Christmas at Home

After our weekend trip to Oklahoma City, we spent the rest of the year at home. Just our family. It was great! In 15 years of marriage, Tyler and I had only celebrated Christmas morning at our own home once. This was our second time, and I couldn't wait. Tyler worked a couple days before Christmas Eve, but then had the next 10 days off from work. We enjoyed every quiet, relaxing day together with the girls and had fun together. Before I get into those details, I forgot to mention two other December events. We had our ward Christmas Party on December 12th, and it was themed, A Night in Bethlehem. We dressed up, ate food from booths, and enjoyed the nativity acted out. I had enough extra fabric with some old sheets that I was able to make robes for everyone in the family. We had our picture taken together before we left. It was a fun evening. Tyler cooked lamb three different ways for the dinner, and Abby played her bass with some other primary kids during the program. On December 15th, Tyler and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary. We went out to eat and did our last minute Christmas shopping. Tyler looked up the anniversary gifts and found that timepieces and crystal were both listed for a 15th anniversary, so he found this clock with crystal pieces. I love it! It plays songs on the hour and when the song is playing, hidden pictures of horns show up as the numbers spin. It's really awesome. He always finds the best gifts. I really love that guy!

Once Tyler started his long break from work, the fun began. We organized a Christmas Eve get together with our friends the Kasallis's with their relatives who were also in town. We wanted to do all the usual Gibbons Christmas traditions, so we had a talent show, a pinata, and a nativity play. We started the festivities by making a turkey dinner. Tyler wanted to fry a turkey (which we love doing), so that was our meal of choice. I had to take a picture of him once he had his apron and protective eyewear on. After dinner, we started with the talent show. Abby played Ode to Joy on the piano - a song she learned on her own during the school break. I videoed everyone else, but forgot to take pictures. Taryn and Aubrey both danced to a song and Tessa did some gymnastic tumbling for us. I played my French horn and Tyler even did his famous clogging steps. Everyone in the other families participated as well and we all had a fun time.

Next, we did the pinata outside on our patio. Here are all the kids lined up from youngest to oldest to wait for their turn. I took pictures of each kid getting ready to hit the pinata, but they all looked the same, so I just included Taryn's, so you could at least see what the pinata looked like. We even included a special coin for each kid that coincided with a numbered present that we had wrapped inside. Each was just a little gift from the dollar store, but it was like Christmas came early as they all opened their gifts and had fun playing with them.

The kids were put in charge of the nativity and deciding who would play what part. We even got to use the robes again that I had made for the ward party, so that was great. Abby and AJ were Mary and Joseph, and the youngest child, Nolan (AJ's cousin), was Baby Jesus. We had a lot of angels and only 2 wisemen, which is usually the case with all the girls we have. Taryn opted to be the donkey since the Kasallis's have awesome animal outfits. I thought that was pretty cute. They did great acting and following along as the nativity story was read. 

On Christmas morning, it was just our family, which is what I was most excited about this year. The girls opened up their Christmas Eve pajamas on Christmas Eve, so I was able to take their picture in those pajamas with their Santa gifts before anything was opened. 

Santa, Mom and Dad, and Grandparents must have been extra nice this year as you can tell from all the presents and new things in the picture. From scooters, long boards, and gymnastic mats to tablets, headphones, and games, all the girls were happy with all their presents. We had fun taking breaks after each round of presents to open them and let the girls play for awhile before opening more presents, so that stretched the day out and was a lot of fun and lot less stressful. It was a great Christmas Day! 

So we were invited over to the Kasallis's to swim in their heated pool on Christmas day, which the girls loved. I wished I had taken a picture, because the next day I was taking pictures like the following. We went from swimming on one day to playing in the snow the next. It was so crazy! It started snowing Christmas night and it didn't stop all weekend. Our church was even cancelled on Sunday because it was so deep. The girls loved playing in the snow with all the neighbor kids. Tyler and I even had fun once a snowball fight started with our neighbors across the street. 

