Christmas Extras

Neighbor gifts:

Chocolate covered Oreos with sprinkles.
Tags from Pinterest.

(ba hum bug to all those people who say that Pinterest is just a place to post things you'll never do, or clothes you'll never wear, or places you'll never go, etc. I've used over 5 recipes, used 3 outfit ideas, printed cards, and made or purchased many Christmas presents fro Pinterest. Seriously, I love it. It's so handy!)

The man we bought our Christmas tree from had a great idea. He gave us the end to the tree after he sawed it off to make into an ornament. If we keep getting real trees every year, we'll have one for each child, cool, no?

Malcolm's First Christmas

We woke up Christmas morning and went into Malcolm's room to wake him up. He woke up to both of us standing over his crib, smiling at him.

R: "Do you know what day it is Malcolm? It's December twenty fifth!"
A: "'December the twenty fifth is here, December the twenty fifth, The greatest day in all the yeeeeear, december the twenty fifth...
A: "'...is here!'"
R: "'correct!' erm..... yeah."
A: "It's Christmas!!!"
R: "yaaaaay!"

Etc. Etc. Etc.

He was smiling and wiggling and was so excited!
Though he had no idea why.

We took turns opening presents and helping Malcolm open presents until it was too close to church. Ryan had to help prepare the sacrament for our tri-ward sacrament meeting, so he left early. It interrupted our present opening, but we finished after church.

Mal by his load of goods:

He's so cute with his hands all folded, looking at his present.

Pose with your present on! Uh... nice.

My favorite present:

A blog book!!
Ryan made a book of our blog from it's beginning in 2008 to as far as he could fit in one book (they limit you to 1500 pictures), which went to June 2009. It is awesome!
Ryan's Grandma also gave us money to print another! I'm so excited! We'll have through 2010 done, then we can do 2011 next time we have $180 laying around.

Having church on Christmas was really nice. It interrupted our festivities, but it made me really remember what Christmas is really for. It was really spiritual for me, listening to the music and the talks about Christ's birth. I got teary several times during the meeting. It was wonderful to have that renewed testimony that Jesus Christ lives.

After our last present opening, we headed to my parent's house, where we had lunch and opened presents again.

Laura and Andrew

Jordan and MiQuelle

Ryan and sleeping Malcolm surrounded in opened gifts.

Minnie ears!

Mom and Dad

Mike and Brenna were on call at the mortuary for Christmas, so we went up to their house later. Jordan and MiQuelle had the Burr's to visit too, so they left early. The rest of us hung out and played games.

Dad during Blokus (both us and mom and dad got Blokus for Christmas)

Christmas was kind of a hard day for Mal. It threw off his schedule. So when the rest of the family went to visit Grandma Hibby, we stayed behind to let Mal nap. It was sad to not see Hibby, but Malcolm was so tired and cranky.

That evening we went up to Ogden to Mike and Brenna's. We ate gyros and played some games. Bridget showed everyone who walked in the door her room and all that was new in it. (dress ups and tea sets and stuff like that.) Malcolm borrowed his arriving-in-March cousin Quin's crib for bit. Then we left late and Christmas was OVER! How fast it is fleeting every year...

It really was a good Christmas.

Christmas Eve 2011

We spent Christmas Eve at the VanDenBerg's annual "Pretzel Party".

And I took no pictures.

Yup.
None.

I was just too busy enjoying myself! We made pretzels (of course), and ate them with soup. Had a little program by the VanDenBerg kids and Aaron brought a DVD. We sang carols, watched How the Grinch Stole Christmas, opened presents, and read Luke 2. That's the gist of it.

More specific highlights:

-Ryan relentlessly teasing his cousins while eating soup. It's fun now that they're all getting older and can catch him in his lies.

-Paul and Jared discussing and debating actors and music artists that can do no right. Namely: Jim Carey, Celine Dion, Michael Bolton... and a few others that I can't remember.

-Leo partially participating in the VanDenBerg kid's recitation of "Twas The Night Before Christmas." He stood backwards instead of facing the audience. He had only occasional lines in the poem and most of the time had to be nudged by his sisters to say them.

-The kids' choreography to their caroling.

-Leo getting to have his own personal bowl of fruit dip as he was a really good double, triple, quadruple, dipper.

-Malcolm being content on everyone elses lap instead of ours! Even on Jackson's and Aimee's!

It was sure fun! More might have happened, but we left early to get tired Mal to bed. My highlights are pretty meager because I'm writing this weeks later!

Five Months

Before I overdose on Christmas posts, I wanted to squeeze in this one on today--the day Malcolm is officially 5 months old! Wow!

No doctor appointment at 5 months, so no new stats, but he's truckin right along in the development department.

He has mastered eating rice cereal and no longer spits most of it out.

He can tripod sit if you prop him up first.

I caught the very first time he did it too! That's why it is blurry, I was scrambling to get it while I could!

He can push up on his arms when on his tummy. Caught this one too, but not before he put his elbow down.

He screams (both the happy and the sad kind). This is Ryan plugging his ear because Mal is right there SCREAMING next to him.
He can do mini sit ups while propped up. Like while on your lap, he can bend forward to reach for toys/books/etc.

He laughs and is very ticklish.

He also does this a lot:

He just sticks up his arms and leaves them there. I find him this way a lot.

