The Land of Oz: December: It's a Wonderful Life, Another Adult in the House, and Merry Christmas 2017

It was a fun start to the month when we got to go and see Kendall and Lynnsey perform in the MHS production of It's a Wonderful Life. They both had such a fun time with this one and I loved that they were able to be in theatre together this year. Kendall played the part of Cousin Eustace and Lynnsey had several roles as part of the ensemble. It was such a talented cast and they all worked so hard in the weeks leading up to opening night. They did a phenomenal job!

Kendall celebrated his 18th birthday on the 7th. I just can't even fathom how this is all happening so fast. How do I have another high school senior? How am I going to send out another missionary in a few short months? I am simultaneously dreading his leaving and just so proud of who he is becoming and excited for the opportunities ahead of him. I just wish he could do all that and still come home every day! He has been such a joy from day one--so funny and kind and helpful and such a peacemaker in our home. It has been one of the biggest blessings of my life to be a mom to this boy.

Kalen actually missed Kendall's birthday because he was on another trip to Spain with some students from his first year seminar class. This is literally the only picture I have of his trip! He has lots of others but they're on the camera and he lost the cord needed to upload them to the computer so we haven't been able to retrieve them yet. He had a great time although I think he much prefers going on his own. I keep telling him he'll prefer taking his wife even more! Maybe someday...

We had a great time at our branch Christmas party this year too. The food was great and we had a really nice turnout so that was fun to visit with everyone. Brother Fittro planned a fun music program with performances from branch members as well as a few songs with all the primary and youth. And he played his guitar and sang his traditional version of "Run, Run Rudolph". We also sang some Christmas hymns to wrap up the evening.

While I was looking for something in our game closet one day, I came across this old puzzle that we'd been given a few years back. We haven't put it together since that first year we got it and we decided it would be a fun activity to do. It kept us occupied for several days and we finally finished it on Christmas Eve, just in time for Christmas.

We had a wonderful Christmas. We actually managed to cut back on our spending this year so the gifts were a bit less extravagant, but we were all together and had a great day. Taylor was able to come home which was a bit lucky. He had put off buying his plane tickets until the cheapest tickets were about $500--way out of his and our budget. But I was feeling sick about not having him come home since he'd missed the last couple of Christmases before while on his mission. I had the idea to check Chicago flight prices just to see and I was able to find one for $244. Taylor didn't even have enough to cover that much but we we bought it and he's paying us back gradually. It was so good to have him here for the first time in years, but next year he'll have to be more on the ball and get his ticket earlier because it was a nightmare making that drive twice to Chicago during the holidays when traffic was even worse than usual and taking him back we hit a horrible snowstorm that slowed us down and caused Taylor to be later than we'd wanted. So hopefully next time he can just fly to Detroit. But anyway, we had him home this Christmas and that was a blessing. We had a fun day opening presents and talking to extended family members and we had our traditional breakfast omlettes and a ham dinner. Our house smelled amazing all day!

One day shortly after Christmas I was passing by the Nativity set and saw something a little off. I about died laughing when I realized that Spencer has put his Yoda figure in between Mary and Joseph! He said it had been there for probably at least a week or more and he was wondering how long it would take before someone saw it. Yoda was just blending in so nicely, I guess!

We had another awesome New Year's Eve party. The best ones are always just our family in our pajamas with lots of great munchies and tons of games. And this one did not disappoint. We had great food, including some treats like eclair's from Kendall. Yum!

We played lots of games. Every New Year's Eve we play Clue and have a Fast Track tournament. And then each family member gets to pick the game of their choice and the rest of us have to play it whether it's a favorite or not. We played the games that Timothy gave us this year--Spoons, Tenzi, and Wacky Six, plus the one he gave us last year, Ticket to Ride.