Happy Christmas from the Bush's

We had a lovely Christmas this year in Orem.  We didn't have to drive anywhere so it made for a nice, relaxing week.

We've been centering our family home evening lessons around Christ's birth this month, hoping the kids start to understand why we have Christmas.  Yesterday, Jonah and Sophie were playing with a new Play-Doh set and I looked over when I heard Sophie singing "Happy Birthday to you".  Soon Jonah joined in and they had both created "birthday cakes" which Jonah said was for Jesus.  It was really sweet--one of those moments when you get some confirmation that you're doing the right thing and that it will pay off.

Cousins stayed the night on Christmas Eve which made everything more fun, especially for Jonah who got to have a sleep over with his cousin Vaughn.  In the morning before we went downstairs to see the tree, Jonah said they had heard Santa's footsteps the night before.  They were so excited!

I realized I didn't have any pictures of Jonah this way and it's such a wonderful moment when I check on the kids and they're far away in dream land.

Is this an angry face?? He was so puzzled as to what could be large enough to require such a box.  Silly guy.

Safety first!

Candyland

I predict a sugar crash...

Christmas Eve Traditions

This year we had Christmas with Jon's family which meant we didn't have to go anywhere!  This allowed for a much more relaxed holiday.

The family came over for Christmas Eve dinner followed by the kids' Nativity reenactment and opening gifts from other families.

I feel ya, buddy.  It's almost child abuse to make them do this thing every year.  It's always good for a laugh, though.

Since most of our Christmas decor is in storage along with the majority of our other belongings, we had to wing it with stockings this year and decided to get the cheap stockings and make an activity of decorating them together.  It was a lot of fun and provided much laughter!  I'm pretty sure my Christmas tree drawing hasn't improved since first grade.

Funny story behind the kids stockings:  Jonah wanted to add "Christmas lights" to his stocking so he asked Jon for some M&Ms to glue on.  Well, we had a huge bag of Costco trail mix and when we looked back over, they had added nuts, raisins, etc.  We just laughed and had to remind ourselves that we'd only be using these stockings this year.  We had to let them dry overnight before we could attempt picking them up without all the nuts falling off! LOL.

 

We had the kids hang their stockings just before going to bed on Christmas Eve which got them all riled up for the morning to come.

and then Santa came.

Rain in December

Until yesterday, all we'd really gotten as far as precipitation here in Utah was a bit of snow in November and a ton of rain in December.  In fact, Sunday it poured all day long.  It didn't help the Christmas spirit one bit but it sure was cute to see the kids holding umbrellas as we crossed the field to church (one of the nice things about living in Utah is you're usually right next to your ward building--ours is literally in our back yard).

Merry Christmas to you all! 

Jonah's Preschool Christmas Program

 Last Thursday was Jonah's preschool Christmas program. They must have practiced for weeks because those kids had to learn a LOT of songs! I was just beaming with pride and it brought me to tears more than once. I looked at Jon and said, "Can you believe we're at Jonah's school Christmas program?" I just couldn't believe we were already at the point in parenthood.

I purposely forgot my camera because I didn't want to lug it around and didn't want to be the obnoxious mom crawling down the front of the stage to get her kid's picture.

Thank goodness my father-in-law had his camera and we got plenty of pictures and footage.

Forgive the red eyes.  It wasn't my camera and I didn't feel like editing them.

The True Meaning of Christmas

I've been trying to teach my kids the real reason we celebrate Christmas.  I'm not sure how far it has sunk in and I wonder what they'd answer if they were asked some of these same questions.

Yes, I cried.

'Tis the season

We've been celebrating Christmas all month and our activities are far from over.  Last weekend, we went up to Heber to attend the baptism of our nephew, Quentin.  It was a neat experience and the first baptism Jonah has been able to watch and be old enough to remember and talk about.  We talked about baptism with him before we went and made sure he knew it was a special occasion.  For the remainder of that day, Jonah kept asking if he could be baptized like Quentin.  I believe his exact words were, "Can I be bathtized in blue?" or "I can be bathtized when I'm eight, Mommy.  I'm two, Mommy."  We have since been hearing several variations of these.

