Christmas in Idaho

We spent a fun week with the Yost side for Christmas this year. It has been two years since we were last in Idaho and only Todd's parents had met Kaitlyn. Todd comes from a family of 7 kids, all but one are married- he's engaged- sorry ladies. Everyone was there this year - 32 Yosts total, of those 32, 17 were kids - two of them new babies. Busy house but a lot of fun!

We flew into SLC on Friday and spent so time visiting great grandparents, old friends, and taking the kids to see the lights on Temple Square, something I hadn't done in years. I loved it! Abby was more fascinated by the snow and all she wanted to do was play in it. While at temple square our camera battery died and I didn't bring the charger. There was no way I was not going to have a camera for Christmas and I made Todd by a new charger. He's so great.

On Sat. we visited some more family and friends and drove the 4 hours to Rigby. If you went to Ricks, you know where Rigby is :).

The rest of the week was spent visiting with family, eating, playing games, eating, and watching the kids play in the snow, oh, and more eating. It snowed every day we were there and it was very cold! I loved watching Abby play with her cousins. There were a couple of the older ones who she'd play school with and run around with. She loved the 24/7 friends.

Because there are so many of us, we reserved the church one day. One gift for one of the guys was "Dodge Ball" the movie and a bunch of dodge balls. Needless to say, games of dodge ball were going on in the gym. Todd even got some nice war wounds. We also had a nice experience of seeing the two new babies blessed with all the family there.

Lots of fun this Christmas and we're glad we were able to go out to Idaho and spend some time with the Yosts. I even got two families blogging! yeah! Hope everyone else had a great Christmas too!

Sweet Caroline

Found this video off of Eric Snider's blog and thought it was fun to share.

Snowball Fight!

The Yosts and an Australian kangaroo!

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"Boots Por Me!"

We had an early gift exchange with my parents this past Monday since we won't be doing Christmas together. Abby was a riot and was so into it. Kaitlyn liked sitting on the boxes and was happy with that.

Kaitlyn with a scarf made by Grandma.

Everything Abby opened, she would exclaim, "I cannot believe it!" One of her favorite gifts was a pair of red boots that we gave her. I was lucky enough to tape her expression. They were immediately put on her feet and didn't come off until bedtime.

Today, Tuesday, Abby didn't wear her boots, so at bedtime she said, "I haven't worn my boots in a really, really, really long time."

Wooo Boots! from sassy momma on Vimeo.

Gingerbread Train

We've been counting down the days to Christmas with doing a fun activity every day. Things that we'd normally do like watch Rudolph or drive to see the lights. Well last year in the Family Fun magazine they had a cool picture of a gingerbread train and the instructions on making it. This year I thought we'd try it out for one of our daily activities since Abby loves trains. I had no idea what I was getting into.

Making the dough, refrigerating it, rolling it out, baking it took a day in itself. And the mess to clean up when you have a 3 year "helping" you. Then today, I made their icing and started to "glue" the pieces together. It wasn't working! After an hour and an icing mess - our table was covered in white, I threw their icing away and made an icing I know. Things looked better from there. Abby liked eating all the candy before she got it on the train. She also loved to decorate it but she loved eating it more. It was a fun activity for that 30 minutes of it. As we finished taking pictures and all the decorating, I lifted the cardboard it was sitting on to move it to it's higher spot. While sitting on the counter, the weight of the "broiler" knocked half the engine to the floor, breaking it to pieces. Ugh! Two days of work on the train and nothing to show (okay, I did get a few pics). The things we do for our kids to make memories. Next year I'm buying a kit!

Abby did a great job decorating and being careful when putting the candy on.

Holiday Parade

Every year McKinsey gets bleacher seats for the Children's Parade in Downtown Dallas. It's a great tradition that we have done over the past 3 years. It's really one of our favorite December activities. There were great floats, the weather wasn't too bad and, as always, Santa was a big hit. After the parade, all of Todd's co-workers and their families have a brunch and the kids get to sit on Santa's lap and get a little gift. Another great perk with Todd's job.

Reindeer Ears

Kaitlyn is not happy about Santa

Houston

This past week we spent in Houston. My younger sister Laurie and her little family live there. Todd was doing some work in Houston and thought it would be great if we all drive down so I could spend some time with Laurie.

The only bad part was the drive down and back. It's normally a 4 and half hour drive. It took us 6 hours both ways. We got stuck in Thanksgiving weekend travelers on the way down and Cowboy/Packer football traffic on the way back. Love the portable DVD players that saved our sanity!

We had a wonderful time spending the week with the Stephens and getting to know little Benson better. We visited the zoo, the Children's Museum, Chuck E. Cheese, and even tried to do a little Christmas shopping. The best was just hanging out with the Stephens and watching the cousins play. Thanks Laurie, Cade, and Benson for a fun week!

Laurie and Benson at the Zoo

Abby and Kaitlyn playing at the Tot Spot in the Museum

Kaitlyn and Benson playing with the big buttons