He also spends significant amounts of time inspecting his hands:

Malcolm continues to have the sweetest disposition. He smiles at everyone and is always happy (unless in need of something, obviously). He's very easy going and so easy to take care of.
He sleeps steadily through the night for 11 hrs as long as his schedule isn't messed up. If he skips naps or stays up later than 8pm than you can bed he'll be up at 3. I'm starting to understand other mom's obsessions with meeting nap times and keeping routines.

Malcolm is such a joy, and we just love him!




[side note: my camera is broken! Yep, my nice DSLR one that takes awesome pictures. It's flash is SO bright. Like this: I took it in to Inkley's to have them look at it, and sure enough, it's not just messed up settings. It's broke. And will be $200 to fix. So it'll be a while until I get that done. We had planned to do it after recovering from the holidays, but now my car needs a $1300 oil leak fixed. So... stuff sucks. That's all.]

What are you doing New Years... New Years Eve?

I'm working. All night. And getting paid time and a half.
Looking forward for the all the drunk-fell-down-went-boom's after 3am!

Two of my favorite celebrities, enjoy!

Today by Camera Phone

Are you on Pinterest?
I am.
And I found this cool pin from Mary that was from a digital scrap booking blogger that I wanted to do. But I don't digitally scrapbook. I just blog. And poorly. So this is my version of this idea:

Source: goingdigi.com via Ashley on Pinterest

And I may turn it into a repeating segment on this blog. (Which reminds me... it's been a long time since I've done a "Stuff We Like" segment, huh? Woops!)

So here is "Today by Camera Phone" (Actually, it's yesterday, but you get the idea...) (I kind of would rather say "Today via Camera Phone" what do you think?)


8:35 am: Wake Malcolm. I've been working on more sleep training with him since he's started waking at 3 am--no bueno. I never included a set "wake up" time before now. It seems to be working though. 3 nights with no 3 am wake up call!









12:15 pm: an ill-fated walk/run on the parkway. [Blankety-blank] flat tire 5 [blankety-blank] minutes in. Having to [blanketly-blank] half carry the [blankety-blank] stroller with a [blanketly-blank] screaming baby inside [blankety] 500 [blank] yards. [Blank] that.








2:00 pm: 5 loads of laundry. Washed, dried, folded. Bam, what next?










5:30 pm: Laura and Andrew come over with Andrew's sister Rachel. Ryan and Andrew go pick up our brand new mattress!!!!
Merry Christmas to me!! Furniture Warehouse went out of business and has some killer deals!








7:00 pm: Zoolights. After eating at Zupa's and getting some hot chocolate from 7-11, we all headed to Hogle Zoo. It was freeeeezing up there at the mouth of emigration canyon, but the lights were neat. We got to warm up sometimes going into some animal exhibits. Malcolm was a trouper and did fine right until we decided we were done and were headed out. Then he decided he was too cold. I did too. The wind was raging in the parking lot. My face was frozen. Malcolm was squealing under his blanket I threw over him.




10:00 pm: Went to bed on our new bed. Look at that plush pillow top... it's as good as it looks. It's also HUGE! it makes our bed so tall. It's like the princess and the pea, only no pea. Just soft luxurious sleepiness. Ah.....









Hm... the spacing is weird...

Temple Square

We've been to Temple Square twice this year. Once with Mary and Vince, and once with the youth. The time with Mary and Vince was much better. One, because it involved sushi before hand, and two, because with the youth we spent the whole time making sure we didn't lose youth in the chaos.

We got to try out Malcolm's snowsuit. It's still really big. His little arms don't go all the way down the sleeves and he ends up waving his big floppy flipper arms in frustration.

Herpes!

The winter is always extra dry, and Ryan and I have been complaining to each other about how chapped our lips seem to always be.

Well, yesterday we broke out in Herpes. Our lippies couldn't hold out any longer and we've got a matched set of cold sores. Which is made even more lame by the fact that I haven't had one since high school. The actual sore on my lip isn't extra big, but it has made my lip so swollen I look like I've been punched.

Oh what a pair of attractive people we make.

Dearden Christmas Party 2011

We got to contribute to the annual talent night at the Dearden Christmas party this year. Last year we were with the Green's who were in town last December. We had the party in Tom's pool house, which had lots of room for our get together and talent show. It was lots of fun, and good to see everyone. I think I got pictures of all the talents except Jamie's--which was successfully keeping a child alive for 4 months! (Holla that, yo.)

Spectators from the loft above:

Cuties Kate and Megan:
Kate kept trying to get Megan to follow her by beckoning with her little hand. It was adorable.

Lorenzo reading The Night Before Christmas:

Hailey performing her part in the Nutcracker, with help from Tom:

Jana Singing:

Jordan soddering (sp?) a joint:

Malcolm got really tuckered out. He'd wake between each performance to the applause.
He did demonstrate his own talent of being able to grab things and put them into his mouth.

Paul and Sue Ha-ha-ha caroling. (They sang a carol all in different types of laughter. It was funny, and got us all going.)

Laura demonstrating some basic Zumba moves:

Mom and Dad Tango-ing:

Malcolm fully crashed:

I also participated. I yodeled.

It was a good time had by all I think! Yay for families and Christmas!