Christmas and The New Year!

The holidays have been so fun this (last) year! This first picture starts us off about a week before Christmas. We had dinner with our friends Amanda and Tim, Amanda's older brother, and our friend Britney. This is a picture of all of us girls, friends since junior high! I'm so glad we still all live close enough to see each other at least a couple of times a year!

These next pictures were taken the night before Christmas Eve. Sarah's three eldest kids got to spend the weekend at Grandma and Grandpa's, and Luke, Peter, and I came to join them Sunday night. We watched a Christmas movie from the 80's which was one of Luke's favorites growing up, and had fruit and hot cocoa for a treat, and big coloring pages for a craft! This was already after the kids had been having fun with Grandma and Grandpa all day, making the animals for our upcoming Nativity play, and doing lots of other fun things. You go, Grandparents!

Peter's jam hands after breakfast on Christmas Eve morning.

These next pictures chronicle our evening with the Perkins family on Christmas Eve. Here is a picture of me and Lauren, showing off our twin pregnant bellies! Mine is a bit bigger, despite the fact that I'm due a solid two weeks after she is. Chalk it up to this being my second baby and her first. And maybe the fact that I haven't been awesome at exercising like I should. New Year's Resolutions, coming right up!

This is a picture of all of us as we are gathering in the front living room, putting on our costumes and preparing to do the Natvity play.

This year's narrator was Jackson. He assigned all the parts, as well as several singing solos, helped craft the cardboard animals, and read the narration perfectly! Excellent job, Jackson!

Here he is in his lovely red Christmas jacket, a contribution from his great-grandpa, listening to Andy sing his solo. Andy, of course, whipped out his guitar and accompanied himself. Why not?

Peter and Blaze were innkeepers and possibly shepherds? They spent their time running through the room several times and not saying any of their lines. They enjoyed their costumes and the festive atmosphere though.

Jackson, in his narrating stance.

Paul, performing his part. Paul helped fill in for the little toddlers who wouldn't. Thanks Paul!

At the last minute, Luke and I were cast as Mary and Joseph. This actually went rather well with my assigned solo of Mary's Lullaby. Here we are in costume, with our baby in his manger.

This is Cara, Andy's girlfriend, performing her role as the angel who spoke to the shepherds. Lovely.

Sarah accompanied us all in singing "Joy to the World."

This is a shot of Caleb right after he finished singing his solo. Alanna, too, is pictured with her father, looking on the whole thing. She was going to take part in the beginning, but then decided not to. Next year!

After the play was finished we opened our gifts from one another and from Mom and Dad Perkins. Andy had me and Luke, and he got us some chopsticks and a movie by the Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki, called My Neighbor Totoro. We have watched it since, and it's delightful! I felt like the depiction of the two little girls was so realistic! In a surprising way. Mr. Miyazaki has a gift for pulling that off.

Here are the kids, opening some of their gifts.

Caleb and Lauren and Sarah and James got one another's names, and ended up each getting the other this game! Ha ha ha! I missed getting a picture of Sarah and James with theirs, but I think they were equally delighted.

Luke and I had Andy, and we got him a gigantic pack of Strawberry Crush, a childhood favorite.

Kids are so fun to watch on Christmas! They open one gift, squeal with delight, and immediately set to work playing with it. Here is Peter, with a new Finn McMissile car.

Here's Mom and Dad, opening one of their gifts.

And Blaze, unveiling the Telestrations game given to the Williamson family!

Throughout the holiday, Peter and Alanna continually came back to these chairs together. They love spinning them around, and spinning one another around on them.

That night we went over to my parents' house and I gave Kaden his gift, a book and a 2-liter pop bottle with instructions on how to make a cloud in it once the drink is gone. He's obviously ecstatic.

