The Christmas Season in iPhone Pics

 1. Each year my mom gives us keepsake ornaments on Thanksgiving...here's this year's haul.
2. We decorated the house for Christmas.
3. Each year we get together with Jeff's family (the ones here in Utah) and make gingerbread houses.

 4. Made sugar cookies with my handsome guys.
5. Each year the city has Santa drive through the subdivisions on the firetruck and throw out candy.  The kids LOVE it.
6. Ward Christmas breakfast and seeing Santa (again).
7. Porter couldn't keep his hands off the Christmas tree.  That's why it was shoved into the corner this year.

 8. One of our "must-do" Christmas traditions is to see the Elves at Gardner Village.
9. Christmas shopping with my handsome men.
10. Making sugar cookies (again!).
11. Carson and Jonas made a snowman in the front yard.

12. We went to Carson's "Christmas Sing" at his school.  His grade sang "All I Want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth" and "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas."

13. We went to City Creek to look around.  Its always fun to go with Jeff because he tells us about all of the fun things he got to do on this project.  He laid out the main fireplace.

14. While Grandma was here, we braved the crazy crowds the weekend before Christmas and went to Temple Square.  We even ran into Krysta and her family!

 15. We went to see Santa's Reindeer at Thanksgiving Point.
16. I spent a few late nights working on these robots for Jonas and Mason.
17. Our house on Christmas Eve.
18. Matching Christmas jammies on my sweet little boys.

And finally Santa came! He brought Jonas a basketball hoop, Carson a BB gun, Porter a push along buggy, and Mason a trailer (for the Cozy Coupe he got for his birthday a few weeks ago). It was a modest Christmas for our family (most of these presents were from other people, not Jeff and I) but my boys had a blast and we were able to spend time together as a family.

Elf on the Shelf

This year was our first year to have an Elf on the Shelf.  I'd been wanting to get an elf for the past few years, and decided that I HAD to when Carson came home from school last year asking why we didn't have an elf because "everyone else in my class does".  About mid-October we received a box from Grandma Larsen and it had an Elf on the Shelf in it!  The boys were so excited and we immediately pulled out the book that came with him and read it.  I noticed the copyright on the book was 2005, so I guess that we were super slow in jumping on the Elf bandwagon! I hadn't even heard of them until about three years ago.

When our Elf arrived, he made a mess of our tree decorations! We soon named him Ernest, and he had some fun adventures while in our home. He played with the boys' toys, brought back letters from Santa, got into Christmas treats, wished Mason a happy birthday, and when it was time to leave he left a sappy letter for the boys telling them to be good all year long.  I was surprised at how attached the boys got to him and Carson had a hard time when he left. We can't wait for him to come again next year!