Christmas Festivus Spectacular

We liked to come up with cooky names for our family events.  It gets us more excited as we plan and prepare the activities.  So Christmas 2010, became known as Festivus.  It was our turn to spend Christmas with my family and it was our turn to be at the cabin in Bear Lake.  It has been four years since we had been at the cabin and it was funny to look back at pictures and see how "little" the kids were.  We had each family/sibling come up with an activity that could be done together at the cabin.  We kept ours a secret to add to the suspense.  I loved everyones different ideas and creativity.  Mom and Dad did Minute to Win It games and it was hilarious.  Chocolate Unicorn, Cookie Face, Jingle in the Trunk, Hangers, and many others.  The kids loved playing too, especially Ryder.  He is 3 and wanted to try every game.  It was awesome.  We did a Gray Family Christmas Flashmatch.  We loved Flash Match when we were growing up.  It was a Family Night favorite.  I scanned in several hundred pictures from Christmases past and had another few hundred from more recent years already on my computer.  I then made them into short little movies with music.  I think it was more fun just to look at all the old pictures, the hairdos, the outfits, etc..  Kam and Brandy decorated sugar cookies.  Everyone got into the decorating, even the cutting out of the cookie dough became an event.  We didn't have many Christmas cookie cutters to Kam went to town with the knife coming up with his own Christmas tree, snowman and reindeer designs.  Adrienne did a spectacular Hot Chocolate bar with all kinds of fixings,  We broke it out a few times to enjoy the cocoa goodness.  Lindsay and Riley's activity was tying a quilt.  Me, Mom, Adrienne, Lauren, Maddy & Tenley tied the quilt that Lindsay and pieced together at home.  She is becoming quite the seamstress.  It was actual blocks sewn together, not just some slab of fabric.  It was awesome.  Lauren and Tanner did their 2nd annual mini gingerbread house decorating activity.  Tenley made a dog house, Cole made a hotel, and I made a train.  This is always so fun for the kids, especially the candy.  I think Ryder had more fun running around seeing who had what candy dish in front of them at the moment.  We also decided to change up our 12 days of Christmas tradition.  Every year, for years, since before I was born, my Dad's family has sung and acted out the 12 Days of Christmas song.  This year I thought it would be fun to have everyone have their day picked out and have a costume/prop to go along with the song.  We aren't a performing family (except Lauren) but everyone brought their prop/costume and it was most spectacular.  I found a little script for acting out the nativity play and had the music on my phone.  So on Christmas Eve we acted out the Nativity story.  We all promised to not be silly and try to feel the spirit of it.  It is hard sometimes with that many people and kids to not get away from the spirit of what you are doing.  We did a great job this year and it was really neat.  Dad was the narrator.  Cole was Joseph, Tenley was Mary, Maddy was the Shepherd, Bridget was the baby Jesus, Ruby & Lindsay were angels, Ryder was a sheep, Norm, Tanner and Riley were the wisemen.  I liked this script because it started out with the Angel visiting Mary and talking to her about becoming the mother of Jesus.  It included the shepherds and the wisemen and some great music.  I don't even have to mention the food.  Of course we ate well and ate a lot.  We always do.  Mom made chicken cordon bleu that was to die for.  We had ham & AuGratins, Chocolate Pudding and tons of other goodies and deliciousness.  We decorated with lights, garland and stockings and we cannot forget the ginormous tree that the boys cut down.  It was a little large for our stand so on Christmas day, in the afternoon it came tumbling down.  It smelled so good and looked so perfect while it was standing.  We watched Christmas movies, listened to Christmas music, played games and just enjoyed being together.

This year, as usual, the kids were so spoiled.  Cole got an Iphone that is not a phone, so basically and Ipod touch, clothes, books, some converse shoes from Gma/Gpa.  Maddy got an ipod, boots, clothes, jewelry, slippers.  Tenley got an MP3, a Littlest Pet Shop house, boots, clothes, jewelry. They all got many many more things and we are so grateful for all that we were blessed with.  My Mom gave me my own temple dress which I am super excited about.  I have never had one so this is a real treat.  Norm got a blu-ray DVD player from my Mom and Dad.  We love it and will get good use out of that. 

It was very cold and very icy at the cabin.  I couldn't even get the van up the road to the cabin.  Tanner had to shuttle us and all our stuff up in his Pathfinder.  It sat down at the bottom of the hill for a few days.  We did some luge track sledding in the neighbors yard across the street.  It was not steep but the snow was deep so the kids kept sledding down to make a track.  We had track 1 and track 2 and would do races down to see who was the fastest.  I don't normally like sledding (or I should say careening down an icy slope in an out of control fashion), but this was fun. Now, there were some, more brave than I, namely the Memmotts and Kam and Brandy who did some crazy sledding down the road.  It was snow packed and icy and with Riley's big black plastic super duty sleds they were cruising.  It was fun to watch but too dangerous for me and my kiddos.



With all 17 of us there at the cabin there was never a dull moment.  We truly made some great memories.  I look forward to all of our times we can spend together.  I am blessed that my family lives so close so these get togethers are frequent.  I don't know if we truly appreciate them all the time because we do it so often but I sure love it.