Our first Christmas home

How it got to be February I'm unsure. But all I know is I don't want time to keep going by without documenting the Christmas of 2016. We hosted Christmas and somehow made enough room for all 10 bodies to sleep in beds and be generally comfortable (aside from that nasty flu that hit 8 of us, of course). It was more of a magical Christmas than we could have reasonably hoped for. We woke up to piles of snow and happy babies, took said babies to church in their Christmas nightgowns, ate our traditional creamed eggs breakfast, and opened presents lazily all through the afternoon. Rory happily chomped on the mints from her stocking and wore her new mittens and glittery kitten shoes the better part of the afternoon. If you don't get through all the pictures at least scroll down to the last. She's my favorite. 

As for this blog in the new year, I have a lot I have floating in my brain that is itching to be written. Some of it scary, some of it mundane. But write I will. It's my goal to write some of my more vulnerable, scary narratives this year. For no reason aside from that my heart somehow itches to write them down. It's a hankering I'm not sure how to explain. 

Sometimes during the day my brain will latch onto a thought and write in paragraph form. And I let them go unwritten more often than I like to admit. So here's to putting yourself out there with abandon. If a million people or no people read, I think it's good practice not to care. 

The great flu of Christmas... and Santa!

I'm finally catching up from Christmas. And the fact that I had the flu in these pictures, a fact I didn't really understand until we were already on the train (and again after New Years! Are you serious?!) is a large reason why. 

Regardless, the Heber Creeper's North Pole Express was so fun! None of the girls were big fans of our special visitor named Santa, but the cute elves let Rory dance in the aisles and we were all wildly entertained watching their flirting and general high school age antics, so it was fun for us too! 

Jay and Brooke stayed home because the flu hit them first, then it hit Zane and I on the train, then my dad, then Jess, Steve and Clara by Christmas Eve. (Can we all appreciate that by the hand of God the two littlest didn't get it somehow?! We said at least twenty prayers of gratitude-little people don't know how to aim into a puke bucket!) We were basically a pile of fun through the holidays, but it was still fun to be together and hang out in misery on the living room floor with the people we love. 

There was something that I thought about so many times though, through the great flu of Christmas. It hit Jess, Steve, and Clara at the same time- hard. So I took over being Clara's mommy for a good part of the day. Jay took Rory, Brooke took Winnie, and I took over for Clara. That poor sweet 4 year old probably threw up a solid 15 times that day. We carried around a puke bucket and did a lot of hot water, soap, and bleach cleaning of everything in sight. But I didn't mind at all- I'd already had the flu so I wasn't scared of cuddling her or washing her clothes or holding her bucket. 

And I think it's that way in life. When we've been through something hard- or gross- or scary it just becomes easier to help someone else going through that same thing. We aren't scared of proximity or of standing there with them in the middle of the chaos. There's a silver lining to every trial, and I think most often that's it. I don't believe God sends us trials necessarily, but he's the one that lets us learn from them and find sweet moments (like holding Clara's puke bucket) in their wake. 

An Ewok Hallow's Eve

Jay and I knew from the moment we watched Star Wars together as married couple that our first child needed to be an ewok for Halloween. That's not a joke. We've been patiently biding our time until Rory was old enough to toddle around, because that really makes it. And this was our year!

My sweet Jay humored me, and I went to work sewing my little heart out to make it a family affair. I really didn't want to have to buy anything new this year, so everything we're wearing is either pre-owned, thrifted, or made from thrifted materials! 

So Jay's vest is a $3 fuzzy vest that I cut down to size, cut the zipper off,  and sewed over the logo.

My dress was an XXL, which I cut down, sewed, and made a choker out of the spare material. 

And Rory's suit I found at DI for $4, cut it down to her size, and made a hat with ears out of the extras! (if you could see under the sheet, it's a little small because I ran out of scraps!)

So in all it probably took less than $20 and a few hours of sewing.

And kudos to Jay who made his own Hans Solo leg wrap/gun holster out of a black tie down strap!

Also our sweet Ewok won't stay still for a picture to save her life these days, and some of these are a little blurry because well... #life We hope your Halloween was as fun as ours! We went to a party Thursday, a restaurant grand opening and the rec center Saturday, and trick-or-treating on Halloween night! Rory loved it all, aside from our rather tall neighbor Paul who wore a scary mask, and the house next to his who had a witches hand in the candy bowl. I've never seen the poor dear so scared. So many tears. But also so much candy. So I think it was a win overall in everybody's book.