More Sledding! (in town style)

Our Critters really love to go sledding. Saturday afternoon we went over to some friends house and they pulled the critters behind the Rhino. We went around their house for a while, and then over to the High School parking lot and took them for a spin.

Penguin and a cousin go flyin' over the "jump" (a pile of sand)

Over the jump again...

Bee and Penguin went flying, but miraculously they both landed on the sled and hung on!

Dinner at Sizzler

We NEVER go out to eat, so for one of the critters Christmas presents, we took them out to eat at Sizzler. They thought it was pretty cool that they could eat as much as they wanted. I think most of them got sick from eating too much. After dinner, we took them to Target and Sportsmans to spend some of their Christmas money.

Sledding

The day after Christmas we took the critters sledding out along the canal banks on the BLM property. We drove for miles and miles. The critters had a great time even though we had a few good crashes, a case of snow rash on the chin and lot of bruises!

Hunter gets his thrills by trying to dump the critters off their sleds.

Martin and Steelhead take a turn. Steelhead had a hard time staying on the orange sled. He was a maniac on the other one when it was his turn though.

Monkey and Porcupine zooming along.

Penguin takes a tumble and Bee hangs on.

Lemur went for a ride all by himself!

Monkey and Porcupine think they are snow boarding (and very cool) while Lemur takes his turn.

Christmas Night

The M. Critters came back on Christmas night at 8:00. We had another round of gift opening and then went to bed.

Christmas Morning

The K. Kritters were with us on Christmas morning. We actually slept in this year and it was the best present I got! :) We had a nice quiet morning opening gifts, playing with our presents and then taking a nap. Later we had a big Christmas dinner of ham, augrautin potatoes, and green salad. We all ate until we were stuffed. Then we played more games and I watched a movie while Hunter took the critters sledding.
Steelhead digs into his stocking. All the boys got wrist rockets this year.... look out birds in our area!

Penguin opens a gift.

Porcupine digs in.

Lemur caught on real quick to all this present opening stuff.

Lemur loved getting a ride in the wheel barrow from Penguine!

Christmas Eve

Traditions are so wonderful, it keeps me from having to think of something new every year, the critters know what to look forward too, and thankfully, our traditions are simple and Christ Centered. We weren't really hungry around dinner time on Christmas Eve because earlier in the day we had been to Hunters Work Christmas Lunch and had stuffed ourselves on grilled steak and chicken, potato salad, BBQ beans, and all kinds of desserts. SO: We opened our gift first instead of eating first. Usually we eat dinner, open a gift (which is always a game) play the game, then read the Christmas story out of the bible. Lemur had opened the gift earlier in the day, so we re-opened it, acted surprised, and played the game. He actually opened a different game than the one I had meant to give the family for Christmas Eve, but that's beside the point. We played the game he opened; "Wheel of Fortune." We took turns playing in 3's and then... the power went out, like it does every year... hummm. I guess Hunter wasn't discreet enough because the kids caught on and Porcupine said, "I saw him flip the switch." Oh well, the power was out just the same.

We had our "Journey to Bethlehem" dinner by oil lamp light: Flat bread, dried meats, cheeses, figs (okay, we had fig newtons) grapes, and grape juice. I forgot the olives this year. It is a very simple meal to fix, eat and clean up. I love it. I would like to get wooden dishes to serve it on one of these days.

After dinner we read the Christmas story and went to bed.

Sunday Evening

We had an actual, real-live, full blown snow storm today!!! It was awesome. It snowed most of the day. We went to church (Zookeeper, Penguin and Bee left early for choir practice and did a big slidy-whirly in the road on the way to church... whew! Safe! After we had stopped and weren't in the ditch, in the fence or up-side-down, the girls said... that was fun! Zookeeper didn't think so) and had awesome meetings - I love the Sunday before Christmas. Our choir did a Cantata -Shine for Me Again - for the Sunday School program. Zookeeper is the choir director and was thrilled with the way it turned out. When she started having choir practice about 6-8 people came. We had over 40 in the choir on Sunday. She hopes they all come back in January!

