Christmas Break Part 1

December 16, Tuesday

I'm so glad Dad is here and that he made it safely! We had so many errands to run today and he was game for it all. We went to lunch at Flower Child first and met Michael there. 

Then we went to Macy's to return Michael's suit. Then we met Michael at Sam's Club and he had already done most of the shopping. Then Michael took everything home and got it put away. Dad and I stopped at Walgreens so I could pick up my photo orders of mini canvas prints for the missionaries. Then he went into Safeway to buy some Panera poppyseed dressing for me and I went into the UPS store to do some Amazon returns. Then I got gas and got the mail and we went home. When Jonny came home, I played cards with him and Dad. Jonny got to work on his schoolwork and Dad took a nap and I did some tasks on the computer. We had beef stroganoff for dinner and then we read the Come Follow Me lesson and The Family: A Proclamation to the World. Michael helped Jonny study for his sports med final and Dad watched a little TV and I finished up my tasks. I did some minor tweaks to my talk and I'll read it to Michael on our drive to Scottsdale tomorrow night.

December 17, Wednesday

Michael brought all the gifts to the family room for me and I got them all organized and Dad started wrapping them. It takes me a while to get them distributed and make sure I have everything I'm supposed to have and get everything organized into piles but we got everything done today that we needed to. We got gifts wrapped for all the kids, Michael, Debbie, Akers, and even the little missionary mini canvases. We took a break for lunch and then finished up. 

Michael and I got ready to go to the dinner. We had a nice drive up and love having opportunities like that to talk. We had a very nice dinner. The restaurant was called Citizen Public House and we had a private room upstairs called Benjamin's Upstairs. As they kept bringing platters of appetizers upstairs, it kind of reminded me of Downton Abbey and how the footmen would go up and down the stairs constantly bringing food.

Anyway, the dinner was amazing. The menu said there were two appetizers they were going to bring us but they brought us more like 10. They had some delicious grilled cheese and bread and crab cakes and calamari and popcorn with bacon and these little beef sliders that tasted like short ribs. Everything was so delicious! Then they gave us a Stetson salad which they call the Original Chopped Salad. 

Michael and I both got the filet mignon. The desserts were amazing, too. The chocolate chip cookies were warm and falling apart which is my favorite way to have them. They also had brownies and little mini cheesecake tarts. 

It was a fun evening and it was fun to talk to everybody.  

December 18, Thursday

I'm so grateful the kids all made it safely and made great time! I think they left a little after 7 AM this morning. They made really good time and got here right about 7 PM. I put chicken noodle soup in the crockpot this morning and Michael chopped all the veggies for me so we had that ready for everyone and some Rhodes rolls. I got the sheets and comforter washed and got their room all ready with the pack and play and diapers and wipes and things. I got Charlie's booster seat set up. I organized the totes so that it blocked the console and fireplace. I got out all of our toys and even a new box of toys that have those plastic blocks that click together. Dad washed them all off for me. I had Jonny get his clothes and things out of his room and prepare his bedding on the couch. I had a very long list of tasks to do today and I got almost all of it done before they got here and finished up tonight while they played their Villainous game. Dad finished blowing up the baby pool so I could make my ball pit and thankfully Charlie loved it! Dad also said it would be a good day for him to bake the cookies and I told him to go for it but I couldn't help and he was fine doing it himself and I'm so grateful it's done! 

They arrived and I went out and gave hugs and then Audrey bought Charlie in and I helped to grab a few things out of the car. By the time I came back in, Charlie was already in his ball pit throwing balls around and having a great time. 

We had a blessing on the food and then everybody ate. Audrey brought some English toffee that her mom made and it was so good! Charlie played for a while and we all sat around watching him and I took some pictures.

Then Audrey and Nathaniel put him to bed and played Villainous with Daniel and Dad. I told Daniel I couldn't play because I had too many tasks I needed to do. Jonny laid on the couch and watched Stranger Things. I'm so proud of him for getting an A in physics! 

December 19, Friday

It's been a great day. Jonny came home and we got the best news! Not only did he get an A on his sports med final, he also got an A in AP US History and in English! He checked his grade and said wait a minute, what is this? And then he got a big smile on his face. We were all so excited for him! In English he got an 89.5 which is an A so we are thrilled! APUSH was 89.6% but we'll take it! He ended up with a 100% in math.