Luke had picked Samantha's name, and he ended up doing a 12 days of Harry Potter Christmas for her. She opened the last one on Christmas morning, but of course I didn't get a picture of it. I have acquired the pictures my mom took of her opening the items each day, though, so we have the first eleven here. Samantha is generally making some kind of silly face in these pictures. Silly faces are required as a member of the Wright family. As a child you practice them, largely in order to get attention. As an adult, you pull them when you feel stupid being the center of attention in front of the camera. I believe her faces are a product of the latter. The boys are also featured in several of the photos, and they too are generally pulling silly faces, though the cause is most probably the first kind in nature.

The first day she received an acceptance letter to Hogwarts.

The second was two bottles of polyjuice potion.

 

The third was three candles from the Great Hall, which Peeves stole. He also stole stationary from Professor McGonagall's office, wrote rude words on it in lemon juice, and left the whole thing for Samantha to discover.

The fourth day she got howler's, from Neville's grandmother I believe.

The fifth day was five rock cakes (no-bake cookies, rather delightful ones, really) from Hagrid.

The sixth was six butterbeers (cream soda).

 The seventh brought tears to the poor girl! Another classic Wright thing to do, mostly for the girls though. It was seven muggle dollars.

 

The eighth day were the last eight Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, leftover from Ron's package.

The ninth was a ticket for platform nine and three quarters.

The tenth was ten squares of wizard chocolate.

The eleventh was eleven lemon drops from Professor Dumbledore.

The twelfth was a beautiful handcrafted salt dough ornament Luke made of Hedwig, with a decorative diamond attached that had an H on it. So mad I didn't get a picture! And it appears my mom might not have gotten one either. Lame!

Anyway, Luke really out-did himself with her gift. He really loves thinking up fun gifts to do, and his skills as a Graphic Designer make everything that much more delightful! His gift to me was just as well-designed and fun, but of course I failed to take a picture of it. It was a pamphlet with several gift cards to different pizza places, along with fun facts about pizza, a history of pizza, and a blurb about each pizza place. I was so happy! I am such a pizza girl!

Continuing on with Christmas morning. Here is a picture of the tree all lit up, with several presents awaiting our sleepy eyes.

This is a series of pictures of everyone that morning. This first features Devin pushing Silas in his new car!

Mom, Dad, Kaden, Ashton, and Samantha.

Heidi, Devin, and Silas.

Ronny.

Mom and Dad opening their gift from all us kids: tickets to Phantom of the Opera down at BYU. They have since attended the performance, and said it was extremely well-done! (Luke also designed the card we gave them the tickets in. It was very minimal and cleverly put together, consisting entirely of two pieces of paper. The black cover, and a white interior with hand-cut lettering so the black would show through, and a pop-out mask. Again, I don't believe I have any pictures of it. Obnoxious.)

Kaden, Ashton, Samantha's roommate Reagan, and Samantha, in the process of opening some of their gifts.

Mom and Dad, enjoying all the fun.

Luke, perusing his gift from me: a subscription to Print magazine. I was really quite proud of myself for that one. I thought it up all on my own, and then, when he was trying to think of a list of things he might like that he could submit to his parents, he mentioned he'd really enjoy a subscription to a graphic design magazine. Nailed it! ;)

Silas, Heidi, Devin, and Ronny.

Peter, looking at the broom and dustpan we got for him. Whenever we go to sweep the floor he insists on taking the broom from us and usurping our turn!

We also gave him a set of farm animals, horses, barn and fencing that had been mine as a little girl.

Grandma and Grandpa got him this Ballapalooza, which is very like a marble run, but it uses bigger balls, alleviating any choking hazard. It's too bad I didn't get a picture of it all set up, it's fun! But it's also quite big, so it will stay at Grandma's house and be a fresh new toy each time we visit.

