And Christmas came and went...

Christmas is over :( so sad.  But it was wonderful and I definitely need to write about all the highlights!  We also feel VERY fortunate to have all been in relatively good health for Christmas Day, since, two days before Christmas, the flu seems to have hit our house!  We had 3 kids puking, and Lee and I felt terrible as well.  Luckily though, it was short lived, and we were feeling a lot better by Christmas Eve - still a little low on energy and being very cautious about what we ate, but good enough to be able to enjoy the festivities!  Thank goodness!  And by Christmas Day, we all felt great.
On Christmas Eve, our children were very sad to say goodbye, to Candy Kane, our Elf, who had become like a member of the family!  He left a note on his last day to which included a section that told the kids that Santa was going to lift the magic for a few minutes after they read the letter so that they could give him Hugs and Kisses goodbye!  The were thrilled at finally be allowed to touch him and they said their sad good-byes.

We had didn't do a whole lot Christmas Eve, as we were trying to conserve our energy for the evening, but we did have a lot of food and things to prepare!

We spent Christmas Eve at Jordan and Melanie's house this year, with my parents, Sis Darker, Grandma and Grandpa Cooper, and Ashlyn and Jeff.  It was a lot of fun!  Great food, and great company!

We had the usual talents performed - some piano solos of course (Mason and Dakota included, and of course Scarlett had to take her turn as well!)

And of course the evening wouldn't be complete without my Dad's amazing Magic Skills!!  He always has a few tricks that he's obviously spent hours perfecting (ha ha!).  It's actually hilarious, he seems to somehow mess up or forget every single magic trick he does!!  You'd almost think he plans it.  It's so funny to watch him stumble and try to figure out what he's doing wrong, or to hear the children saying that they know how he did it!  I love this picture of him, it shows his fun loving personality!

We also did a whole bunch of Minute to Win It games this year.  We had a lot of fun with it.  We did Team Loewen vs. Team Nielson, and the kids loved it.  Here's a picture of our strong looking team! (We also had my parents join us!)

And here's some pictures of a few of the games!

And now see if you can guess what is going on in this next picture....

Come on, isn't it obvious?  We are acting out the nativity, of course!  Funny how the usual costumes we wear, although cheesy, really do add a big effect to the pictures!  But we did it just the same and it didn't seem to make a difference to the children, and the adults were probably happy to not have to wear one!
Anyway, after a fun night, we ended with the usual opening of Christmas PJs!!

And then we took the kids home to bed to await Santa's arrival.  They were pretty thrilled and I think they got way too spoiled, yet again!  I always seem to buy way too much for them, I just can't resist when I find something on sale that I know they will love!!  It probably brings me even more joy than them!  Grandma and Grandpa joined us this year for breakfast and present opening, and it was a really nice addition!  One other fun thing we did this year was to have the kids each make something special for eachother for Christmas and to wrap it and put it under the tree.  They had a lot of fun doing that and it was nice to be able to teach them the fun of giving and not just receiving.  Mason made Griffin a drum and Dakota a necklace, Dakota painted them each canvas art work, and Griffin made Dakota a jewelery box and Mason some church puzzles.  Overall a very fun and memorable Christmas!

 

  

Santa comes to the Ward Christmas Party

We had our Ward Christmas party last weekend, and once again, the highlight was having Santa come to Visit!  It always takes an hour for the ton of kids in our ward to get through the line, but it's fun to get their photos with Santa (and not have to brave the mall!)

You can sure tell how thrilled Scarlett was to be put on his knee!  She squirmed and tried to get away right from the start!  She really doesn't even like to sit on MY knee, let along a stranger's knee!! Ha ha

We actually had a great time at the party because we brought some non-member friends that Lee met through work, and they really enjoyed themselves and had a lot of questions about our church.  She even talked about her experience going through our temple a month or so ago and how she felt like she could feel God's spirit in there.  She though it was wonderful.  Anyway, it was fun to have them!

