New Years Trip. Part 2. Famiy Is Where It's At

We had a family portrait taken by a very brave photographer friend of my dad's. I say brave because look at those mites!!! For the most part they tried to smile, sort of. Mostly their was a lot of running around, a few tears, some begging, a little bribery and a promise of gifts from Grandpa. My parent kept looking around and saying, "Look what we did." Not necessarily in a good way either...just kidding. We are quite the group when we're all together though, and in reality they were the ones who had 7 kids, what did they think was going to happen???

Here are those gifts Grandpa promised.
Ring Pops, Candy necklaces, Coloring books and dart guns for everyone!
My Dad just can't help himself, he's dime store crazy!
The kids of course loved it!

Carley took over this pair of Addi's shoes. She wore them everyday. That's Grandma in the background making cinnamon rolls!!! We had to beg, but she gave in...she always caves eventually! Thanks mom!

That's my girl!

Taylor & Jen
(expecting, but shhh, it's still early, don't tell)

We took everyone but the babies to see The Tale of Desperaux. We were a very large, very obnoxious group. I'm sure we drove everyone in the theater crazy until the kids settled down. It was fun to watch all the cousins sit by each other and just "hang out". It gets a little crazy at times because they're all around the same ages, but it's also a lot of fun!

I thought I'd post a few pics of myself, since I'm usually behind the lens.

Emry & Hugo were missing....well, I'm not quite sure if anyone knew they were missing or even that they knew they were missing and stuck inside a bedroom....BUT they were & Aunt Jen found them. The door got jammed up on the carpet and it took some brute strength to get the door open and let the kids out. Freedom!

Here is Zack. Zack is the cutest little boy. Zach loves his big sister Addi and she's a great big sister to have. Even more than his big sister, Zack loves to wear her princess costumes! The funniest part of the situation is not that Zack likes to dress up like a princess, it's that he's the child of my brother Joshua. Josh is 100% MALE. He is a guys guy all the way. We're talking hunting trips for whatever is in season, tools out the wazoo and sports. He wouldn't ever have been caught dead playing dress up. He used to beat us up! I'm not kidding here. He once chased me down and mauled me in the neighbor's yard because I wouldn't clean my room. In all fairness, Josh is a great dad. Kristene, Josh's awesome wife, told me that Josh has changed too. He even let Zach wear a princess get up to a party where other adults could see him!! So cute! It's nice to know Josh has a soft side too!

Here is Miss Daisy May!
She's such a cutie.
I am in love with her wispy curls.
So precious!

This is Owen or "O" as his family calls him.
He's a pretty shy little guy, but so cute.

Here is my brother Ephraim, his daughter Daphne & Cameron.
Epher is a great dad.
One thing I've noticed about him is that he rarely turns his kids away when they are seeking his attention. He's always up for a story or song or wrestling match or whatever it is they're wanting to do. He even does hair. I love this quality of his and I wish I had more of it.

This is Liz, the newest Mom in the family, with her little cherub Keegan.
Keegan looks just like his daddy, I'm talking spitting image.
He's such a happy little guy, it was really fun to hold him and all his extra "tankness"!!
Don't you just want to squeeze him!
I do!

Emry & Addi were joined at the hip the entire length of our visit.
They are a year and 10 days apart in age, but you wouldn't know it. They are like twin sisters when they play together. They just laugh and change clothes, giggle and change clothes again...repeated over and over all day long.

Meet Kade.
He's a little guy in stature, but don't be fooled.
He's really a monkey disguised in human skin!
The boy is all over the place.
Kristene is going to really have to watch him because the boy is never still, never!

This is Taylor and Master Hugo.
Hugo is just one little ball of energy that runs from one room to the next from sun up to sun down. In fact I'm not sure he even knows how to walk. He's a one speed only kind of guy....fast!
Taylor is going to be wonderful dad someday! All kids are drawn to him. They all love him.

Here is Cody, Liz's husband, with his sidekick Addi and Zack.

Here is Roxi, Epher's wife, and Daisy!
I think Roxi looks really good in this photo.

