A Funny Christmas Fail

So about 2 weeks before Christmas, Ben called me in tears.  He had been watching the iPad and it slipped off the counter and the screen broke.  We bought it (an iPad 4) refurbished for Christmas 2 years ago.  So it had lived a good life, I wasn't super upset.  We debated trying to fix the screen and then just bought another iPad 4 on amazon for $159.  Then after I thought about it, I realized the Geneva would probably have a good lead for fixing the screen since she dealt with 100s of iPads through the school district.  She did, and we had the other iPad repaired for $100.  (For those who don't know, our kids walk on the treadmill for 30 minutes a day watching the iPad, so this is something that we need to have around).
For Christmas, we gave the kids a Disney Plus subscription.  I was excited, they were excited, even Derek was excited since it comes with ESPN +.  Then Derek went to install it.  And, BAM.  We found out that  you need an iPad 5 or newer to run Disney +. 
BLAST!  A $12.99 a month subscription was now going to cost us MUCH MUCH more. 
It is annoying because to walk and watch for the kids, much of the good Netflix and Amazon content has moved to Disney+.  So in the end we bought an iPad 7 on amazon.  Anyone in the market for an iPad 4?
(I think I have already sold one of them on FB Marketplace...)

Seriously people.  Technology.

Christmas Day 2019

It was pretty darn early when Ben and Sarah got up.  We stalled them for an hour or two waiting for Libby to get a little more sleep (and for Santa to actually deliver the goods). 

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 It was a really fun Christmas.  And I really mean it!  The kids actually all liked what they got.  (This could have something to do with the fact that I told them if they weren't thankful this year, we wouldn't receive any gifts next year.) It was great!

Center floor is the "big" Santa gift, a Husky Football season ticket for the kids to share.  

They were relatively unimpressed by this, because they have each gotten to go to a couple of games over the last few years.  I don't think they realize this is GUARANTEED games, not just when Aunt Maren or someone else can't go.  This will be a fun tradition.  

Uncle Davey got his traditional BEEF LOG! 

Ben immediately started building his Lego set from Grandma Susie and Grandpa Ray

Sarah loved her new bathrobe, her trombone ornament (and trombone book for band that is about 3 months overdue).  

Libby had a VSCO Christmas.  New scrunchies, new water bottle stickers, and a cool pair of converse.  I 100% expected her to hate them, or for them to not fit.  But they fit and she loved them.  WOW!  She also got wrestling shoes that didn't quite fit.  But I have ordered a replacement, so hopefully they will come soon.  

Uncle Davey got the kids a Nintendo Switch.  Basically we could have gotten them nothing else.  

The Husky season tickets also came with a Husky Stadium Puzzle that I am loving.  Libby and Ben have helped quite a bit. Uncle Davey helped too.  I'm not quite done, but I'm very close.  

Our Randall Family Hangout.  Very chaotic.  But it was fun to see everyone enjoying Christmas morning.  

Then off to breakfast at the Norton Grandparents' home to open gifts with the Norton clan.  

Sausages!  Yum! 

Ben was excited to hold Margo.  She has a cold, so was much less excited.  

The whole crew.  (minus the photographer)

Oh, there she is! 

Then home to play with all the new toys!  Ben was super excited for the Bey Blade Arena from Maren. 

My big gift from Derek (and many contributors) was this awesome laser cut map.  I finally got it hung up yesterday.  I had to do some swapping around of items to make it work, but I really like it! 

Christmas Eve 2019

Christmas Eve 2019 was so fun!  (Okay, so it was a little stressful too...) I did my normal morning routine: waking way too early, reading from Jesus the Christ (I thought I could read all 42 chapters before Christmas, but I'm still only on ch. 25), went for a walk, cleaned out the van, etc.  Then, I figured I still had plenty of time to get Libby and Sarah to finish cleaning up their room.  Like a deep clean.  Like I dumped out the princess bin (which had become full of all kinds of random things).  Libby lost her mind (she was hungry--which I didn't realize--who hasn't eaten breakfast by 10 am).  As all of this is unfolding, I am realizing I still need to make my soup, get the tables set for 23, shower, and get to our 1:20 movie time. Then Derek texts that he has a late call and can't go get the traditional donuts.  I drop everything and the kids and I head to TOP POT in Edmonds. I practically buy them out of donuts.  (Note to self for next year: 3 dozen was WAY too many, even for 23 people.)  We rush back home.  We do some teamwork, table setting, soup making, room cleaning, and leave for the movie about 20 minutes later than we should.  Then we accidentally went to the wrong floor of the movie theater.  But we decide to buy our concessions there anyway.  The worker is really struggling with our order.  We end up having to cancel most of the order, I end up with an extra large drink instead of a small.  While we are waiting for the food, Ben is tapping his watch.  He is grabbing handfuls of popcorn.  He declares, "I AM STRESS EATING!"  Derek missed the movie because the DUI call he was on took SO long.  But the rest of us LOVED Jumanji: The Next Level.(If you didn't know, I am a huge Rock fan).  And for the record, we didn't even miss the previews of the movie.  

