Tappana Times: Christmas Festivities

This past December, we were able to meet Santa on a couple different occasions. The first was at Brigham's work party. Kendrick wanted nothing to do with Santa and clung to either Brigham and I tightly with his face buried in our necks. He eventually was persuaded to sit by himself on Santa's lap because of a Christmas carol and the jingle bells on Santa's wrist, (I think the candy cane and present helped as well) and though he was very uncomfortable, I was proud of him.

For Lydia and Ammon, it was easy as pie.

All the kids were spoiled by getting an individualized present wrapped just for them.

The kids are always spoiled by Brigham's work at the Christmas party with crafts and games and swimming and more.

The kids met Santa again at the ward Christmas party.

Santa looks sort of grumpy in this picture, but if you know who this Santa is you have to laugh because he's one of the happiest, nicest guys ever. I think Kendrick was sitting on his beard.

Ammon wasn't very happy to be playing the star during the ward program, but he did his part - even if it was with a frown on his face and eyes looking down the entire time.

We got together with my friend, Brittany, and her girls to make gingerbread houses.

We used graham crackers and frosting to build the structures and laughed hysterically as the walls kept collapsing over and over. The kids eventually ran off while Brittany and I had to fix their houses and laughed some more at the giant globs of frosting and caving roofs.

Eventually, we thickened the frosting and it dried enough to allow some stability to decorate with candy.

Kendrick had the right idea to just eat his supplies and forget the whole construction process from the get-go.

Lydia and Ammon's houses became great gobs of graham crackers, frosting and candy, and they were very happy. Just how gingerbread house making is supposed to end up.

Kendrick just continued to eat his weight in graham crackers and jelly beans.

As for the week of Christmas, all of my siblings were able to come home to Washington so we had the entire crew here to entertain, house and feed. This made for a crazy, chaotic, busy, fun week together so jam-packed with activities that we didn't have time to think straight, let alone be bored.

We had a cheese-tasting contest where pretty much everyone got every single one wrong. Only a couple people guessed a single cheese correctly.

We also had another cooking competition this year. We were split into teams and assigned a dip and some sort of premade Pillsbury dough recipe - it could be whatever we wanted as long as we used a premade dough from the store.

Katrina and Scott were on my team and we worked well together making a pesto puff pastry....thing, and a goat cheese, red-pepper jelly dip.

working on our pastry

Our final products were amazing, but the competition was fierce.

The team of boys - Dad, Taylor, and Brigham - won overall with their Mexican dip and wreath taco roll. They were awarded a cute little Pillsbury doughboy ornament from the judges Aunt Sandy and Russ.

I was horrible taking pictures this year and only remembered to get ones of the rest of the food entries once it was all half eaten or gone.

The family also took a personal vote and the other team's crab dip and lemon crescents won the family vote.

We concocted a pizza and root beer taste test as well (we really like food in our family).

I don't remember the outcome of the rootbeer because there were so many choices, but out of our blind taste test of pizza, Dominos came out as the strong winner. I believe Pizza Hut and Costco were the two losers.

Besides our food competitions, we had an amazing race put together by my dad. It had snowed the day before so the roads were treacherous and my mom's van got stuck once, I was rear-ended (luckily no damage) and lots of sliding took place. It was a great time and my mom's team won because they were stacked with some of the strongest people who know their way around Maple Valley.

We solved our third murder mystery.

The picture is of such high quality due to Lydia being the photographer. The setting was an English Manor this year, and we acted out our parts while we ate roast, creamed peas and mashed potatoes, with English trifle for dessert. Kyle ended up being the murderer and successfully averted all suspicion so that no one thought it was him. Most of our English accents were appalling, while Brigham's French accent was spot-on. It was a jolly good time.

We also went to the temple, played about eight million different board games, went to two different movies (The Greatest Showman and the new Starwars), played basketball at the church twice, watched football, and spent lots and lots of time together.

Christmas Eve, we had a family program and people performed musical numbers. I played the piano while my family sang If I Were a Shepherd, a song written by my cousin. Kayleen played her violin and Lydia played a couple songs on the piano and we sang a few Christmas carols together.

And then we had an indoor snowball fight!

Though they are fluffy, stuffed balls, getting whacked in the ear and face by one of them thrown at a million miles an hour hurts! And my brothers showed no mercy - they aim for the face on purpose! We laughed and pummeled each other until we collapsed with exhaustion. We were finding snowballs for days afterward.

The three toddlers, who are just months apart from each other, were all obsessed with electronics and fought over Chloe's I-pad constantly.

Having these three run around was one of my favorite parts. It warmed my heart seeing Kendrick snuggle with Aunt Sadie, and Lydia and Ammon hang all over Uncle Kenny and Uncle Ryan.

I sure loved having everyone here in Washington with all my heart. Nothing makes me happier than having my family around and I could have it this crazy wonderful for forever. Christmas morning came with gifts, chaos, love, and a surprise....

But you'll have to read about that next!