Caution: Cousins At Play!
It was really fun to watch all the cousins play together. They were all so unbelievably good. This is Harry & Hugo. I have to say that I was most surprised by Harry this visit.
I haven't seen him in a while and he remembered my name and was so chatty and polite.
I think he had a smile on his face the entire visit! Such a delight!

Their are a few people missing from this post, but some of them I'll cover in other posts....Maggie you're off the hook, I don't have one single shot of you. What's up with that???

New Years with the May Clan. Part 1

We went up to my brother's house in Newton, Utah for a May Family New Years Reunion. We hadn't all been together as a family in almost 4 years. I was excited and nervous at the same time. We (I have 6 siblings) were going to be ALL staying in the same house, along with 13 grandchildren (all under the age of 7). So let's recap. That equals 7 May kids, 6 spouses, 13 cousins, and 2 grandparents which equals======28 bodies under the same roof! All eating, sleeping, playing, using the bathrooms, and chillaxin'. Who wouldn't be scared heading into that!

I am happy to report that it was AWESOME!!! The cousins were all so well behaved and such a joy to be around. It was fun to watch them all play and get reacquainted. They ran around like a little flock of sea gulls, or was it a heard of elephants??? The whole trip was so fun, thanks for hosting Josh & Kristene, you guys are so wonderful and patient. Thanks for opening your house up to us. And a special thanks goes to your kids who shared everything they had with us. Bedrooms, toys, snow clothes and dress clothes! WOW!

The present game did not disappoint either! My family doesn't exchange gifts in a traditional way, when we're together we play the present game and sometimes it gets down right nasty!!! It seems that the last few times we've played that Taylor has been the entertainment, and this year was no exception. He opened not only 1 girlie gift, but 2!!! so funny, lucky for him Cesar felt bad for him and helped him out in the end.

Some of the fun things we did were hang out together, play games, watch movies, Trent & Cesar went skiing, we had lunch with Trent's brother Troy's family, a group of us including Trent & Luke got to go see a USU vs WYO basketball game, we went the the movie theater, the kids went sledding, the ladies went out for dinner and shopping, the guys went shooting, duck hunting and of course we ate! Here, in the next 3 posts are a lot of photos from our trip. None taken by me, my camera would have stayed in it's case unless my sister hadn't pulled it out to play with. So the following pics were taken by my sister Alissa, thanks for sharing!

Arriving

We left for Utah on Monday morning as soon as Trent was done working. We drove allllll day, thankfully the kids were wonderful. We stopped in American Fork to have dinner with Uncle Jerry and to pick up Trent's 50 gallon fish tank that has been in Jerry's storage shed since we lived there (Thanks Jerry!!). It was so nice to get caught up and visit with Jerry, it's been a long time and I haven't been the best letter writer.

Back in the car we piled and traveled up to Roy, UT to sleep at Trent's brother, Travis' place. Travis and Angela are always so good to put us up when we're driving through. We arrived around 10pm, let our kids run a little and then everyone went to bed. Everyone except me that is... Trent and Carley were snoring so loud that I couldn't sleep. In fact, I'm surprised that they didn't keep the entire house awake....it was like a freight train kept circling the house. Finally I got so fed up that I fled to the couch....sleep found me at last.

This morning we woke up and Uncle Travis made us french toast! We let the kids play with their cousins Kendrick and Cohen for a few hours before we made the final push up to Newton, UT. (Almost all of the pictures I'll be posting for this trip were taken by my sister, Alissa. I was busy working and chasing kids, so I let her take my camera over and I'm glad she did b/c otherwise I wouldn't have had any shots at all, so thanks Ali!)

When you're driving up to Josh/Kristene's house their is this sign. It's got to be the craziest sign ever. This really is how the road goes at this intersection, but to see it in a sign is just weird. So I had to have a picture of it.
Visiting Utah makes me miss the mountains. They are so gorgeous no matter what time of year you visit, but this year they were absolutely stunning! We saw snow about 3 hours North of Las Vegas and Emry went nutz! She wanted us to pull the car over so she could make a snow angel...she didn't care that she was also in her pajamas, we kept on driving. She did make one at Uncle Travis' house, she even went outside barefoot, she's one crazy girl! By the time we reached my brother's place, Luke & Emry were delirious with excitement for the snow. Before we were even inside the house they were asking to go out and play.

