Christmas Happenings 2007

Christmas Eve - 2007

Here are some things we did:
- Mom cooked dinner all day.
- The kids played & had fun.
- Did last minute things to get ready for Christmas.
- I was able to make arrangements with some good friends of ours, the Jasperson's, to go & help with their evening chores as they raise miniature horses. (We were spoiled!) I thought it would be really cold, smelly, hard work, etc.... (so we could get a feel for what the 1st Christmas Eve might have been like) Well - this was a dream as they had a fire lit in the stove in their barn, it was so clean & didn't smell at all, & the work wasn't hard at all! Plus they treated us to cookies & juice afterwards!
- The kids got to try & lead the baby horse around (I don't really know all the technical names) as she is learning & didn't like to be tied up with the rope. So she would resist & resist... then to show her age... she would almost throw a tantrum & jump up & do a flip - stirring up dust. Quite the show!!
- She was soft as a teddy bear & as you can see from the first couple pictures are all clear... then it gets much more dusty... as she wasn't having much fun as we tried to lead her around. She did finally give into Garrett & followed him around - but she really tried not to budge for the rest of us.
- After a while Mr. Jasperson saddled up KC & let the 3 little kids ride him!! OH HEAVEN!! I think Madison was in heaven!! You should have seen her trot around the barn. Brady was a little unsure & Tyler really enjoyed it too!
- On the last lap around the horse decided he wanted to roll in the dirt & just sat down with Brady on his back (Dad quickly pulling him up & off the little guy!) & started rolling in a pile of fresh dirt!! (With Brady's boot underneath him - all is well & the boot was recovered.)
- We had a blast & it was fun sharing time with them & hearing of their racing stories & tales of taking care of their horses!! The horses sure were neat (not to mention just the kids size!!)
- On our way home we went around town looking at the Christmas Lights - then to the Luminary display on the east side of town.

Christmas Eve Dinner
- When we got home, we were able to have a delicious Christmas Eve Candlelight Dinner consisting of turkey, corn, warm rolls, mashed potatoes and gravy, and for dessert, we had a delectable layered Jell-O with Whipped Topping. We were also privileged to have our great friend and neighbor, John Lewis, dine with us.


After Dinner
After dinner, we read a flannel board story on the First Christmas, and following that, we opened our traditional Christmas Eve Pajama Present. Everyone seemed to enjoy their presents, though Madi wasn't totally pleased with blue pajamas, since she loves the color pink, but she will survive. We all went and climbed into bed with thoughts of candy and sugarplums dancing in our heads to await the presents to come from Santa and everyone else.

Christmas Day

Yeah! Christmas Day has come! Everyone woke up to a sweet surprise of many great gifts. Everyone was very happy to have gotten many different fun things, both of things they had wanted, and some special surprises. After we had opened our presents, we spent the day lounging and trying out our new things. We did things like played our new X-Box games, the little ones tried out their new bikes and Barbies, and everyone watched their new DVDs.

(This was a nice treat - I showed Garrett how to journal using these simple tools on the blog, & he gave a go & spent the afternoon authoring this blog for our family. He did a wonderful job!! So look for more entries soon from Garrett - he just might be the one to keep this blog active!) - Love ya Gare!