On the same day, we ventured to Midway to see the Creche and gingerbread house exhibits.  It was bitter cold but we enjoyed and felt the Christmas Spirit.  At the Creche exhibit, there were Nativity scenes from all over the world.  People sang Christmas music and the kids dressed up in their own Nativity scene.  I believe we had more angels than anything else.  Sophie was a sheep and made games of taking off her sheep hat while the pictures were being taken.  Jonah was a little angel.

A beautiful gingerbread house, decorated both inside and out.

 

The cousins in the Nativity.  Don't worry, Baby Jesus is a doll.

Jonah loves the piano.  He loves all musical instruments, for that matter.  He asked me a few weeks ago, "Can I play the violin?  No, I want to play the blue guitar.  No, I can play the big cello."  Jonah loves to sit at the piano while Grandpa Bush pounds out his repertoire of oldies such as "Love Potion #9", Jonah's favorite.

Celebrate me home

Since my family came to Utah for Thanksgiving, it was our year to spend Christmas with Jon's family. We decided to make the holiday more "vacation-like" and stayed at his parents' house. It was a lot of fun spending the days in our sweats. It was Jonah's first Christmas where he actually somewhat grasped the ideas of opening presents, Santa, etc. It was so much fun to watch him! He had such a great time playing with all of his cousins.


Here is Jonah with Mamou.

One of Jonah's most favorite things is bikes. He LOVES bikes! We made sure Santa knew this and Jonah loves him for it.

Baby Sophie has had a nice streak of blowouts and happened to have one at Mamou and Grandpa's house so I took advantage of their perfect-sized sink and bathed her in it. She enjoyed it quite a bit. And NO, I didn't use Windex on her...even though I've heard it has some amazing cleansing properties when used in unusual situations.

This is also Jonah's first winter playing in the snow. We went out and got him some proper snow pants and boots and he just loves it!



Jonah also loves to play the piano. He pulls the chair over and climbs up and turns on the keyboard. He thinks its so neat! Unfortunately, he also knows how to turn on the songs and even more unfortunately, A Whole New World happens to be the first song to come on. Jon and I have had it stuck in our heads for the last week now....uhhgg.

We love the Christmas season and are so grateful for our Savior and all He has done for us. What a wonderful time to reflect on the birth and life of Jesus Christ. We hope you all had a lovely Christmas and we wish you all a Happy New Year!

At Exactly Midnight

Well, I'm happy to report that Jonah is doing much better. It has been quite the fight each day to give him his medicine but we've gotten it down and it is indeed working!

I, on the other hand, am not feeling fantastic tonight...or this morning. You'll notice the time of this post. Well, I'm having issues sleeping. It's amazing how during the day I can lie down and be asleep in a matter of seconds but at night, it's a different story. I've been lying in bed for 2 hours now with no sign of sleep. Grrrrr. It doesn't make it any easier when Jon gets into bed and immediately starts snoring (not his fault, but I'm a light sleeper and hate earplugs). So tonight I decided to hit the couch--or the computer, until the couch sounds appealing.

So what I really meant to post about was the fact that at exactly midnight (we know because we checked) our radio stations began playing Christmas music. Can you believe it?! We knew it was coming but when we actually heard it...weird! We decided we might have to boycott those stations for just a bit longer since they refuse to play more than 10 Christmas songs over and over.

Halloween was fun! Jonah strolled around Jon's work and immediately grasped the idea of taking candy from strangers and putting it in his bag. He dressed as a giraffe this year and was adorable! My favorite part of the costume was the butt because it was huge and just swayed back and forth when he walked. We went down to Springville to trick-or-treat with Jon's sister and our nieces and Jonah had a blast. We weren't sure he'd get it but soon enough he was mimicking his cousins and saying "tick-a-t" or something to that effect. I forgot my camera so I'll have to post pictures tomorrow. For tonight I'll show you the best Halloween costume I saw today...it just made me laugh!!!!

The best part for me was the red frosting on his eyebrows. Ahhh...I'm still giggling!

I guess I'll try to get some shut-eye now. Nighty-night!