Project 365 (333-344)

Project 365 (321-332)

Moon Christmas Family Home Evening

Let me start off by saying that Moon Family is a very large family.  There are 7 kids and they all have families of their own.  So when we all get together under one roof it is very loud and crazy but always tons of fun! This year we were missing 2 families.  We were sad they couldn't be with us and missed them all.

Of course you can't have a FHE without prayers, songs and lessons so each family gets assigned a part.  Like music...

A lesson...

A White Elephant Game (that was our part)...

And of course food! (we all pitched in for that)

 

We also opened presents from our family present exchange.  

 

The entire night was a ton of fun.  But I have to say I also enjoyed the quiet ride home.

Project 365 (309 -320)

Family Pictures

Christmas Day

Even though I still can't believe how quickly it came, Christmas morning was a very fun and busy morning.  Santa must not have paid to close to our kid's behavior becasue they were spoiled and not so sure they deserved to be.  This is what Santa brought.

Morgan's

Cameron's

Allie's

Liza's

Not to mention all of the other gifts from parents, grandparents, cousins and siblings. 

Here is the traditional line up on the stairs.  I remember growing up it was always youngest to oldest on the stairs as well so seeing this line always reminds me of the anticipation I used to feel at this moment and how excited I was.

I think Paul likes his present!

For breakfast we made cinnamon rolls.  I would love to say that these were from scratch but I was tired so they came right out of the tube.  But it ended up being perfect.  We usually make a big breakfast on Christmas morning and then no one eats it and I am even more tired, so the cinnamon rolls were perfect becasue they
took no prep time and easy to grab one when you got hungry.

After all the presents are opened and my house looks like a disaster zone I like to take a break and think of all of the many blessings I have.  I am so thankful for this time of year.

Christmas Jammies

Every year on Christmas Eve we get to open one present and for some reason every year it is a new pair of jammies.  Every year when that mysterious "Open Christmas Eve" present appears under the tree one of my kids will say "there's the jammies" and just toss them aside.  Now I can understand not being that excited about jammies, but at least when Christmas Eve does finally does roll around they are much more excited.

This was our silly picture.  The jammies were all a touch big, but I do that on purpose so they can wear them longer then 2 weeks.  :)

Here is my sweet children .  I can't believe how big they are getting!

Now if only they were magic jammies and would help them sleep!

Nummy Marshmallows!

For a yummy treat our family made chocolate dipped marshmallows.  My favorite where the white mellows dipped in chocolate and then crushed candy canes.  But we also made strawberry mellows dipped in chocolate that were pretty tasty too.

While making them was fun, I think eating them was the best part!

Dance Recital

My kids are involved in the after school program at our school.  For the last couple months they have been learing a Mexican Dance and they finally got to perform it at a choir/dance recital.

The girls were most excited about their costumes.  They loved the big full skirts and the flowers they put in their hair. 

They did a great job and I was so proud of them!!!

Our New Baby!

I would like to introduce you all to our new little baby Rockie.  Isn't he sweet!!

It is going to be a little crazy having 3 dogs but at the same time I am really excited!!  Rockie is a very sweet and super playful little boy Chiahuahua.  

ahhhhhhhhh!

Oh Christmas Tree!

I just love putting up the Christmas tree.  When the tree is finally up that means that it is officially Christmas time and means family parties, lots of fun crafting and my husband will finally tolerate listening to Christmas music in the car. I just love Christmas!

The kids also love decorating the Christmas tree.  Every year they get a new ornament so when we decorate I end up sitting on the floor going through the ornaments and sorting them out so they can hang all of their own ornaments. 

This year they did a really good job and Paul and I only had to do a minimal amount of rearranging.  But there is always one branch that ends up with about half of the ornaments so we spread them out a little bit more.

After all of the ornaments and lights are on we hang lots and lots of candy canes.  We all LOVE candy canes so we load the tree up and eat them throughout all of December.  We actually have to reload the tree a couple times becasue we go through so many.

Here is our finished tree!  I love our tree because every time I see it I see all the different ornaments and each one reminds me of someone or something.  I love all of the memories it holds.

Project 365 (297-308)

Pie Night

Since all of our family couldn't be together on Thanksgiving we decided to have a Pie Night where we could all get together and play games and of course eat some more.  I brought bingo which turned out to be a big hit!  I meant to bring Smarties for the bingo daubers but spaced it so last minute we ran to the grocery store and bough marshmallows.

They worked perfectly until they became projectiles.  There were marshmellows EVERYWHERE!  But it was too much fun!

I also learned to read Chinese (a game that Tia taught us and it took me way to long to catch on).  We played spoons and my nephew pulled me across the kitchen trying to pry the spoon out of my hands - that poor spoon was very mangled when we were finished with it - oops  :)

And of course the pie!  The pie was very yummy and everybody brought their favorites.  I just love when the whole family gets together.  It was a great night we really had a great time.