Rencher Christmas

This year we were worried that Wyatt was only going to be able to take a few days off for Christmas. He hurt his knee in the middle of summer, and ended up using all his vacation time, so when Janelle, (Spencer), Nate, and Megs, (Cambri) decided to come down the week before Christmas, we decided to leave Wyatt slaving away at work and to start our vacation early. After a stop at the airport to pick up stragglers, we all descended on Mom's new house in Idaho Falls. It is a great house for gatherings. We spent the next couple of days playing with cousins and doing all our last minute shopping. It was great fun to play with Cambri. She is at the perfect age for Christmas because everything is sooo exciting. Rhee is still to young to really get what is going on and Damion is now old enough to be really into presents. Cambri just thinks everything is awesome. She spent all day wandering around going OOOH and AHHH. She was so fun. Unfortunately, she also decided it was a good time to get sick and didn't give her parents much time to themselves.

Marianne came down to spend a couple of days with us before Christmas and it was so much fun having all the cousins together. We stopped at the dollar store and let all the kids pick out a secret Santa gift for one of their cousins. They all play so well together. I tell you what Grandma's house was a zoo. Marianne took the kids to a movie, and brought art supplies, and the rest of the time was just devoted to chaos. We all loved every minute of it. I never get to spend enough time with my sister Marianne. When we moved to Utah we were officially to far from each other, so it seems we only see each other when we meet in the middle on big family occasions and then there are a million things going on. I am so glad that she came down for a few days. She has the best sense of humor.

Wyatt joined us on Christmas eve and we spend the evening eating hors' devours acting out the Christmas Story, watching Scrooge, and I dragged Janelle and Kenny to midnight mass. I love how we put all the kids to bed and then ring in Christmas with carols and stories of Christ. The service we have gone to for the last several years, is in the First Presbyterian Church. It is a beautiful chapel with big stained glass windows. The pastor is a little out there, so you have to take his words with a grain of salt. This year he decided to make all the parables more modern. It was interesting to learn about the ten sorority sisters rather than the ten virgins.

As always, my kids were up much too early, so we popped in a DVD in the portable DVD player and gave my poor siblings until nine to sleep in. Then, they all dug in. Santa got more than a little carried away this year. Jordyn got an American Girl Doll, Kirstin. Alex, got a million star wars legos. Damion got a million spiderman legos, and even Rhee got more presents than she knew how to open. I got a date night kit with a bunch of gift certificates and a new camera. Unfortunately, I didn't open it in time and we have to rely on all my sibling to send me all the pictures they took of my kids. Wyatt got Rock Band and I did not see the rest of my family until they surfaced to go to the cabin the next Friday.