Shakespear Shuffle

Days 16-21

Day 16

We went on a temple trip to St Louis. The kids favorite part was staying in the hotel room. They basically watched a lot of TV & they are still confused about what commercials are. Hyrum kept asking if we could pause it & every time a commercial came on Hunter said 'But I want to watch that other show, not this one.' I found it hard to explain!

My favorite part was being able to do a session by myself in peace & quiet :)

(I didn't take this beautiful picture)

Day 17

Gifts of self. It's a tradition carried over from my family growing up. We each write down some type of service we're going to do for each of the other members of the family & then we put the slips of paper in the stockings to read Christmas morning. I like to hear what the big boys ideas are.

Day 18

Sunday we were going to make popcorn balls & string popcorn but went with chocolate dipped pretzels instead-YUM! This is one of my favorite treats ever. I love the salty/sweet combo. They're so easy to make & so delicious.

Day 19

Monday night we did Shepherd's Night. We made cotton ball sheep, a star & some wolves. We dressed up as shepherd's, ate shepherd's pie on a blanket in the living room & acted out the shepherd's story. The shepherd's went to sleep & then a pregnant angel came to tell them Jesus had been born & they went in search of Him. Luckily one of Hunter's little friend's had just given him a cabbage patch doll for a present (funny story) so we had a doll to wrap up & put in the manger, otherwise it might have been a stuffed animal. Then we talked about how Jesus is our shepherd & what we can do to be His sheep & avoid the wolves.

Here is Emma rehearsing for her big role as Mary next year

Day 20

We did a service scavenger hunt & decided to just pick one friend's house & do whatever they needed us to do. We picked up toys & took out the garbage :) I'm hoping we'll get better at this one as the kids get older! They ended up playing mostly.

Day 21

Tonight we went to Jeremy's work Christmas party. We went early & left before anyone was too sloshy & before Justin could completely melt down. That kid....

Since I didn't take any pictures of the last couple of nights here are some bath photos.

Emma - our little Who

In other news, as you can tell by his cheesy grin, Hunter is very proud that he has finished his preschool workbook. I love these books.

And Hyrum had his very first school concert this morning. He sang, did the hand motions & only picked his nose once!