christmas eve

The morning of Christmas eve I finished up some sewing projects.  One being a hat to complete Hallie’s elf costume.  Hallie liked the elf hat WAY more than the gnome hat and would actually keep it on.  After Hallie was in her costume we went to go visit Berret’s grandma.  Hallie loved looking at grandmas little houses, she pretty much has an entire city set up.

 

Hallie’s favorite part about her elf outfit is the bear on the bum of her tights.  I think the bear even beat out the bells.

 

When we got home we had homemade chicken soup for us sickies.  Then we let Hallie open a couple gifts which were our pajamas.  The pajamas were the other sewing projects I did.  I made a simple dress for Hallie and a circle scarf for me out of fabric given to me.  Circle scarfs are amazing by the way, no tails hanging for kids to pull on.  The dress pattern I used is from here, the summers eve dress.  Super simple construction and easy to alter.  I sized it down, added long sleeves and made it much shorter since it was going to be used as pjs.   Hallie pajama pants were patterned after a pair of pants we already had and made out of an old black t-shirt.  Mine and Berret’s pajamas were crazy cheap from Old Navy.

 

Then we got to read the fabric books I made last year, The Night Before Christmas and Rudolf.  We finished our reading in the scriptures.

 

Hallie loved the peanut butter cookies great grandma made.

  

Then off to bed excited and ready for Christmas morning.

christmas decorations

Today I plan on taking down the Christmas decorations.  We usually don’t even leave them up this long but I’ve been sick and too tired to take care of them.  I think I am finally getting over this obnoxious cold that has been around for about 2 weeks.  I love my Christmas decorations but as soon as Christmas is over I just feel like every time I look at them I see a bunch of work to do so might as well get it done and over with.  It is always sad to see all come down though.  I think Hallie is really going to miss turning on the lights to the tree.

    

I’m going to leave the cards up for awhile since we still have been getting some and they are so fun to look at.

The stockings above the sewing machine are the first Christmas Berret and I had together.

 

A lot of ornaments on the tree were passed down to me.  I remember lots of these ornaments from past Christmases especially the little stockings.  There are some that I’ve made like this Noel that I did in my jewelry class in high school.

 

With Berret and Hallie’s help we have also been “putting away” quite a few Christmas goodies.

See decorations from our other Christmases here, here and here.

snow boarding

Berret got to go snowboarding with his friend Grady last Tuesday.  It looks like they had a blast.  They went to Targhee and it is really beautiful up there.

     

Apparently Berret is a total goofball when he has a camera on him all day.

berret snowboarding from tanyamg on Vimeo.

weekend with luke

The weekend before Christmas we had Luke stay with since it would be the last chance to really hang out with him before his mission.  On Friday when we went to pick him up we were able to meet up with Brad and Ally and have dinner together at Frontier Pies.  It was lots of fun and I can’t believe how much Hunter and Brooke have grown up.  Hallie had fun sitting next to Brooke at the table sharing her pretties and Brooke let Hallie play with her ponies.

Saturday the boys played video games and I got to go shopping with my friend Morgan and we got some awesome stuff.  We scored some killer deals since it was the last weekend before Christmas and there were LOTS of sales.  When I got back from shopping Berret’s voice was almost gone and he was feeling pretty crummy.  Berret and I had both had colds that weren’t bad but Berret’s was at its worst on Saturday.  Since Berret was sick and I was exhausted from shopping we decided to rest up and just watch Bones on Netflix that night.  Which was a real bummer since we had planned to play Kinect with Brad and Ally, another time I guess.

Sunday evening Berret was feeling quite a bit better after resting a lot.  Luke made us a yummy dinner and even put up with me being a fanatic with hand washing.  I’m crazy when it comes to raw meat especially chicken, it is pretty ridiculous.  Thanks Luke for making dinner and putting up with me being crazy.  After dinner we made graham cracker houses with our friends Mark and Morgan.  Mark teaches 4th grade and had tons of supplies left over.  It was so awesome, I’ve never had so many supplies to work with (and sample).

Mark had enough house making with his class and was super nice to entertain Hallie while we made our houses.  Hallie was taking bites out of pieces Berret was using for his house.

  

Hallie had tons of fun with her uncle Luke all weekend.

white elephant party

On December 11th we had a white elephant gift exchange.  We had lots of fun just like last year.  Here are a few pictures from before the party.  I forgot to take pictures during the party though, lame I know.  Hallie was super cute dressed up like an elf.  Dressing her up as an elf let me get more use out of the skirt I made for her gnome costume (check here and here).