After church, dinner, naps and home teaching, we took the critters sledding behind the pickup. We started with three sleds, but of course one ended up breaking, so we were down to two. The camera battery died and it was getting dark, but here are a few shots. Hunter drove pretty mellow until just Steelhead and Martin were riding, then he went crazy trying to knock them off. I think Martin might have said, "not fast this time" but we heard "real fast this time!" :) We live near a BLM field so we borrowed it to drive the critters around in. Even Lemur had fun and he was mad when his turn was over.

The girls got dumped. Steelhead and Martin hang on.

We came in after sledding for hot chocolate and a game of Settlers of Catan. (and we charged the camera battery).

Cold and Basketball

Just a cute picture of Lemur playing outside. It has been really cold here. Wish it would snow more like the weather man said it would!!! Liar!

Bee danced at halftime at the Varsity Basketball game on Friday night. I took Penguin, Porcupine and Monkey to the game with me... others wanted to go, but didn't have all their homework turned in... darn it! Next time though! We had a great time at the game. I hadn't been to a good old high school basketball game since Cheetah was in High School. It was a close game which made it exciting, and the Band was super good. Bee did a wonderful job dancing with her group at Half Time. Of course the candy was good too!

School Christmas Concert (Not a Holiday Concert!!!)

Two of the critters had their concert on Tuesday night. Here is Bee and one of her friends. The Music teacher did "Christmas Around the World" this year and everyone sang or played songs from different countries. It was a true Christmas concert with religious songs and fun ones. The music teacher is really, really good. The concert was one hour long, great songs, great dancing and a sing-along at the end.

Martin's Intermediate Band

Martin and his buddy - who is moving to Oregon in January :(

Bee played the recorder (Jolly Old St. Nicholas - the only song I've heard played by recorders at a Christmas Concert!!!) She did great though!

Bee singing with the choir - they did a song from Mexico, it was original, cute and sassy! Their music teacher does great choreography.

At the end, the whole school came out and sang one last song about Christmas in America that was very cute. I didn't get a picture of the kindergartners dancing which was the highlight of the concert (including one dress that the little girl kept pulling up over her head)

No Christmas concert is complete without an appearance of Santa - who I think went on a major diet this year, don't you? :) He was dancing to some of the sing along songs and his belt came off... I think he about lost the rest of his belly! If only dieting were that easy (I never wear a belt, so I should be as skinny as a pencil!)

It was a great concert and the kids did a super duper job.

Are snacks better if you eat them off the floor?...

Maybe I should try eating my snacks right off of the floor. Lemur seems to think they taste better that way, or at least it is his preferred way of eating his snacks. I got this shot this afternoon, but missed getting a picture of him eating Doritos off the floor this morning, apple jacks off the floor yesterday, and crackers off the floor at church. Maybe we'll have dinner off the floor tonight and test his theory.

No, I don't think Lemur is meaning to flip you off....

Fun in the Snow (all 1.5 inches of it)

The critters were so excited that it snowed on Sunday! After church they put on their snow stuff and headed outside.

Lemur LOVED it! The other critters pulled him around on the one broken sled that we have. He didn't care that it was broken.

Trying the sled out on the canal bank... made for a fast, bumpy ride!

They took turns sliding and crashing down the canal bank.

The critters were glad Uncle Cheetah left this little blue sled in our shed.

Cloggin' and Jazzin'... Bee's on stage!

Bee has been in a Clogging and Jazz dance performing group. Their recital was last Saturday. We braved the freezing cold night and went to the recital. It was a SUPER long program, but luckily Bee was in the first 10 performances and then she was done... yes, we snuck out early and went home to decorate more gingerbread cookies. :) Bee did a great job. She's quite a little dancer. Look how much taller she is than some of the other kids her age!

Clogging group.

Jazz dance group.

You can't catch me, I'm the ________________

You can't catch me, I'm the GINGERBREAD MAN! (and we did a few trees and snow men too)
We made up a batch of gingerbread cookies this afternoon. It was fun decorating them. Lemur was eating the candy by the handful. I think he did eat a few cookies too though.

Hunter actually decorated a tree, but he gobbled it up before I could take a picture of his Hallmark.

Artist's Hard at work.

Porcupine's Pieces.

Monkey's masterpiece.

Steelheads sensations.

Bee's Beauties. (and Monkey snuck in there too)

Penguin's Perfections.

Zookeepers Zowies!