Christmas 2018

We had a wonderful Christmas this year. I felt more relaxed than I do about things typically, so that's always nice. :) Some things just didn't get done, and that's ok. Christmas Eve day was mostly spent at the Garner's house. Uncle Tanner was making his missionary call at noon, so we gathered there to talk to him and have our family meal around lunch time, instead of later in the evening. I love getting to see far away faces and hear their far away voice, but I admit, chatting over computers with everyone else around is a little awkward for me. So I just laid low. :) Then we ate a delicious meal, opened gifts, and really enjoyed our time together.


We made it home later than expected, so instead of making cookies for Santa, we just threw some neighbor treats on a plate with notes, got in our pj's, checked where Santa was on the Santa tracker, and got to bed. One of my favorite traditions growing up was all of us siblings sleeping in the same room on Christmas Eve. It's fun to watch that tradition live on through my kids. They usually do a pretty good job at getting right to bed on Christmas Eve because they want Santa to be able to come, but I caught them sneaking out quite a few times this year. *ahem, Gwen.


Christmas morning was magical. Richie built us a fire and we worked on our traditional Christmas breakfast of German pancakes, bacon, oj, and grapefruit of course. We finally let the kids through the curtain to the living room and tried our best to savor the gift opening that morning. Richie really surprised me this year with a beautiful new leather purse and wallet, and other goodies he snuck into my stocking, which I believe is a first. My other favorite memory may be showing Richie the poem that Gwen wrote me for part of my Christmas present, and watching him immediately tear up. Other top moments would be watching Richie teach Miles the basics of long boarding and watching the kid's reactions when they opened their sibling gifts.


Later that morning, Grandma and Grandpa Garner, and uncle Jacob came over to take part in the chaos and helped keep the kids entertained while Richie and I ran around trying to get things packed and ready to go to St. George.


I am now realizing that I took a measly amount of pictures while we were down in SG, but it was wonderful, as always, to spend time with the Crosby side. Highlights include: seeing the new Mary Poppins with everyone, getting to Celebrate Ilah and John getting married at Ilah's shower, playing games and eating snacks with everyone on Christmas Day,taking our kids to walk around the temple grounds, getting Gwen's ear's pierced as a part of her Christmas gift, the kids sleeping over at the Lamb's, and taking our kids on a tour of a water reclamation facility in Hurricane. (side note, this is something we've wanted to educate our kids about for some time, but they don't allow young kids on tours typically. Long story short, through a connection here in Riverton, we were hooked up with a private tour and it was so cool!! Way cooler than we were expecting. The kids probably thought it was fun just to ride in the back of the truck, but Richie and I geeked out the entire time.)



We were tired by the end of our trip. That's the status quo with little kids and traveling right? But we were tired in all the best ways. Merry Christmas 2018!