These photos were taken about 30 minutes after we arrived at Josh's house. Luke & Emry were supposed to be inside visiting with Trent's parents who'd driven down from Idaho to see us, but they were being too obnoxious so out they went. The snow was deep!

Here are Harry, Luke, Emry, Daphne & Addi

Emry sledding, she had so much fun, she dreamed about sledding for the next few nights!

Christmas 2008

This year our Christmas celebrations were a little strange. Trent had to work Christmas Eve, so the kids and I watched Christmas movies and put out the goods for Santa & Co. all by ourselves. Luke taped the news Christmas Eve morning b/c they were tracking Santa's route and he was currently somewhere over China...we got updates all day long. Luke got "reindeer food" at school and when we put it outside he was soooo excited! I was so relieved b/c we've had to answer a lot of tough questions about the "true identity" of Mr. Clause this year. My little boy is getting so grown up. Anyway back to the story, after the girls and I had come inside I noticed that Luke lingered a little longer outside. I went out to see what he was doing and he said, "I'm looking for sparks Mom. Santa's sleigh always leaves sparks in the sky." My heart just melted, what a sweet, tender hearted boy I have!

In the morning the kids were gracious enough to wait in my room and not peek at the Christmas tree while we waited for Trent to get home. He was home by 8am, so they didn't have to wait too long. Of course they did not disappoint in their excitement level and they really enjoyed themselves! Here are our pictures of the big event.

This is Luke's gingerbread house. He made it at school.

The stockings were hung, poor Santa got fruit at our house b/c we'd just moved in and I didn't have time to make sugar cookies. I heard he really likes citrus, in case anyone was wondering!

Carley got this caterpillar and she didn't get off of it all day!
It plays music and rocks, she loves it!

Luke & Emry received skateboards from "Santa's helper"
aka our landlord Larry, who is a skateboard designer.

Santa also gave our kids bikes! Lucky ducks!

Luke also received some Nerf toys.

Emry got a skirt and shirt.

Carley got a baby doll and she's barely put it down since. She really is so cute with it.
Holds it, pats it's back and gives it kisses. She's definitely a little mother.

Family Funnies

January-Emry, Luke and I went to get flu shots and no one was in line when we arrived at the hospital. So we walked straight up to the nurse and Emry got up onto the chair, yanked up her sleeve, slammed her bare arm onto the table and said, "Give it to me." Which they did and she didn't even flinch.

December Begins with an advent calendar!!!

My mother gave me this lovely advent calendar for my birthday and I could not wait to use it! Although, I'm not sure who's more excited me or the kids! When I pulled it out of the box, they went bananas. They are having an extremely difficult time keeping their little, grimy hands off...it's just too tempting! This afternoon I noticed Emry standing in front of it softly repeating to herself, "don't touch, don't touch, don't touch"! Funny girl.

A close up of the detail.

The activities and goodies.

All tucked in and ready to go!

In preparation, I consulted my own brain, Trent's brain and many, many websites for fun ideas that our family would enjoy. Here's my list:

• watch A Charlie Brown Christmas, Polar Express, It's A Wonderful Life, Scrooge, etc.
  
• read The Best Christmas Pageant Ever
• write letters to Santa
• make various holiday crafts
• take food to a food pantry
• play Christmas bingo
• go for a walk as a family
• Make cookies
• Deliver holiday treats to friends & neighbors
• write a note or color a picture for someone in the family, then give it to them secretly
• extra bedtime stories
• eat dinner by the light of the Christmas tree
• pick out a toy for Toys 4 Tots
• eat dessert first
• make paper snowflakes
• go for a drive to see neighborhood Christmas light displays
• read the Holly Berry Story
• legend/history of the candy cane
  

Each Sunday and then Christmas Eve & Day we're going to read from the scriptures about the Saviors birth. Here are the scriptures I'm planning on using: Mark 1, 1-8, Matthew 1:18-24, Luke 1:26-38, Luke 2, 3 Nephi 1:15-21.

I've never done an advent calendar this involved, so I'm excited to see how this works out this month! Happy Holidays! Feel free to leave any additional advent ideas for me b/c I already have a file going for next years ideas!!!