We started Christmas off at the ward party.
Patrick asked Santa for a train (the first I'd heard of that)
Colin asked Santa for a train (what?!?)
I loved that Samantha got right in line and didn't express any concern about being too old or 'is Santa real?'.
She asked for a microscope.
She told me that was what she would ask for because she was too embarrassed to ask him for the fish training set that she REALLY wanted.
Here's Samantha (in yellow) at her school Christmas program. She did great but was bummed that her class sang the same song her 1st grade class sung last year.
The 3 days before Christmas we joined Grandma & Grandpa across the street for their annual candy cane give away. This was the first night. It snowed kind of a lot. We stuck close to the fire and went home early.
Samantha & Patrick trying to catch snowflakes on their tongues.
Patrick grew an impressive mustache fro some hot chocolate some friends brought us while we were out giving away candy canes.
Christmas morning.
I finally realized the flash on our camera is dead. (Thus all the dark pictures) I think this is about the only picture I took on Christmas morning.
Samantha got her fish training set. Unfortunately, training fish is a long boring proses and to date none of her fish have learned any thing.
Patrick was a little disappointed that Santa, knowing that Mom found a smoking deal on a train before Christmas, didn't bring him another for Christmas. He got over it.
All 3 kids got lots of cool stuff.
After we were done at our house we went to Grandma & Grandpa's, then to Grandma Ruth's for breakfast.
The day after Christmas we headed to Utah to visit Dale's sister and brother.
While we were there we sold Colin's "buddy" Little Man.
Colin was sad but took it like a big boy. He knew that Little Man was going to a new home and enjoyed his last few days with him.
We all hope he is enjoying Idaho.
Good-bye Little Man!
Don't freeze in Idaho!
We had a great time in Utah but were happy to get back home to the toys we didn't get to take with.