesday afternoon, Cali and Chey had practice and Me and Mariah had practice.

Wednesday night was Savannah's high school choir concert.  Five choirs performed.  It was all beautifully rehearsed and orchestrated.  The songs varied from happy to spiritual to humorous.  The kids all have a great sense of humor and are super fun to watch.  Savannah even got to play the bells with a couple of songs.  It was a really nice night.  We really enjoyed it and are so glad that Savannah is involved with it all!

Thursday was Christmas hat day at the elementary school.  It's a good thing they told me it was coming up before we went to the dollar store last week.  It is really handy to have a child on the student council!  Don't they look adorable?

That evening was our busy basketball day.  Sarah had a game and everyone else had basketball practice at different times.  So . . . Beth and Ben helped me make dinner.

And that night we also went (between basketball practices) to Bethany's dance recital.  The little girls dressed as Disney princesses and danced to A Princesses' Twelve Days of Christmas.  It was adorable.

Friday there was only a half day of school.  It's a good thing because it was Kevin's birthday!!!  Yay, Kevin!  So, we packed up the family and went bowling!  That's what Kevin like to do for his birthday so it is pretty much a yearly tradition for us, now.  We take up two lanes with all our family members, now.  We are quite the bowling party!

Bethany gave her ball a kiss before she sent it down the lane! Is that sweet or what??

Go team!

We didn't have to tell Ben to push hard.

Kevin schooled us all!

Afterward, we went out to eat at Brick Oven and Grandma Gazdik joined us.  It was a fun time!  When we got home, Kevin took Sarah and Mariah to the church gym to end the day with some basketball just to make the day complete.  Happy Birthday, Kevin B.!

Saturday was Megan's birthday!  We went over to Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik's at lunch time for Megan's birthday dinner.  Savannah had to work form 2 to 9, so we moved Meg's party to earlier in the day.  She didn't complain.

Beautiful girl.

We had a great lasagna dinner, opened presents, and had cake.  It was great fun.  Afterwards, Meg, Savannah, and Mariah wanted to go to The Nest, a store in Springville, to get things with their gift cards.  It took quite awhile to pick out all the perfect things, but the girls had a fun time there.  When we got home, Meg and I went to the store to rent The Avengers and buy some soda and chips in order to continue the party atmosphere well into the evening.  After the movie, while I bathed the little ones, the rest of the family played the T-Shirt game to finish the day with a bang.  It was a fun birthday and we love that sweet girl.  Happy Birthday, Megan!

Bethany and Benjamin love the ipad.  Benjamin doesn't do very well by himself.  He gets crazy mad at it and throws it.  He does a lot better with someone bigger helping him.  Bethany can do it by herself, but her very favorite thing is to play "scary games" with Megan.  Meg does really well helping them with the ipad.  "Scary games" are something Meg and Bethany share.  "Scary games" are those I Spy type games where there is a mystery and you have to find certain objects and solve puzzles in order to solve the mystery.  Apparently, they are the best!

I went to Sarah's home game this Monday.  It was so fun.  She's playing great.  She doesn't think so, though, of course.  She doesn't much like losing, or almost fouling out, or bad sportsmanship from her team or the other team.  (These games are way more intense than I remember my games being in high school.)  Still, she does like her coach (Jill) and practices and making everybody laugh (when they're in the mood -- like at practices, not at games).  She also really likes wearing her cool warm-ups.  They played again on Thursday and they won their first game!  Go Knights!  Go Sarah!

In other basketball happenings, Cali and Chey had practice on Tuesday.  Calianne demonstrated what she learned about blocking out on her dad.  It was pretty impressive!  Mariah and I had practice on Tuesday and Thursday.  Meg and Kevin had practice on Monday and Thursday.  Mariah and Dad's club team had practice late Thursday night and a game (which they won by a lot) on Saturday.  It keeps us moving.

I've had a bad cold all week.  My voice even went out for awhile.  It wasn't very fun.  At least I had a good excuse for not exercising and sleeping in.  :)  Otherwise, it was dreary.

On Friday afternoon, the choir from Brookside and the ukulele club performed together.  Mariah is in the choir and Cheyenne in the ukulele club.  They both did great.  I love to see them doing these good things and developing their talents!

Mariah is in light green, fifth on the top row.

Isn't this a great view I had of Cheyenne?

My two shining stars!

On Saturday, I left Benjamin home with Kevin and took the rest of the girls (minus Savannah who was working) to the dollar store to let them shop for presents for each other.  They were all so funny.  We had a grand time and I think many fun presents were chosen and will brighten our day come Christmas morning!

That night we all watched Miracle on 34th Street together.  It was fun being all cozy together!

Savannah had a big work week.  Two of the regular workers were unable to fill their regular shifts, so instead of Savannah working three days, she worked five.  The poor girl.  She is sick, sick, sick of Christmas music!

We decorated our tree last week on Sunday!  We decorated in the last half hour before the Christmas Devotional came on TV, but with so many hands to help with the “work,” that was plenty of time!

Sarah had her Christmas Choral Concert this week on Wednesday night.  She looked lovely.  I know this because I saw her before and after even though two tall boys stood in front of her during the performance!  That’s alright.  I could see half of her face most of the time and all of her face some of the time.  She sang with confidence!  They even sang in Russian!  They even sang Betelehemu which I first fell in love with when I heard the BYU Men’s Chorus sing when I was in college.  We really enjoyed the whole performance.