Those neighbors, the Romney's, are also from church and good friends of ours. They were in the process of moving to Arizona when the snow came. We were sad that they were moving, but happy to have one last day to play and hang out with them. Their only daughter, Remy, was right between Abby and Tessa in age, so she played with our girls a lot. Here she is on the far left with Claire (another member neighbor), Abby, and AJ. 

Remy's dad pulled out the four-wheeler to take the kids for sled rides up and down the street. My girls took turns riding on the sled. Abby rode with Aubrey and then Tessa took a turn with Remy.

Another neighbor family, the Reddings, were around to play as well. Here's Tessa and Aubrey with Bianca in the middle. They played in the snow and built a snowman together. We really love our cul-de-sac and where we live. We know almost everyone on our street and all the kids play really well together.

Sunday night, since church had been cancelled, Tony Kasallis, got permission to do the sacrament, so we went over to their house and Tyler, Tony, and Tony's brother-in-law, Nate, blessed and passed the sacrament to us all. I took a picture of the kids all lined up together before we started. We had a little spiritual thought afterwards and everyone shared what they love about their family. It was awesome to do something spiritual since we missed out on our regular meetings. We love having such amazing friends! 

That was my last picture of 2015, but we did a lot more fun things that last week of the year. We played our new games, did puzzles, and cooked yummy food. We had the Davis family over for dinner and games one night. (Claire from an earlier picture is from that family.) They also live near us and we get along with them really well. They hosted a New Years Eve party that we went to and had fun playing games and eating food with some families in the ward while waiting to ring in the New Year. All of our kids made it to midnight this year except for Taryn - playing with friends probably helped with that, but they were so proud nonetheless. It was a great 2015. I actually emailed out a family letter this year and was going to include it in the blog, but it pretty much just hit the highlights of things that I've already posted about. So another year down where we've truly been blessed. We love our family and friends.

Matt and Taylor's Sealing

Over Abby's birthday weekend, we traveled to Oklahoma City for Matt and Taylor's sealing. We were so excited to be able to be there to support them during this exciting time. They were going through the temple for the first time and then getting sealed together. And finally, having their baby Tye sealed to them. The Oklahoma City Temple has special significance for me because it was the first temple that I went through during a temple open house. When it was opened in 2000, I remember going through with my mom and seeing all the rooms and having her explain things to me. I had not been able to go through that temple since I received my own endowments, so I was super excited to be able to do a session with Tyler and my entire family. It was an awesome experience sitting with my Aunt and sister-in-law and seeing Tyler, my brothers, and Matt and Taylor. It was so cool. My parents and Scott and Nevla came for the sealing portion and I got to sit by my dad. Melody and my mom sat with Matt and Taylor and I loved witnessing their sealing. Paul was proxy for baby Tye when he was sealed to his parents. That was so emotional. I couldn't keep from crying. I was so happy for them. It was like an epiphany to me thinking that baby Tye, who was only alive for 3 days, had such an obvious life purpose, which was to bring his family together for eternity. I thought it was so powerful and am so proud of them and happy to be a part of their special day.

Afterwards, we took some pictures around the temple grounds and I was excited to show the girls the temple and take a lot of pictures. Here Tyler and I are outside the temple entrance.

The girls loved playing with their cousins even though it was such a quick trip. We were there only one full day. 

 

And here is our family on the other side of the temple with the fountain that kept splashing us because of the wind.

The girls wanted their picture by the nativity that was on the temple grounds. After taking this picture with the three girls, I had to take individual pictures of each girl next to Mary because that's where they all wanted to stand. 