The primary kids also sang Feliz Navidad - which was quite entertaining to hear all those little kids try to sing some Spanish words, or at least use words that they thought the singing leader was trying to get them to say!  Pretty funny.  See if you can find my 3 primary kids in the pictures!

Girls Getaway

For 4 days this December, I was lucky enough to get to go to Arizona with a few of my girl friends for a Girls Getaway!  I was pretty surprised that Lee was actually quite willing to let me go while he takes care of the kids for that long, but he was very good about it all.  He admits it was quite tough, especially with Scarlett being his little parasite while he tried to get some work done, but he seems to have held the fort together quite well actually!!  He got the kids to help him do a thorough clean of the house, doing little fix-its that needed to be done as well, and he even took the kids to the MALL to do some Christmas shopping for me!  I wouldn't even attempt that myself!!  I thought it was really sweet though, and it made me come home feeling so grateful for him and his positive attitude and willingness to do anything to make me happy.  He really is a wonderful husband and I'm lucky to have him.

I really did have an amazing time on the trip too, it was just what I needed.  We had time to relax by the pool, eat out at wonderful restaurants, get pedicures (my first one ever!), see a movie, and most of all, SHOP!  I have never shopped so much in my life!!  It was so nice not to feel pressured by time in the least, we just spent full days going from store to store, especially making sure to hit some of the good outlets and stores we don't have in Canada.  I had so much fun with my friends too, we had lots of laughs and it was a confidence booster for us that we were able to figure out everything on the trip on our own without men to help us!  I came home feeling happy and refreshed!  I was pretty excited to see my kids again though, I felt bad for leaving them again so soon after our Bahamas trip.  And when I got back, Scarlett wouldn't even come to me!!  I think I've given her abandonment issues!  But it definitely didn't take long for her to become my little cling-on again!  Love that baby!

Christmas begins, and... Candy Kane!

The older kids had a lot of fun decorating for Christmas this year - it's always fun to watch how excited they get when all the decorations come out!  We had to be a bit strategic though with how we put the ornaments on the tree - all the nicer and breakable ones had to go at the top of the tree, and the less precious ones down low.... bet you can't guess why that might be.... maybe it has something to do with the fact that we've got a crazy little stinker on our hands this year!  Such a fun age!

I would say the most exciting thing to start our Christmas season off though, was the arrival of our cute little Elf, which the kids named Candy Kane, or nicknamed "CK".  Santa dropped him off one day and he has been watching the children ever since.  CK has quite the sense of humor too, he hides in some funny places and does some really funny stuff!  I love hearing the kids wake up and and laugh every morning when they find him!  And Griffin repeatedly says, "That is SO FUNNY!!"  I would say their favorite morning was when Candy Kane had switched all their stockings hanging on the mantle for their UNDIES, and wrapped himself in their stockings rolled up on the fireplace!!  Even Scarlett had a diaper handing where her stocking should be!  They just thought that was hilarious.  They have also written him notes from time to time and love receiving letters back from him!  He has definitely been a highlight for us this December!

Our little Ballerina.... maybe not so much...

Time to catch up on some blogging, I am way behind!  It's amazing how busy I have felt these past few weeks!  It seems like the Christmas season gets busier every year!

Anyway, here's a few pictures from Dakota's last dance class/recital a few weeks ago!  The classes are definitely getting more advanced, so it was fun to watch this one!  Yet Dakota still has a little trouble focusing on her dancing, and just wants to smile and wave at us the whole time!  And I really don't know if Ballet is her thing... she just doesn't quite seem to mesh with the structured moves and positions, and the funniest part was she just kept doing her own little hip hop grove whenever the music started until it was time to follow the teacher!  She looked so cute, and it made me think I should register her in a Hip Hop class next term instead of ballet!  

She sure had fun though, especially taking the class with her best friend, Laura, again!  They are adorable together!