Christmas 2011

We went down to Utah for Christmas this year and on our way down we decided it would be fun to stop and see the lights on Temple Square. Just days earlier my parents had picked up Nati Haile at the airport, he has come from Ethiopia to go to school at BYU-I for the next few years and he got here just in time for Christmas. He loved the lights!

It was a great evening, it wasn't too crowded and it wasn't too cold either. We had heard from a lady passing by that the Mormon Tabernacle Choir was practicing and recording for their Spoken Word performance for Christmas morning over in the Conference center so we headed over there to see if we could catch it.

 

This was amazing! They had all of the decorations up and we happened to hear them sing the Hallelujah Chorus, we were all in tears afterwards because the Spirit was so strong. That's a moment I'll never forget! 

After the night's stay in Salt Lake City we went down to the Castle Valley Ranch to stay at the hunting lodges. This was our second time staying there for Christmas and we love it, thanks to the Fauver's for making it happen!

There is a pond just yards away from the lodge and so we took advantage of the nice weather and cleared off the snow so we could go ice skating the next day, Christmas Eve.  

The next day the girls, Sara, Grandma Baum and I decided to go for a nature walk down to the other pond. The weather was so nice we didn't really even need coats.

Here is one of the lodges we were all staying in, this was the main one where we ate and had the Christmas tree. Each family had their own room and bathroom so it was just like staying in our own personal hotel.

Since the weather was so nice we decided to invite everyone out for a game of "futbol".

Soon everyone migrated over to the pond because the ice skates were brought from CD as well as all of Dennis' ice fishing gear. 

Many, many fish were caught. I love ice fishing, it reminds me of good times in my childhood. This Christmas' memories will only add to them.

Christmas morning was a little crazy! We had 25 people there for Christmas and a loaded Christmas tree. It  didn't take long though before all presents were opened and played with before church. We gave our parents a large collage of pictures where one of them was left blank but instead I put a small note saying "reserved for Grandbaby #3, due in Aug." So yep! We are expecting with baby #3 and couldn't be more excited. Because I wasn't feeling particularly well that morning I didn't take many photos. Most were blurry but the girls got a doll house, books, Lily got a Fisher Price Zoo and Leah got a bike all from Santa. From us the girls got the much sought after, LeapPad. We were all blessed with wonderful presents from family. But more than anything we feel blessed to have a new baby entering our family.

Christmas day was wonderful, good food and lots of games. The following day we went back to CD and finished up the rest of the week there. We decided it would be fun to go the desert one of the days and had a great time exploring the Wedge, dinosaur footprint and Indian writings and having a good picnic.

I didn't get pictures of New Year's Eve but we had a small but fun party. I wasn't feeling well again and was very tired but the girls had such a fun time with their cousins and Andrew and I new it was time to head home, back to Ashton. What a great vacation we had and thanks again to everyone for the gifts. We have already put them all to use and have enjoyed reminiscing on the fun times in Utah for Christmas.