Quarantined at Christmas Time

The beginning of last week was full of holiday fun. Here are the kids dressed up for church. My mother-in-law, Lisa, made Anna's adorable dress and Jack's matching tie. Super cute!

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 On Wednesday, we met Christian after work and went to see the lights on Temple Square. It was crowded and cold, like always, but was really pretty and the kids enjoyed it. I had the brilliant idea of eating in a cafe next door to Temple Square to save time and enjoy the atmosphere. Everyone else had the same idea too:)

On the way home from seeing the lights, Jack started to cough a little. He woke up the next day with a fever and a full blown nasty cough. This is the point where our holiday plans started to change. On Thursday night, we stayed home and watched Toy Story 3. We brought down tons of blankets and pillows to the living room and just snuggled up. It was the first time any of us had seen the movie and we loved it.  On Friday, we had plans to go spend Christmas Eve with family, but decided not to go in case we would get them sick.  We did end up going to see Tangled that afternoon, since I guess it is okay to get strangers sick but not family. It was Jack's first time seeing a movie in a theater and it blew his mind. Anna was tired and was ready to go about half way through, but I just stood with her over in the entrance and that seemed to work. We all really enjoyed it and I can't wait until it comes out on DVD.  Later that evening, we put carrots out for the reindeer in the wooden shoes, and made some cookies for Santa. The kids went to bed early and so did Santa and his helper.

Christmas morning was really nice. The kids were excited and had a lot of fun opening presents. Here are some videos of the kids opening stuff: 

The rest of the day was pretty quiet. Christian and I were both sick at this point and we didn't feel well enough to make Christmas dinner, so we went to Ihop and let them cook for us:) We finally had Christmas dinner on Monday evening with our friend Mila. It was really nice to celebrate with good food, even if it was a few days late.

All in all, it was a quiet Christmas, but really nice. We enjoyed our time together and in some ways, I am grateful that we were forced to take a time out and stay home. It made us appreciate each other and also, made us remember how much we love and missed our other family. We hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and that your New Years is just as merry!

The Festival of Trees

Today, the kids and I went to the Festival of Trees, which is a fundraiser for Primary Children's Medical Center. For the last 40 years, people have created amazing trees, gingerbread houses, wreaths, and other holiday items which they donate to this festival. Each item is then sold, with the proceeds going to Primary Children's. I had never been to the festival before, but many of my friends consider it a holiday tradition. We had a really wonderful time. There was good music and good food. Jack and Anna had a blast looking at all of the different trees. They are all decorated with a theme in mind and many are created as memorials for a family member.  I'll be honest, I choked up a little bit walking through the trees. There were pictures of fathers, mothers, grandparents, and many children set around trees that held favorite items from that person. There were candy trees, sports trees, cartoon character trees, and many trees decorated with angels. What a special way to remember a loved one and also help a wonderful hospital at the same time.  There were a few trees which had not been purchased yet, and that broke my heart a little too, especially when they were memorial trees. I am sure those families will wonder why now one bought their tree. Hopefully they will all be bought by the end of the week. Anyway, here are some pictures from our day.

Checking out the candy amusement park. I think he was drooling a little:)

 Up close view of candy land

 Fishing in the kids play area

 Two crazy reindeer

 This set of trees was amazing! Those are blue trees, filled with fish, that are bent to look like a wave for Santa to surf on. Wish I could have gotten a better angle but it was pretty popular.