December Happenings

This Christmas Season has been full of lots of activities, big and small. Here's a recap:

--This month has been incredibly busy for me. David and I talked at the beginning of the season and talked about how we wanted to cut out things that we were doing just for the sake of doing them, and really try to slow down and enjoy the season and focus on the things that were the most important to us. I feel like we did a good job with that as far as family things go - but I spent a good number of mornings waking up at 4 a.m. so I could get work done before the kids woke up and it was exhausting. Preparing for a new year in Primary is no joke. There's so much to do. Plus I had a couple of RLD design projects that jumped out at my last minute and it was just... a lot. However, due in large part to my many early mornings, I was able to get everything done and still enjoy this season with my family. I'm so excited for the Primary Theme next year, "I am a Child of God." The start of the year is going to be a little cra-zy, but I'm hopeful that it will go smoothly and be successful! 

-We celebrated my parent's 32nd wedding anniversary. I'm so proud of them and grateful for their example. And grateful for the love that they share and the hard work that they've put into raising their family. 

-A lunch date with Dad is the perfect kind of activity for these kids. (And their mama.) 

-I can't remember if we wrote about this or not, but this year David's Eide Bailly Christmas party was at the Living Planet Aquarium in Draper. We got to walk around all of the exhibits after-hours, eat a delicious dinner, and hang out with David's co-workers. I wish I'd gotten a better picture - but we dressed up nice and had a great time. 

--Lydia's at the sweetest age right now. She is SUCH a good big sister to her brothers and has recently started picking Caleb up and carrying him around. (I don't really like it when she does it, but he's finally big enough, and she's big enough that I let it slide sometimes.) She's always so proud and takes good care of him. She made a Christmas present for David and I at school and was soooo excited to give it to us. We sure love this girl. 

--We hit the Festival of Trees with Sue and Amy for Sue's birthday. I was SOOO glad to have David be able to come with us! 

-Some Christmas shenanigans included a chocolate advent calendar every day - and many Target runs (one of which they were handing out free cookies and juice boxes - so that was a win!) 

-Last year after Christmas I found a whole bunch of wrapping paper on super-clearance and I snagged 80+ rolls for between 20 & 30 cents a piece. We held on to them all year long and handed them out to our friends and neighbors to express our love and gratitude for them. (I truly love neighbor gifts.)

--The Peaden Family Christmas party was a hit. We played bingo, decorated cookies, and had a white elephant gift exchange. Usually the goal of the white elephant gift exchange is to buy gifts that everyone wants and then trade strategically so you end up with the best thing. This year, at the very end, after all the gifts were locked in - there were a few still unopened. Austin had an unopened bag, and when he opened it - it was a live beta fish. :o I wasn't so sure at first - but "Little Blue" has become a happy little part of our family. (Side-note: I was trying to make a dark red frosting color and it ended up totally black. I took the opportunity to make a "lump of coal" for my cookie submission this year. It didn't win. Ha.) David's cookie is the one under mine in the picture below. Austin made a sprinkle covered snowman, and Lydia made the most darling white-frosting covered reindeer with a red sprinkle for its nose. 

-One of the last things we did this month, and also one of the most adventurous, was an escape room with a few of David's siblings. Bruce had to go back to New York (boo), so we decided to get a babysitter and have a fun evening out. We went to an escape room, and actually did really well. The room we were in was decorated beautifully and the puzzles were interesting and varied. Some of the puzzles were too easy, in that we guessed the order of the letters (because we thought we were supposed to arrange them to make a word) instead of learning from a different puzzle what order they were supposed to go in. So we did some things were out of order, and ended up getting out of the room without solving all of the puzzles. The look on the guys face when we burst through the door (on accident) was priceless, because we were really struggling with one puzzle and all the sudden we were out without ever figuring it out. But we came back inside and figured the rest of the puzzles out, still within the hour time limit. This is the second escape room we've done - and we really like them. It's fun to work together as a group to solve puzzles. Both times we've gone, we've used a groupon so even though it's one of our more expensive dates - it hasn't been too expensive.