Thursday night was Cali and Cheyenne’s Third Grade Christmas Program.  They did awesome singing Christmas songs and teaching us about traditions from all around the world.  Calianne dressed as a Santa Lucia girl from Sweden in a white dress (my baptism dress that my mom made for me!) with construction paper candles on her head.  Cheyenne didn’t have to dress special, but she played the Santa Lucia song on the ukulele with the other kids!  I was so impressed!  It was a fun night!

Cali even wore the apron that goes on top for school.  So cute!

Friday night was our ward Christmas Party.  The decorations were fabulous and the program was full of the spirit of Christmas.  The food was awesome, as usual, as well.  I brought apple turnovers.  That’s the first time I ever made them so I was very impressed with myself.  Cali and Cheyenne were in the primary’s reenactment of the nativity.  They didn’t script the kids very much this year, and when it was over, everyone was crowded around the manger.  All we could see were the backs of a bunch of kids, trying to get a look at the baby.  Which is how I’m sure it really was, afterall.  It was pretty special to me.  We had a good night!

Saturday night, Kevin and I went out for our date night (since we couldn’t on Friday) and we went to Mr. Mac’s to get him a new suit for his birthday present.  He’s going to look great in it!

In between all that, we played a lot of basketball.  Sarah had a game on Monday and practices Tuesday thru Saturday.  Megan had games on Wednesday and Thursday and practices on Monday and Thursday.  Mariah had games on Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday and practices on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday.  Calianne and Cheyenne had practices on Tuesday and Thursday.  Kevin came home from his game Saturday and said, “Hey!  I’ve been thinking of a way we could get Megan on another team.”  Yeah, I think we are suckers for punishment.

Sarah got her "warmups" for the basketball team and she loves them!  She thinks she looks totally cool in them, and . . . she's right!

Savannah worked holiday hours at Funfinity on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.  She also went to see Lincoln at the theatres for extra credit for her history class.  She really liked it.

Bethany went to preschool on Monday and Wednesday and ballet on Tuesday and to Grandma’s on Thursday and Saturday.  She and Ben also watched “Sofia the First” 400 times . . . or thereabouts.

Benjamin has had a bad cough all week, but if you think that has made him more willing to nap during the day, you would be mistaken!  He has learned that he can crawl out of his crib, open his door, and rejoin us.  Mostly so far I have just let him.  He has been calling Bethany, “Beffy,” but lately he can say Bethany with only a small lisp.  He follows her everywhere.  On the way back from preschool this week, he walked next to her and kept his hand on the small of her back.  What a gentleman, eh?  He missed her.  Those two are good friends.  I love to see it.

This week was Mariah's birthday!

She turned twelve and has joined the Young Women with her older sisters at church.  Holy Cow!  She is so grown up!

Thursday was Mariah's birthday but it was a crazy, crazy day.  We knew we'd be busy, so we planned to celebrate Friday night over at Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik's house!

Grandma made a lovely dinner.  We had ham and potatoes and corn and rolls and jello.  Mariah got to open her presents (finally!) and we all had cake and ice cream.  It was great!

I made that cute owl bag!  Didn't it turn out awesome???

We are so happy that she came to our family 12 years ago.  She is so full of energy and drive and pushes us all to be better.  Happy Birthday, Mariah!!!

On Monday, Sarah had a junior high basketball game.  Kevin and I and Grandma and Grandpa all watched her together.  It's so fun to watch her in these level games.  She had another game Tuesday and another on Thursday, but we weren't able to go.  They haven't won, yet, and that can be frustrating for Sarah, but she is having a good time!

Also on Monday, Megan went to referee training.  She is going to try to earn some money by reffing for the younger leagues through city recreation.  I hope it all works out.

On Tuesday, the girls had a combined Young Women activity with the Young Men to go rock climbing.  Savannah convinced Mariah to go, too, since she'd be twelve in two more days.  They all had a great time!  They were all oh, so sore the next day, but they loved it!

On Wednesday, I went to parent-teacher conferences at the elementary school for Chey, Cali, and Mariah.  There I found out that my children are about as close to perfect as they come -- a fact I was pretty sure of already!  Megan, Mariah, and Kevin had a basketball game that night and lost their first in that league.  Sarah, Chey, Cali, Beth, Ben, and I had fun watching anyway!

Thursday, our crazy day, Cali and Cheyenne had their first basketball practice (yay!) from 4-5, Mariah and I had our first basketball practice from 4:30 to 5:30, Mariah, Megan, and Kevin had a game at 6, and Kevin and Megan had their first basketball practice for their Springville team from 7:30 to 8:30.  What do you think of THAT!  Also, Savannah was at work from 4 to 9:20, and Sarah had that third basketball game of the week over at the junior high.  That's just about everybody!  Beth and Ben got to go on a lot of car rides!

On Saturday, we decided to get our Christmas tree!  Savannah was at work in the morning, but the rest of us went to the lot, and the girls picked out a beauty!  We even bought some hot sugared almonds as we left.  It was fun!

That afternoon, we dropped Beth and Ben off at a friend's house, picked Savannah up from work and drove into Orem for the matinee performance of the Forgotten Carols!  Our family watches the DVD every year, so it was a real treat to see it live.  The spirit was so strong.  It was such a great event to share as a family!  We will always remember it.

That night Kevin and Mariah had another basketball game.  (You saw that coming, right?)  It was their first with the advanced Bantam league.  They won by a lot!  Kevin's hoping for a bit more of a challenge with future games.  Heh, heh.

I also taught preschool this week.  Bethany would prefer to be going to princess school, but she doesn't complain too much when we learn letters, instead!  :)

Sarah is so FUNNY we love her guts! Even though it gets annoying sometimes we live with her.
                                                  - STIFF!!!!!!!!

(Yes.  Sarah added the last two lines.  We do love her guts, though.)