The Week After Christmas

We awoke on Christmas morning to realize that Santa had, indeed, arrived.  Later in the morning we headed to Grandma Judy's house for brunch and presents.  When it was time to eat, Elliott in a dramatic manner announced that he didn't feel well, and that his throat hurt.  As all good parents, we ignored him for a while, and then after even opening presents didn't jazz him up, Ross decided to take him home.

Around 10:00 pm that night, he puked.
Around 12:30 am, Wyatt puked.

Both boys had the flu.

A perfect start to a LONG week.

On Tuesday, Ross took all three boys to the doctor.  Elliott and Wyatt had the flu, and later that week Wyatt's test came back positive for strep.  Quinn just had a runny nose and a bad attitude.  My normally lively, wild and happy to be alive boys were slugs.  Sleeping all day, couldn't sit up and there wasn't much I could do to help.





Early in the morning on the Wednesday after Christmas, my dad came out to sit with the boys while I drove Ross to St. Mark's outpatient surgery center, for, well, surgery.  He was having some procedures done on his nose, a septoplasty.  It was a quick procedure but a ridiculous recovery.  We have learned since that:
1) Ross' pain threshold is different than mine and I need to be nicer.
2) Narcotic pain killers (percocet) do not mix with Ross brain and seem to melt his ability to ration, reason and function.
4) Strep throat, sinus infections and surgery recovery do not mix.
3) Annie needs to work on her patience.

Now that we are two weeks out from the elective procedure, and I've finally started sleeping upstairs again and not in the basement, things are on the up and up.  But, I tell you, we struggled.

Once the boys started to feel better, as their dad was feeling worse, the four of us managed to do a few things.  We went bowling for Willie's birthday.  We walked around temple square to see the lights before they got turned off.  We went to a movie.

It wasn't our best Christmas.  I'm sure it won't be our worst.  I so enjoy shopping and planning for my boys - it just makes my heart happy to PREPARE for Christmas.  But, the actually day always bums me out and makes me sad, and, the blur of days between Christmas and New Year's is exhausting.

The Week Before Christmas

We've tried every weekend in the Month of December to do a family activity.  In 2016, we ended up with only one night in the entire month where we were overly committed to other people, to spend with each other.  So, this mama made it a priority for some quality family time.  Well, we had 4 Friday's before Christmas and, we were about 50/50 on quality family time.

Week one: Out to dinner at a restaurant with menus and to see the "tree of life" in Draper, Utah.  Fun activity, fun night.







Week two:  Per the request of the children, gingerbread houses.  The houses collapsed several times, the dad yelled several times, the frosting got everywhere, and the mom got stuck with clean up.  It was a struggle.


Week three: Drive around to see the lights - except for the fact that we didn't prepare ahead of time and the local news map we used was highly disappointing.  All Christmas spirit was lost, immediately.


Week four:  We went with Grandpa Karl to dinner and to see the new Star Wars.  The boys were immediately enchanted with the porgs and late in the night, after the movie we headed out on a small adventure to, unsuccessfully, secure our family a pet porg, two days before Christmas. 



On Christmas Eve, which was a Sunday this year, we ventured out to Grandpa Huber's house for our traditional Christmas Even program.  It was a nice program and fun to see my kids read and participate.  Man, everyone is getting so big.  Ross and I also hid in the corner before everyone else got there to test out my selfie light for my phone.  It took us, maybe, 20 attempts, but we got a nice little picture of ourselves.  I have no idea how people take "couple selfies" on the regular.  It's difficult.





Oh, and yes, my hair did change colors from the beginning of this post to the end.  Funny what a trip to the hairdresser right before Christmas, and a general feeling of anxiety can do to a girls hair color.

cousin picture

Willie decided that for Christmas, he wanted to give my mom a photo with all SIX of her grandchildren.  Willie organized everything, we met at my house a couple of days before Christmas and did our best to be fast and create enough good light.

We ended up with some pretty cute pictures.  Even if, these Napoleon Dynamite obsessed kids were doing their best glamour shots by Deb looks.


The winner winner Chicken Dinner:


The Out takes:

Christmas Programs

December is so busy.  In the last few days though, we had some great little Christmas programs with the boys.

First up was Quinn's preschool program.  It was the sixth and FINAL time I watched the Learning Dynamics Christmas program and it was great.  Quinn did a good job reciting his part, "We are getting ready for Christmas" and sang most of the songs.  I took "the brothers" to school late in the morning so they could support Quinn and his program and Willie and Grandma came along as well.







The big boys also had a holiday performance, but for band.  They did two assemblies at school back-to-back in the morning and then a program at the junior high in the evening.  Elliott is in his third year playing the trombone.  In fact, we just got a letter in the mail telling us that we have rented long enough, we now own the trombone.  Hooray!  Wyatt is in his first year of band and  even though he initially wanted to play the saxophone, after trying it out, it was discovered that he was not only too small handed as an 8 year old, but in fact the alto sax is so heavy that it nearly tipped him over.  He settled on percussion, and has struggled a bit being a first year band nerd.  But, as the concert approached, he and I had a week of mini lessons and practicing at home, he finally started to get the hang of the fact that he is playing notes that are written on a page, not just to memorize.  Hooray.

Both boys did a great job.  I was very proud of them.

Halloween with the Dynamite's

Months and months and months ago, Elliott had the idea to be Kip from "Napoleon Dynamite" for Halloween.  As the months passed, more people got roped into the idea of a giant family themed movie costume party.

The assigned rolls were as follows

Quinn :: Napoleon
Elliott :: Kip
Wyatt :: Pedro Sanchez
Ross :: Principal
Annie :: Deb
Mama Judy :: Grandma
Coach Karl :: Happy Hands Club
Molly :: Summer Wheatley
Jack :: Don, Summer's boyfriend
Baby Brady :: Tina the llama

Now, thinking about it, I cannot remember what Haley and James were assigned...I think that James was also part of the Happy Hands Club - or maybe James was Rex Kwon Do and Haley was supposed to be Starla?  I cannot remember....

Anyway, as Halloween drew closer, the costumes got more real.  As silly as it sounds, I've maybe never been more proud (in an ironic sort of way) of how well my kids pulled off their Halloween costumes.  They were the hit of school, the hit of the neighborhood and after our professional photo shoot images were posted to Uncle Rico's instagram feed, they were for a brief moment, the hit of the internet.

I laughed all day long and told Elliott before he went to sleep that most likely, never again in his life, would he ever have such a great costume.

It was truly the best!