After the temple events, we ate lunch together at On the Border and then hung out at our hotel. We played games and visited and celebrated Abby's birthday. It was a fun trip but so fast. We had to leave Sunday morning to drive all the way back before Tyler had to be to work on Monday. Our drive ended up taking longer than planned because we were stuck on the freeway for over two hours because of a very large multi-semi accident. Luckily, we just watched a movie and ate dinner in our van, but it was hard sitting and doing nothing for so long with no options to go anywhere. We were glad when we finally made it home. We loved being with family even though it was for such a short amount of time. That was our only trip for this holiday season. We spent the rest of the Christmas and New Year break at home and it was nice, quiet, and relaxing. Details to come.

Families are Forever!

Abby Turns 11

Abby turned 11 on December 19th. We celebrated by traveling to Oklahoma (see next post). But before that post, here's a post all about our first born. Here's Abby outside the Oklahoma City temple on her birthday.

This semester, Abby played another season of volleyball through the Y. She played in the next age group now that she's in 5th grade, so she was with 5th-7th graders. She still did well and was one of the best servers. By the end of the season, she was even getting some overhand serves over. Her coach, Coach Eric, was the coach for two teams and they practiced every week together. His daughter plays for the high school team, so she was usually there at practices with some of her teammates, which helped the girls advance in their skills a lot, at least when they were being nice. 

I finally got a picture of Abby with some of her team at their last game. Coach Lindsey, the daughter, was the one there for that game. Abby had a lot of fun and we've already signed her up to play for the next season starting in January. 

Abby has become very involved in musical instruments this semester as well. She started taking piano lessons from a neighbor and has really enjoyed it and picked it up quickly. She had her first piano recital the week before her birthday and played two songs. She sounded great. She practices all the time, so she'd better be good. :) She helps babysit her teacher's kids during her teacher's other lessons, so she even pays for her own lessons that way. She wasn't sure if she'd keep doing it next semester since the babysitting and practicing takes a lot of her free time, but after her recital and all the hard work, she's thinking she may stick with it a little longer. Abby has also continued playing the bass at school. She even learned Silent Night on her own so she could play with a church group at our ward Christmas party. She really likes playing and is proud to tell everyone that she's first chair at school.

Abby's orchestra concert at school was held on December 17th. The school cafeteria was packed so I took up my filming spot right behind Abby since she was the front, right person of the whole group. Here she is with the entire 5th grade orchestra. 

Here's just the bass section, all five of them. They all played really well and sounded good considering the majority of the kids have only been playing for about four months. I liked the action shot while she warmed up for the concert. They played a lot of songs - some Christmas and some basic tunes like Twinkle Twinkle. My favorite parts were when they played by sections, so only the basses would play while the other sections either picked out the notes or waited their turns to play.

Here's a picture of Abby with one of her friends, Amy, who plays the cello. And then we took a picture of Abby with her orchestra teacher, Ms. Cedillos.

December 18th was the last day of the school semester. All classes had their Christmas party for the last couple hours of the school day. I was pretty much running Aubrey's class party, but I took some time to go to the other girls' classes to see them and take a few pictures. This is Abby with her home room teacher, Mrs. Ayers. She is also Abby's Math and Science teacher.

I took some pictures with Abby's friends too. The first is with Amelia and Isabel, and the second is with Sophia and Ady. Abby has done really well in school so far. She's had to work extra hard to keep up her good grades, but she did it, making straight As again this semester.

While in Oklahoma City on her actual birthday, Abby was able to open her presents in the hotel with all the family. She got clothes, games, a Pentatonix cd, a movie, and gift cards. She was happy. And we were all happy to be with family. Happy Birthday Abby!

Thanksgiving - From San Antonio to Utah

This Thanksgiving, it was was our year to be in Utah with Tyler's family. Tyler had a work conference in San Antonio the weekend before, however, so we tacked that trip on too. We took the girls out early and drove down to San Antonio Friday night and stayed with Scott and his family. It was fun staying up late, playing games, and hanging out. The girls decorated cupcakes and we got to see Chloe play her T-ball game.

