House guest

We have a house guest for two days. Ashley H* was a classmate of Aaron's in med school. She is out on the interview trail and we offered her a place to stay. It's been fun to have someone to talk to, especially since Aaron is on call. She's the first non-family guest we've had stay over night!

This gave me an excuse to do a thorough cleaning of the house. As I was cleaning the kitchen Timothy suddenly pulled up a chair and said, "I want to help."
How helpful, I thought. I said "what do you want to clean?" He answered, "No I want to make something." I had to laugh. I usually clean the kitchen after the kids go to bed, unless I'm about to make dinner, or cookies or something. So he must have thought that I was going to make something.

Tomorrow we may have a rare treat. The forecast calls for snow, which is unusual in the "lowlands". Apparently the streets are horrible in snow. And there are hills everywhere. Did you know that? I didn't until I moved here. So if it does snow, I'm not leaving the house. So I hope it doesn't snow, at least not in the morning. We are going over to Andy's house (a friend of David's from school). His mom - Caroline - said if it snows she wouldn't want us to drive down her street or get stuck in her driveway - very steep. David is convinced it will snow, because all the kids were talking about it today at school. Weather.com thinks there's a greater chance tomorrow evening, so we shall see. We were going to eat out with Ashley tomorrow, but we'll see what the weather brings.

Far Side

David found and old Far Side book of Aaron's. He thought the pictures were so funny! Thank goodness he can't read. Oh wait, yes he can. I'm in trouble.

Our Christmas Tree

I didn't realize how many ornaments we have until I started taking pictures of all of them. I am not the best photographer, so some of these may be a little blurry, sorry. Growing up we always had an eclectic collection of ornaments. No themes, just ornaments people had given us, ones we had made at school etc. So here are some of the ones we hang on our tree and their background.

OK first I have to do our stockings, because I forgot to upload them in my last post.

My mom has made stockings for the family for a long time. At some point
she added the fur on the top and made the boys' stockings green.
As we add spouses and children she makes more.
Although they seem to be getting bigger, I can't even fit an orange in mine.

Here's one from my Brother Mike - who's now in college! Man they grow up fast.

The one from my brother Scott the same year.

Cute one from my sister Eva from last year. She gives us ornaments every year.

She gave us this one for our first Christmas together.

(If I remember correctly she had two and gave us one)

Another from Eva

It's matching partner.

From Eva - cute Raggedy Ann Doll!

Either from Mom or Eva- very cute.

From Eva. If you look closely the snowmen

are made out of walnut and hazelnut shells.

Can't remember who it's from, but it's from 2000 and came in a green velvet case.

From my mom, she made it the same year as our tablecloth,

oh and these cute hot pads and an apron.

My dad had these made with our names engraved on them years ago.

It's one of the few I've salvaged from my childhood.

Last year we all got angel ornaments from Mom and Eva.

These next ones came from my parents in 2003

This is mine

This is Aaron's

This is David's

There were 12 in the box and only 7 kids, 2 spouses and 1 grandchild at the time. So there was an extra one for when I announced that I was expecting my second.
So this one is Timothy's, even though it doesn't have his name on it.

This is Timothy's "Baby's First Christmas" given to us by my family.

This is David's "Baby's First Christmas" given to us from my family.

This is another given to us, I think from Eva, but it is too heavy for our

wimpy tree, so it sits next to our caroling angel reindeer.

This is our star. After years of searching, we found one

that was right for our tree, and in our price range.

This is one Aaron brought into the family.
I believe he bought it in Argentina.

Aaron also brought this one from his childhood.
I don't know what happened to Mickey.

This is also one of Aaron's, but I can't remember where it came from.
(update - it's from Aaron's Grandma P*, from when she served a mission in San Diego with the Hmong people)
The following 6 ornaments came from my Aunt Patty, Uncle Don and cousins Jen and Kristy.
My uncle works at the Pentagon and is able to purchase the White house ornaments every year.
I think they are so beautiful.

2000

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

This came from a friend I worked with at Beehive Clothing.
It's melted snow man! So funny.

This was also from a coworker at Beehive Clothing in 2001.

The ornaments we buy for ourselves come from places we have visited.

These are the souvenirs we bring back.

We didn't have to travel far for this one. We were in UT
during the 2002 Winter Olympics.
Not surprisingly this is our most expensive ornament!

We got matching ornaments in San Francisco one of the many times we went there.

On another trip to the bay area we went to the Winchester Mystery House.

Aaron was in San Antonio for a Conference

while at BYU and found this Alamo ornament.

While Aaron was interviewing for med school he picked this one up in New York.

While interviewing for residency in Boston, Aaron found this one.

And lastly this one is from Texas of course.
The two sides are different, hence the two pictures.

Whew, that's it. So when we add to our collection I'll have to post more.

Our Christmas Decorations

This weekend we put up our decorations. I thought it would be fun to share a little background on some of the things we've been given and collected over the years. (descriptions are below the picture).

Aaron put up our Christmas lights
and then took this picture from the apartments just south of us.
The satellite dish was left from a previous tenant.
We still have rabbit ears.

I got this at a discount store back in 1994. The mirror it came with was broken-
that's why it was really cheap.
It was the only thing I had to decorate with at college.

I don't remember when I got this angel. I had to have been at least 8
because all five girls got one from Aunt Goldie.
Our tree isn't big enough to support it, so it sits on one of our shelves.
Aunt Goldie loved to give us angel things.
Maybe it's because she had two boys. At least she has granddaughters now.

This came from my family last year. I love it. It also has a place on our shelves.

Aaron and I got this nutcracker the first year we were married.
Honestly I think it was a free doorbuster gift from Black Friday 8 years ago.

This was also a Black Friday purchase some years ago.
Just a simple crystal Christmas candy dish,
with no candy to fill it, just yet.

These reindeer choir angels came from my family a few years back.

This was a post Christmas sale find last year.
So this is the first year we've displayed it.

My mom made this tablecloth for us 7 years ago. I remember because she was finishing all of her sewing projects on Christmas Eve. The sewing machine was in the room we were staying in and I was exhausted, but I couldn't sleep because she was busy working. I tried to stay awake and talk to her, but I think I was asleep half the time. We use it as a throw because now that we have added two kids, our table is no longer round.

This is what happened when the kids noticed I was snapping all of these pictures.

Here is our tree (more to come on the ornaments)

The kids in front of the tree. I kept this one because Timothy is in fact not crying but in mid-sneeze. Love the 2 second delay on my digital camera!

David being silly in front of the tree.

My silly kids!