When we got home from the movie, we did a few last minute prep things, and then the party got started!

Tradition is very important to the Norton family.  I think for the most part we kept it true to form.  There was clam chowder and donuts (even if we added a few more soups).  We had a different kind of rolls, made by the Hardies, and they were DELICIOUS.  

We had some musical numbers (this is a Randall tradition that I inserted several  years ago).  Libby sang "Winter Wonderland," Sarah sang her number for the variety show, "Wonderful Life." We had the nativity.  We finished with "O Holy Night."  Some were lucky enough to stay for a viewing of some old Randall family home videos--a very memorable rendition of "The Mormon Rap" and "Pinecones and Holly Berries" from when I was about Libby's age.  We watched "Twas the Night Before Christmas" a new version that my brother made for this year.  

Grammy gave out the pajamas. (She didn't need to forget them this year, because Derek had Christmas Day off. The kids asked her to still forget them, but I had her go and get them before the evening got rolling.)  True to tradition, Libby's were too big.  

But it was a wonderful night, remembering our Savior, and how lucky we are that we have each other.  And that we are not celebrating at the Intermountain Medical Center again this year!

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Loved Jumanji!  It was hilarious.  

There was one hiccup in the frantic table setting.  Most settings only had spoons, no knives or forks.  Oops.  At least the main dish was soup.  Also, this tablecloth inspired all the other tables, which had a white tablecloth and then wrapping paper on top to match this cloth.  Just as dinner started someone spilled a whole giant cup of cider on this table, so the cloth was gone before we even really started eating :).  

Nativity Roles: 

Mary: Wren

Joseph: Ben

Innkeeper: Kaj

Angel:  Rose, Sarah 

Shepherd (s):  Brett, Ann, Joe 

Sheep: Willow, Libby, Yukine

Wise Men:  Emma, Maren (note, not a sheep), Geneva

Bell Choir: Trish, Derek, Whitney, Brittain, Asami, Kanata, David, Alayne

O Holy Night

The Wise Women

A good view of the STAR.

The Shepherds

The angels

Mary and Joseph, who had a hard time not laughing at first.  (Wren has a pretty big crush on Ben, which made this a little adorably awkward for both.)

Willow was our sheep, and she had a blast dancing around during the talents.  She was pretty hot and tired by the end.  

A few years ago I bought a holiday ring toss.  I buy some of those big candy filled candy canes.  This year even adults got in on the action.  Geneva won with her first set of rings.  

The PJ success stories!  Geneva took Libby out on Friday to get some other PJs.  It worked out just fine (even though Libby was originally really mad at me for telling Grammy that the original pjs didn't work.) 

We were cleaned up and in bed at a reasonable hour with Uncle Davey here to help too.  All in all, it was a Merry Christmas Eve.  Next year, maybe we will do the movie on Christmas Day. 

The Last Week of School before Christmas

We had a really good last week of school before Christmas.  All of the performances and meetings were behind us!  I got a little bit caught up on school (much to do over the break) and we even went to a SW wrestling match, another VICTORY (so close!  It was down to the 2nd to last match.)  

I thoroughly enjoyed our Friday Spirit day: Ugly Sweater and PJ day.  We had a great response.  Almost everyone (including the principal after I basically forced him) dressed up.  

I found Baroudi and I these matching sweaters.  Fab-Yule-Us.

 After school on Friday it was gingerbread house making time!  There were kits for everyone except me (which I didn't mind at all).  We all had fun, and everyone showed a bit of their personality. 

Sarah's house actually has a story line.  The kisses are people doing something or something like that.  This is my girl who is always writing or reading these days, perfect. 

Derek wandered in after we had started and after a bit of grumbling, proceeded to make the best house!  Especially the icicles are amazing.  This size house was right up his alley. 

Libby chose the biggest house. Then she proceeded to decorate about 2/3 of the front in a pretty elaborate design.  Then she got distracted/bored and wander off to do something else.  

Ben used up all the fondant to make his lawn.  It looks like there is a gingerbread casualty in the yard.  Not sure what is going on there.  

This is Uncle Davey's creation.  Very cute.  Orderly.  A bit minimalist.  

