A little Christmas spirit

This month is flying by! There is always so much to do and so many events to attend in the month of December. I helped to organize and put on the Relief Society ornament exchange the first Thursday of the month. I was asked to sing and play a Christmas song that I hadn't heard before- "Let there be Peace on Earth". Everyone laughed at me that I had never heard it before :) Well, now I know a new song.
Then the second Sunday of the month I was asked to play and sing a song for the lesson in RS. Silent Night, not as nerve racking. We had a ward service project the following Wednesday and then this last Saturday was our ward Christmas dinner followed by a music "concert". Yes, I was asked to sing for that as well. Another new song that I did not know, "A long time ago". It is a really beautiful song, I was happy to learn that one as well.
I also have had two dentist appointments, a hair cut, tithing settlement and bunco at the neighbors.... I'm sure i'm missing some things too :)
Anyway- we bought a Christmas tree this year and I hung up the Christmas lights outside and tried to decorate a little in the house. William spoke up the other night and said "For family home evening, we should make snowflakes!". So, we spent an evening making paper snowflakes together and I hung them up on strings in the window. I also bought a book this year called, A Christ centered Christmas, and we have been reading the chapters together every few days. What a great book! So many touching stories and great traditions to incorporate into our own families. The boys went through their toys after the lesson on Joseph and "serving others" and picked out a bunch to give to children who don't have as much.
A thoughtful couple at church bought the boys an online advent calendar this year... they have been LOVING it. It's really neat. Each day there are new things to click on and do. (I am sure this is where William got the idea to make snow flakes, it's one of the activities they can do in "the house")
We are signed up to have the Elders over for Christmas :) I'm really excited for this. There are 3 of them right now, so it should be a lot of fun.
We are deep into the Christmas season and I am trying my best to prepare and enjoy every moment... it's always a juggle I think.

Mini Me

Well, I finally turned my head and let Billy give William a hair cut.... it's the only one he knows how to do. (kinda like I only know one way) Anyway, I'm getting used to it. If William didn't already look like Billy enough, now they really look like twins!

Disney Land!

 

We finally made it to Disney Land! We had planned to go in April before fire season and things kept coming up... so November 21st was finally our day.
Billy took a half day Wednesday and we left for LA to stay with Camie and her family in Redondo Beach so we could be closer. It ended up to be a helpful thing for Camie, who is a first grade teacher and was in the middle of parent teacher conferences. She wasn't sure how she was going to juggle her kids on her one late day at school, so we were able to pick them all up and take them home, feed them dinner and all that good stuff. I was so happy to be able to help her!!
Thursday morning we left Camie's house about 9am and were on the shuttle into Disney Land by 930. It had rained the night before and was a little cloudy and gray in the morning. This made for the PERFECT day to be there! We did not have to wait more than 5 minutes (with the exception of a couple times) if not walk right on to all the rides we chose.  We spent the first 5 hours of the day in Disney Land. I did not realize how many of the rides are on boats! The boys really loved the buzz light year ride, shooting at all the targets :)

We ate our packed lunches in toon town and the boys rode their first little roller coaster there.

Jameson was mesmerized in small world, he was so fun to watch, his cute little face was priceless.

After seeing lots of Disney Land we made our way over to California Adventure and spent the last 5 hours there. Billy and William went on soaring over California and Zachary fell asleep in the stroller for a while as we walked around waiting for them. The boys had a good time in the challenge hike and then we headed to cars land. It was just starting to get dark, Billy and William went to the racers ride and this was the longest wait of the day. (everyone must have gone here right at the same time) They were gone for an hour. I pushed Zachary and Jameson around cars land and into bugs land. We rode the caterpillar chew chew.... but there wasn't much else I could do with those two boys there. We saw Mater and Lightning drive down the street and had a dance party with DJ (I guess he is one of the new cars characters).  We went on maybe one more ride and then I went and got tickets for the light show. While we waited, we went back to Disney and rode the train around the park and admired all the Christmas lights.

Then back to the other side to watch the world of color light show on the water. It was neat... but we were all pretty worn out by that point. We left the show before it was over to head back to the car. The lines for the shuttle were super long, and we could only be in the handicap line with our big double stroller... so we decided to just walk. It was a good choice because we had two sleeping boys in the stroller that we would have had to take out to get on the shuttle. Zachary gave us our own little grand finale "firework" show getting into the car :) I wanted him to change into his jammies for the drive home so that when we got home I could plop him in bed without a hassle. He was so exhausted from a 9-9 day that he LOST IT. Wow, talk about a strong willed child! We heard about it for at least 20 or so minutes until he finally gave up and passed out. Poor kid, it really was a very long day for all of them.

The boys are still talking about how much fun they had and how they want to go back though. Disney Land is no walk in the park with little kids.... we had to take all of Friday just to recoup and feel back to normal. It's a pretty awesome place though, especially when it's not crowded, and I can see us getting back there next year :) Thanks again Mom and Tracy for giving us your tickets so we could have such a fun family experience without breaking the bank!