Merry Christmas!!

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house,
ALL the creatures were stirring, even a ....donkey?

The Annual
Lewis Live Nativity
2009

Act I

Staring:
Daddy: Donkey

Ty: Joseph
Mara: Mary
Caleb: Baby Jesus

Mama: Narrator &Photographer

Act II
Ty: Sheperd

Mara: Angel

Daddy: Sheep

Caleb: Baby Jesus

Mama: Narrator & photographer

This is the best tradition of all--playing dress up and acting out what Christmas is all about! This is the reason for the season! It was a lot of fun this year to act out the Nativity. Ty and Mara are all about dress up! It was a special evening, we sang our favorite primary songs that the kids had worked on this year in primary and nursery and read the story of Baby Jesus from Luke 2. Then we watched The Nativity. If that was all we did on Christmas it would have been worth it! It was great!

Christmas has many traditions. Dressing up and acting out the Nativity is just one of our families traditions. Another tradition we like to do is decorate Christmas cookies on Christmas Eve and leave some for Santa.


Caleb sure enjoyed the cookies and frosting! Yum!

Some traditions we started when we began our family, others have come from Nate's family, others from mine. One tradition in Nate's side is opening one Christmas present on Christmas Eve. We let Ty and Mara each choose one present to open.
Ty picked the biggest one from Mara and boy was he thrilled!
A new dinosaur! He could have been done with Christmas right here! That was all he wanted!

Mara was happy with her new shoes!

Christmas Morning!
Christmas with kids is the BEST! They make it so much fun and magical! I just love the stage they are in and wish I could freeze time and stay in this phase! Well I love every phase, but especially this year because they were so happy and pleased with everything they received and gave. They didn't ask Santa for much, in fact all Ty asked Santa for was a Rudy from Ice-Age 3, and although Santa couldn't find a Rudy (but tried) he did find a Manny the Mammoth and Ty was so pleased! I love that they aren't into technology gizmos and don't have to have the latest or greatest!

Baby's First Christmas!
Caleb was the most excited about Christmas--okay not really, but he was the first one up! He didn't really understand what Christmas was all about! He didn't want much to do with the presents. He could have cared less about unwrapping them! He was even less thrilled about what was inside! He just liked unplugging the Christmas tree and putting small scraps of paper in his mouth!

We had a really really nice Christmas, our last Christmas here in Oregon. We played with new toys, watched a Christmas movie and then put Christmas away! Since we are moving in three days I felt like I needed to get a move on and so I started putting all the decorations in the boxes and taking the ornaments off the tree. I felt the joy of Christmas being sucked right down the drain! I felt like I was the Grinch who stole Christmas and was taking it away from my kids. But I realized we did have a really nice Christmas and we felt such a good spirit and joyful time and now it's time to move on...(literally)! We took a break from packing up Christmas and went out to one of our favorite places on the beach: Cape Meares.

What a beautiful place! How could we possibly leave such a scenic and wonderful state? Well it comes down to one thing: Family! And although we had a great Christmas it was missing something: our family! It's just not the same talking on the phone! I'm grateful for family and grateful for the opportunities I've had here in Oregon. My favorite gift this Christmas can't be unwrapped or opened. It's not under the tree. It's moving closer to my family and being able to see them more often!

This Christmas was a memorable one. Not only being the last in Oregon, but it was full of Christmas Miracles. Ones that I wish not to blog about, but I do believe in Christmas miracles and I do know that we have a loving and kind Heavenly Father who knows the beginning from the end. He loves us and is mindful of us at all times. I am grateful for his loving kindness to my family at this time. I am also grateful for our Savior Jesus Christ and grateful we could remember Him at this time of year. I hope that the spirit we have felt from celebrating his birth can stay with us and that we can strive this coming year to be more like Jesus Christ.

A year to remember: 2009

Here are a few highlights of our year. Some of our favorite places in Oregon and other vacations spots from the year. It has been a pretty exciting 2009: new baby, fun adventures, moving...just to name a few! Enjoy!

Dancing Diva!!

Check this girl out! What a little dancer! How does she have so much energy? We were playing 'dance and freeze' to Christmas music but then Mara really got into it and just started movin' to the music!

Winter Party!

On Friday I had the opportunity to go to Ty's winter party. It was also Ty's last day at Liberty. I helped the children make their gingerbread houses--which were more like candy creations! They had a lot of fun frosting and putting candy on their houses. They even had enough for the parents to make one too! Oh the memories it brought back of making candy houses, villages, campers, empire state buildings, castles, trains....we used to do this every year in my family as a tradition! I love it!

First they had to frost their milk cartons with frosting!

Then they put on the graham crackers and frosted over those.

Then the kids added the candy.

And of course some of the candy went in their mouths!!

They were each given a bag of candy and it was fun to see their creativity

I think some kids just wanted to see how much candy they could put on their house!

Here's Ty's table and cute little friends. He had a hard time saying good-bye. When Miss Swisher told the children today was Ty's last day and to say good-bye to Ty they all said "Bye Ty" and I wanted to cry, it was so cute!

Ty's final product--the gingerbread candy creation!

Kennedy's cute little gingerbread house!

Two sweet friends! Ty was so glad to have Kennedy as a friend in his class. They were also in the same primary class. He is sure going to miss her and I'm going to miss Kennedy's mom. We were good friends and school buddies! It was nice to have someone so close to carpool with! I wish Ty the best of luck in his new school. Hope he can find more good friends!

Ho Ho Ho and Happy 11 months!

Have you ever seen a cuter little Santa in all your life?

Today my baby is 11 months old! How can that possibly be? In one month by little baby boy will be ONE year old?! Ahhhh! Time goes by way way way toooo fast!! Slow down Caleb!
There is nothing slowing this boy down! He is ever so fast, I can barely keep up! He is full speed crawler and fast little cruiser around the furniture. He stood for a few seconds without support but quickly sat down before he fell!

Caleb:

• waves hello and goodbye
• giggles and laughs at almost everything
• gives the best kisses
• climbs the stairs
• plays patty-cake
  
• puts everything in his mouth
  

Caleb is all about feeding himself these days. If I feed him baby food it is between handfuls of food he has put in his mouth himself! He likes to be in control.

Caleb is into into everything!
Wonder where he gets it?
Like brother like brother!

---Blast from the past---

Ty used to love to pull everything out of drawers and cupboards!
Caleb loves it too!
Here are my boys looking ever so handsome and a lot alike!

Caleb
Ty