Christmas Vacation and then some

We had a very busy Christmas vacation, and I took a ton of pictures.  I didn't have time to blog because we were having so much fun (and I was shopping, wrapping, cooking, cleaning, making goodies, packing for Crane, getting home from Crane, had all 8 kids here to cook/clean for, do laundry for, doing remodel projects, I had to work all week etc. etc. etc). 

SO:  This slide show is the best I can do for pictures and a recap of our December.  Grab a bowl of popcorn and a cup of hot chocolate and have a look.  The slide show is running backwards chronologically - don't know how to fix that, don't have time to figure it out.

Here are the highlights in backwards order:
***Ice Skating with our old ward.  No bumps on the head this year, but one lady broke her arm in 3 places.  I wonder if they will keep having this event?

***Sledding with the youth.  There were not enough women leaders for the youth to go on their annual sledding event.  I told them I could go if I could bring the whole family.  They said sure.  I got up at 4:00 and got my work done and we were at the church at 7:45 ready for lift off.  It was a fun day.  The Bishop brought his 4-wheeler with snow tracks which made for a really fun tube ride.

***Christmas at home with all the kids.  We picked up the K-critters on Saturday, December 26, 2009.  We went home to a nice clean house (thank you G-critters) and had a nice Christmas together.  I had velveeta and chili with tortilla chips and drinks for dinner.  It was a relaxing evening.

***Christmas in Crane. Christmas Day at the Ranch was nice.  We only did "Santa" for the G-critters there so it was somewhat of a not-very-exciting day for them, but we had fun watching everyone else open presents and played a lot of games.  Of course there was way too much yummy food to eat.

***Christmas Eve in Diamond.  We spent Christmas Eve at the Horse Family Barn.  Mare and Grandma Bear made yummy soup and I brought a yummy salad bar.  There were lots of choices for dessert and drinks too.  The Horse Family invited some guys from Peru to celebrate with us.  There were three of them and they were really nice even though we couldn't understand them - the Horse family could as well as Cheetah and Chamealon.  It was fun playing the Wii with them.