Count Your Blessings!: Christmas in Utah

After our early Kentucky Christmas morning on December 24th, Rich put in a full day of work at the hospital while the kids and I ran a few last minute errands (Wal-mart: Santa only left ONE new baby bed. The girls were not pleased. Dick's: Switched Josh's new baseball bat for a shorter one. It was quite convenient to be doing my Christmas returns while the rest of the shoppers were still buying their gifts.)

I also packed up the crew that afternoon. You would think it would be easier since we opened most of our presents in Kentucky, but knowing I had to pay $15.00 per bag really put a crimp on what I could take. I hate shelling out money for such petty things like your first checked bag. Four bags later we were all set.

Rich walked in around 5:30 PM and we were back the door a few minutes later headed to Bluegrass Airport here in town. It was heaven to only have to drive 15 minutes instead of an hour and half to Cincinnati. It was a bit strange flying on Christmas eve. The pilots talked about seeing Santa on the overhead and told us to keep a look out for Rudolph. I had cute pink Santa hats for the girls, but in the chaos of trying to get all our gear (backpacks, car seats, rolling suitcases, bags and coats) onto the plane, the last thing I wanted to do was worry about hats.

The boys are seasoned travelers and pack their own backpack full of things to do on the plane.

Matt took a little rest.

I LOVE not having lap infants!! The girls were excellent

We did have a few interesting carryons. Kaitlyn brought along her new baby carrier with baby strapped in and Brynn brought her 'gorgeous shoes' aka new Cinderella shoes and Tinkerbell Build-A-Bear. Such funny girls.

We landed in Dallas and switched planes. Our terminal was far away so we hopped on the Skyline train and grabbed a frozen yogurt at the only open food place in the airport. We were the last to board. Our seats were a mess. They had all five kids seated in the last row of the plane, row 32. Rich and I were sitting in the exit aisle on row 21. Yeah, that wasn't going to work since the kids are not old enough to sit in an exit aisle. The plane was full and no one was willing to move to help us out. That's the old Christmas spirit right?! Finally a woman moved to the exit aisle and Trey sat a row behind Rich. It wasn't perfect, but it was fine by me.

We arrived in Utah around 11:30 PM and thanks Rich's parents for bring the car up early and our brother in-law Charlie letting us borrow his new 'Beast' (Ford Excursion jacked up to look like the monster truck Big Foot. HUGE is an understatement, but very cool.).

We got to my parents home around 1:30 PM. Santa's elves had to put the last minute touches on a few gifts and climbed into bed at 3:30 AM ( 5:30 EST to my body). Santa's elf (me) was up until 3:30 AM the night before wrapping gifts and only got two hours of sleep when the kids woke up at 5:30 AM wanting to open their presents. I was exhausted. Luckily for us the kids slept until 9 AM giving me five good hours of rest. It wasn't a lot a lot, but enough.

CHRISTMAS IN SALEM. We found many presents under the tree for the kids, my brother Rhett and parents. Rich had a pile for me under there too.

It was a gorgeous white Christmas.

Rhett and the girls

More Webkinz!

My dad bought this cool remote control dinosaur that all the grandkids can play with when they visit.

My parents open their gift from us. My mom: A hand carved snowman from the St. James Art Fair in Louisville and a little box from our trip to New Orleans.

My dad got a golf club from us on eBay months ago and he models his new gear from the Ryder Cup that was in Louisville this past September.

Greg and his cute family came down from Salt Lake. They spent seven years in San Francisco and took a new job working on computer security for the U of U (school and hospital).

My dad and Oliver.

Our Christmas feast: turkey, stuffing and all the trimmings. We topped it off with an ice cream cake from Cold Stone.

Brad and Jana were in town from Wisconsin and Grandma Nance stopped by from Springville. We were only missing Jeff and Sarah, who had to stay in Milwaukee because of Sarah's new job, and Kurt who is serving a full time LDS mission in Taiwan.

My parents have seven grandchildren (Greg and Kate have two boys- Michael and Oliver). It was so nice for them to be together.

Mom and Dad

Rhett

Jana, Brad and Grandma Nance

The Swenson's next door gave my parents this fun horse that straps to your leg. Brad gave Brynn a test ride.

Clean up was fast with many hands.

Gotta love Brynn's brown teeth since she just ate a Kara's mint truffle.

It was so fun to spend part of Christmas day with Grandma Nance.

Matt took her hand and showed her all of his new toys.

At 5:30 PM Kurt called from Taiwan. Well, he actually called at 4:30 PM because he forgot about day light savings, so he called back an hour later so he could say hello to Lizzie, a girl who is his very good friend. She's a sweetheart. Kurt could only talk for 40 min so our conversations were short, but it was great to hear his voice. He comes home in August.