And that finishes off the Christmas pictures! After opening presents we had our traditional Christmas breakfast of cinnamon rolls, orange rolls, and an omelet. We spent most of the rest of the day playing games and eating leftovers. That evening we went over to the Perkins' again to exchange gifts with them. Of course I forgot to take pictures. But Grandma and Grandpa got Peter a treasury of Curious George, which he has already had us read in its entirety, as well as several more cars from the two movies Cars, which he plays with every day, and a mini basketball hoop which can hang from a door, and which he loves to play with his Daddy, particularly if it will delay bedtime. They got Luke a Nexus 7, one of the recent desires of his heart, and me a Moby wrap, one of the long-time desires of mine. I'm so excited to try it with the new baby! They also got us a pass to the zoo, and to Clark Planetarium! Several of our friends up here have passes to the zoo, and it's within walking distance, so that will be so much fun when the weather warms up a bit! We've also never taken Peter to the Clark Planetarium, and they have several exhibits which I've heard he'd enjoy very much. Thanks so much Mom and Dad!

Christmas is always so much fun. I love the decorations, and music, and food, and family time. For some people it's hard to take it all down and put it away. I, however, really enjoy starting off the New Year by doing just that! For the past two or three years we've used some of the break time around New Year's to clean and organize our apartment, and I LOVE it! This year we had a big change to make--Peter got his own room! This new arrangement caused quite a bit more rearranging and organizing than usual, but I was so pleased with the results that I took pictures of it all and had to post them.

Our bedroom, with newly freed-up space on the floor where Peter's bed used to go. Part of me is so sad my baby's growing up! But he was so excited about his new room, that I can't help being excited with him.

Luke's closet used to have Peter's clothes in it as well as his own. Now it houses leftover projects and papers, along with his shirts.

Here's my closet, which got a little more organized on the top shelf, and cleared out some space at the bottom to put our hampers instead of shoes.

We moved all of our shoes to the entryway closet, which I've enjoyed very much. It's nice to have them all in one place, and to be able to keep the wetness, dirt, and salt of the winter at the entry.

We moved the rocking chair and quilt into Peter's room, and the desk out here.

I cleaned out and reorganized the back closet.

And now for the grand finale--Peter's new room! Here is his closet, with his toys and books that we have rotated out, on the top shelf, and his clothes and the books we've rotated in, on the bottom shelves within his reach. He has been slowly learning how to dress himself. So exciting! The closet door also serves as a perfect perch for his basketball hoop.

And the rest of the room, with the set-up of his bed, the rocking chair, and the quilt. Sadly, the air has been so dry that we needed to put a humidifier in his room, which made the quilt fall down (it was only attached by those wall-sticking things). Perhaps as the weather gets warmer we'll be able to replace it.

Here's Peter, enjoying his new room!

For New Year's Eve we went to the Perkins. Sarah and James came with their family as well, and Uncle Caleb made an appearance during the day. Lauren couldn't come because of having pink eye! Poor girl. Pregnant girls really ought to get a break from any other diseases or problems during those nine months. Heck, they should get a break for the rest of the time they're a mom, too!

Here are all the kids, entranced by story time with Grandma, while their moms were cooking up some yummy Asian-inspired delicacies: ham-fried rice, wontons and pot-stickers, and orange chicken!

Peter and Blaze, best of buds. At least for the moment. :)

Peter and Alanna, entirely absorbed by the T.V. in the other room.

We spent the night making and eating the delicious food and playing Telestrations, the game Caleb and Lauren and Sarah and James had given one another for Christmas. It was definitely a hit! Staying up 'til midnight isn't the most child-friendly tradition in the world, though, so Luke, Peter, and I called it a night a little while before twelve.

Luke didn't start school for another week after the break, which was so nice! Peter especially enjoyed the extra play time with Daddy.

Here they are, bouncing on the dragon/reptile-of-some-sort, killing Luke's sore back. (He has also out-done himself with shoveling snow, this season.)

Killing Luke's back further, as they both squeezed into the little playhouse.

And Peter, making one of his first snow-angels! Watching kids grow up is so much fun!

Here is the collection of cars Peter got for Christmas (minus the random blue one without eyes).

Lastly, a photo of our new napkins the Wongs gave to everyone in the Perkins family for Christmas. You couldn't ask for a nicer matching set!