I got to build mine with the glue gun and graham crackers because I didn't buy enough kits (who knew Derek would actually join us when there was a football game of some kind on TV--must not have been a good game).  Anyway, I loved building from scratch.  But I was still at it long after they had done some clean up and moved on to watch Stranger than Fiction.  (And LONG after that I was finishing the cleanup).

We sure know how to make a mess! But it is still one of my favorite traditions.

Nutcracker!

I was on the fence about Nutcracker this year.  It is so much work and time.  But Sarah got a part as a maid in addition to her dancing Jester part.  What  cool opportunity.  She was the comic relief maid.  The one who is carrying in the heavy boxes in the beginning and who gets piled in coats.  She helped hand out the dolls and swords to the party guests.  Since she was in both acts, she has been spending almost all day every Saturday at the dance studio.  (10-4 most Saturdays).  Then she had 1 dress rehearsal and 7 performances this week, including 4 during school days.  All of the stuff was in Everett, about 1/2 hour away in good traffic.  It was nuts.  I had to activate the village to make it happen.  She slept over in Everett at Aunt Alayne's house on Tuesday night after the dress rehearsal because I couldn't get her to Everett on Wed. morning.  I also dropped her off super early on Thursday morning at Alayne's so I could get to school on time.  I made Ben go with me so I had carpool to get back to Shoreline.  Whew.  Thankfully she is super even keeled.  She had a great time.  Derek even got to come and see her, since they had a Friday Night performance.  Today we have the Holiday Show in Everett.  Then no more drives to Everett for awhile!

Love this Crew! 

Libby's School Choir Concert

Libby has been complaining about her school choir all year.  "We aren't even doing any harmony," she has complained.  So imagine my surprise when there was harmony in one of their songs.  I asked her about it after.  She said, "I couldn't stand it, so I just made up my own harmony and started singing it.  I refused to stop, so the teacher wrote it down and taught it to some others."  This kind of determination is what makes me crazy as a parent--but it's going to take her pretty far.  I just have to keep her headed in the right direction, right?

Christmas SCC Choir Concerts 2019

The Seattle Children's Chorus Concerts were really good this year.  Ben complained that his songs were boring...and they were all quite serious for such a young group.  But then they had a fun song with Sarah's choir about Santa needing to use his belt to help pull the sleigh and losing his pants :)

Uncle Davey was there for the kids concert too, but he had a tummy bug coming on, so he bolted right after and I didn't get a pic. 

Sarah's solo blew me away. I was so proud of her!  I didn't take a video--but I am not above sharing someone else's video.

Libby also had a solo.  I don't have any video of hers.  Her mic wasn't right on her, so it wasn't as powerful as Sarah's.  But she had one solo and the other solo was a dynamite senior in the group.  So I was pretty impressed.  

One of her besties, (who was also one of my students).

Grammy took Sarah to her dress rehearsal, and Davey went home sick.  So Libby had a smaller crowd.  But the older choirs were AMAZING.  I love hearing her with this group.  

After the concerts, Ben and Libby and I went to Edmonds Woodway to see Devin wrestle in the finals.  We also got to see Hunter wrestle for 7th (which he won.)  I honestly don't remember if Devin won or not. That is how intense the day was.  😐

Light the World Ward Party

We are still getting settled in our new ward.  It has taken a bit of time since we've been out of town a bunch, 2 hour church, and busy lives!  My calling as Relief Society Meeting coordinator came with the task of the Ward Christmas Party, since it was the RS responsibility this year.  (I do miss having a ward activities committee, but I digress.)  Anyway, I tried to push the party off onto someone else, especially since the kids had choir concerts that day.  But the RS President encouraged me to go for it and beefed up my committee to help me.  It was very stressful for me.  I lost many hours of sleep fretting over it.  I'm not sure why, except maybe it was the straw breaking my already busy back.  I love planning parties.  But it's tricky when I already feel maxed out.

Anyway, I felt prompted to go with a Light the World theme.  So we decorated with globes and Christmas trees.  The tables had blue cloths, and maps and garlands.  We did an international breakfast buffet.  We showed a Light the World promo video.  We gave out Light the World Calendars.  We had stations for writing to missionaries, writing Light the World Thank you cards, etc.  

I want to learn to make these...so good! 

We had a couple from the ward do some German songs on their recorders, a piano number, and the primary sang.  Then there were kids activities and time for the adults to chat. As a part of the event we brought in 50 items for refugees moving into our area. It turned out really well.  Every seat was full, and then some.  

On reflection, I just can't do a party on the morning of the choir concerts.  Dave drove the kids to their call times--otherwise I couldn't have done it at all. Or, I need to plan a simpler party.  As I am writing about this, I am thinking--Just a brunch would have been fine, hahaha! 

Life is about learning I guess.  I think all who came enjoyed themselves and felt a little of the true Light of Christ.