Christmas At The Jones'

It was our turn to visit Boise for Christmas this year. I love all of the old traditions that are still carried on and can't wait until we start having Christmas on our own to figure out which ones we are going to carry on. Some of my favorites are christmas eve pajamas and the traditional Christmas Story reading. (Tim's family even has the kids dress up and act out the nativity.)

Tim and I got to help my parents play Santa Clause (you would be amazed by how many presents there are for 12 people). We ended up putting some of the smaller ones in the tree to make room.

Macy is always the highlight. Sometimes I think I should feel bad though, people always dress her up all silly, like this ganster hat for instance and all the while she just laughs. They even had her riding Shiba (until Shiba started running away).

We had a fun time bowling. Tim convinced all of the little kids to do their own personal jig everytime that they bowled well. His jig was pretty extravagant and probably shouldn't be repeated in public.

BYU won their bowl game (mostly because of Macy's cheerleading skills)!... Go Cougars!

Macy loved eating "SNICE" as my family called it. (Half snow/half ice). Yum.

A few days after Christmas, we all packed up our stuff and headed for a cabin in Garden Valley. It was great to get away from the everyday grind. The best part was the player piano in the family room. It was all old school with the paper rolls that you had to insert and you could even pedal with your feet if you wanted to. Arlin took us out snowmobiling for a bit. There are only a few things prettier than the fresh snow on the mountain tops.

Maybe it is because I am a first time mother, but I had to make sure that Macy was good and bundled before she headed out to play in the snow. She had a great time "bum sliding" with Aunt Kaytlen.

Tim, my dad, and I all spent New Year's Eve serving dinner and milkshakes to the young single adults at Boise State University. The Milkshake bar was a fantastic idea, which allowed everyone to make their own with a variety of like twenty toppings to choose from. Brillant!

Little Macy wore herself while we were there. She had quite a few rough nights (she only slept through the night twice in the ten days we were gone, spending most of the time she was asleep in Tim's arms) with a snotty nose and yucky cough that made it tough for her to sleep. Macy was even nice enough to share her sickness with both of us. The worst night though was New Year's Eve when she was up seven times before Tim and I got home at two. We even took her to the doctor when we got back to Portland and found out that she has a double ear infection, poor kid.

I almost forgot, we got so many great presents this year and we just can't wait to use them. My two top presents this year, which will get so much use, i'm sure were a pressure cooker (Rice has never tasted so nice) and a Cricut (hurray for making my scrapbooking needs so much easier and allowing me to do vinyl! I'm so excited to make cool projects like this one).

Tim has already made a lot of use of his IPOD touch (so much that I get free reign of the laptop now) and using his labeler to label everything in sight (including Macy's forehead and bum).

Macy has been really enjoying her new magnetic farm that attaches to the fridges and loves to push her stroller around. It was really cute she was even pushing Misha in the little baby basinett the other night.

Thank you all for our wonderful Christmas. We love you!