We drove home Monday after Tyler's conference was over. Tyler worked on Tuesday while the girls and I washed clothes and repacked our luggage, and we left Tuesday night for Utah. We stayed in Farmington, NM and drove the rest of the way on Wednesday. We stopped in Moab for lunch. I wanted to take pictures but it was really windy and cold, so this was all I was able to get. I loved their funny picture though.

We spent the rest of the week with Grandma and Grandpa Gibbons and all the cousins. Taryn and Lucy were pretty much inseparable. Sometimes Aubrey led them around and sometimes Anson joined in, but these girls were always together doing the cutest things.

The three little ones made a "doctor's office" and colored lots of pictures of their patients. For some reason, they kept yelling "ohh" while they played so when I got them to stand still for a picture, they couldn't resist saying "ohh" for those too. I at least got them to smile long enough for one.

With all the family together, we had to use three tables to fit everyone (and this was minus Tara and her family who stayed home because Tara was about to have a baby). Here's the kid's table. 

And here's the middle-aged girl's table. The oldest two grandkids and adults sat at the last table, but by the time we were all sitting down, we were eating, so I didn't get a picture. We had yummy food with the traditional items like shrimp cocktail, raspberry jello, and all the usual turkey and sides. It was delicious and so great to be together.

The day after Thanksgiving, we traveled up into the mountain so everyone (except us) could pick out their Christmas tree and cut it down. While the other adults searched for the perfect tree, I followed the kids around and took a lot of pictures. The snow was deep in a lot of places and the kids stopped to rest a lot, but those were the best pictures. 

They all made snow angels during one of the rest stops. At one point, the kids decided to bury Jacob, so he's the black-hooded head in the middle of all the kids in the second picture. He said it was fun, but it just looked cold to me.  

Poor Aubrey always seemed to be the odd man out, because she's the only one of my kids without a girl cousin close to her age. Jacob, who's only 2 weeks older than Aubrey, wasn't who she wanted to be buddies with, but the older girls kept leaving her behind, so she and I wandered on our own for a bit and took some pictures. I liked this selfie that we took together. 

I loved this picture I took of Aubrey by herself so much, that I tried taking individual pictures of each of my girls, but no one else was as accommodating. This was the best I could get from Tessa, although I really liked how it turned out. She kept wanting to throw snow in the air during her picture. 

Abby opted to have her picture taken with Kate and Sara which was fine by me. I love their bright colors against the white snow and brown forest. 

Taryn took her picture with Lucy and Grandma right before they headed back to the car to get warm and eat snacks. 

After Thanksgiving was over for a day, Grandma quickly decorated for Christmas a little bit, so we could have our Christmas gift exchange. The kids all put on their pajamas, decorated cookies, and waited to open up gifts. Here are all the kids decorating and/or eating their cookies. While waiting to open presents, the kids lined up chairs behind Grandma's reindeer and pretended to be Santa and his reindeer so I grabbed a picture. Jacob is Santa in the back. 

The boys were all watching football and hanging out together while the kids worked on their cookies, so I took this picture. It's one of my favorites because the dads usually aren't in many of the pictures, and they were all just sitting there together perfectly like the perfect setup for a picture. I may have to frame this one for all these boys, I love it that much. 

Drew turned 16 this year, but didn't mind playing with the kids or letting them follow him around all weekend. They were all watching him play a game on his tablet, so I thought it was a cute picture. So many cousins! 

We had so much fun being with family. It's always hard to leave, but we left to drive home Saturday so we wouldn't have to drive as long on Sunday. We stayed in Moab and got there early enough to eat dinner at our favorite Moab restaurant called The Blue Pig. We sat at this big booth in the back and I had to laugh looking at Tyler on the opposite side, because it made me think how far apart we were sitting, yet when we were first dating, we used to sit right next to each other. But then I'd look at the four beautiful girls in between us and think about how much our life has blossomed since those days when we did sit side by side. How blessed we are. 

I am so thankful for family!