Papa and Daniel had fun playing backgammon

Jonny and Charlie

Dad remembered he had made an appointment at the Apple Store at 1:35 PM so I changed my clothes and we went to Santan Village. It was a madhouse! It took us forever to get to the store and it took us a long time in the store. They helped us right away but it just took a while. Dad had to clear out some storage so that the phone could be updated. She said he could get a battery for $90 and that's what we decided to do. Thankfully, it's already made a difference. It took two hours to accomplish all of this by the time we got home. Shortly after we got home, he and Daniel drove back to pick it up. Audrey needed a little more time for work so I called Osaka and thankfully they could take us a little bit later. Then Nathaniel heard some bad reviews about the Avatar movie and we ultimately decided not to bother with that. We had a great dinner at Osaka and I ate way too much, as usual. 

Then we went to the Tata Joseph Christmas Garage and then came home.

They put Charlie to bed and then we watched the new Knives Out movie called Wake Up Dead Man. Michael didn't want to watch and Dad tried to watch for about half an hour and then he went to bed. Jonny has been watching Stranger Things so he laid on the couch and watched that while we watched the movie. 

December 20, Saturday

It has been a fantastic day! We got so much done and had so much fun! I got up and sat with Charlie while he ate his breakfast. 

Daniel and Dad were talking about going to breakfast but most of us agreed that lunch would work better so that's what we did. The kids wanted to play Rummikub so I let them open the six player Rummikub gift that I had already bought them. Audrey put Charlie down for a nap and then when he got up we all went to IHOP for lunch. 

We came home from lunch and Daniel, Audrey, and Nathaniel played Villainous. I got a few things done on the computer and then I started making the icing to decorate cookies. We started that at about 4:30 PM. 

We were debating about what we should do tonight because Nathaniel wanted to take Charlie to the train park but Daniel had plans with his friends at 8 PM and Jonny didn't want to go. With a lot of back-and-forth, we finally decided we would go and leave Jonny and Daniel home and we all rode together in the Pilot and that worked out perfectly. Michael drove both ways. We didn't stay there for very long but it was just enough time to look at some lights, go in the model train building, ride the mini train, and get a picture and go back home.

I was stressed because I wanted to work on my talk a little bit longer but it was fine because we got home before 9 PM and we all had a little something to eat and then I worked on the finishing touches of my talk and then worked on pictures and did a Facebook post about our visit. 

December 21, Sunday

I'm so grateful that my talk is over and that it went well! I was nervous about it being too long so I skipped a few things but Michael said everything made sense and it sounded good so I think I did fine. The main points of my talk were that I know that the Savior is the only one who could have atoned for our sins and that I'm grateful he did that for us. I quoted D Todd Christofferson's talk about the condescension of God that he gave at a BYU devotional. I loved his question about could the Lord have simply come as a man instead of as a baby? He said he couldn't say, but what he did was to show us the way instead of just tell us. I also talked about the gifts that I'm grateful for and I specifically mentioned my children, Michael and the fact that our 30th anniversary this coming weekend, and also my dad and my mother. I mentioned about Dad doing things for the Sheriff's Youth Ranch but I kept it really short. I received many compliments on my talk and I was very grateful. I came home and put the ham in the crockpot. I'm so glad we got a good family picture after church. 

I talked with the kids for a little bit and then I took a nap. I came down and it was pretty quiet. Everyone was off doing their own thing and Dad was napping. Andrew called us a little after 2 PM so we talked with him for quite a while. I made pancakes and Michael made eggs to go with the ham. 

I told Andrew he either needed to talk to us while we ate or call us back later and he wanted to stay on with us so we took him off of the TV and put him on Michael's phone and had the phone sitting at the table while we ate. We ate and cleaned up. Audrey went upstairs to put Charlie to bed. I thought it would be a great opportunity to have a gentleman lesson with all the boys. I asked Nathaniel if he thought I should wait for Audrey and he said it was OK, so we had a nice discussion. We had family home evening in the kitchen. Michael gave a nice lesson and we all went around and said what we liked about the family proclamation. Dad said he really liked it when we read it the other night. Michael did the dishes so we could run the dishwasher and I started making the poppyseed bread. I think I started at like 5:15 PM and it took me until almost 7:30 PM to have it all ready. 

Michael, Jonny, Daniel, and I delivered the poppyseed bread. I had 12 loaves to deliver. We came home and played some games and had a nice evening.