Birthdays and Christmas Pageants

Getting Ready for Christmas!

In early December, Ryan's mom and sister were able to come and stay with us over Ryan's and my birthdays.  It was a great weekend - we spent Saturday at Disneyland, where the kids basically got to go on twice as many rides as usual, since  Bomi and Aunt Helena would save them places in line while we took them on something else.  I was certain that Connor would want to do this "Jedi Training Academy" thing, so we found spots a half hour before it started so that he'd have a good chance at being picked.  When the time finally came, and the Jedi Master came past, Connor quickly shook his head and sat down.  Oh, well.  I think he liked watching the show, at least.  

    

   

The rest of the weekend we pretty much just relaxed and ate pumpkin cheesecake, and on Monday, Bomi and Aunt Helena volunteered to watch the kids so Ryan and I could go out for a birthday dinner. It was really nice to have them visit!  

   

   

The following week, Elise's Joy School did their traditional Nativity Show for the Twelve Oaks Retirement Lodge.  We did this both years with Connor in Joy School (well, not really last year, since he broke his arm right before the show, but we prepared for it!)  It was fun to see Elise's age group do it this year.  She got to be Mary that day (the girls agreed to take turns.)  We let Connor and his friend Ben participate, too, since we were short a couple characters.  After the little program, the kids gave homemade Christmas cards to the residents, it was really sweet.

   

Consequences of a well-lit photo

Our ward Christmas Party featured the Bob Baker Marionettes again this year, and the kids got to visit Santa.  They were a lot more into the Santa thing this year - last year they just looked confused.

   

   

The Joy School kids did an encore of their Christmas Pageant for the family party.  It went pretty well, and even when it didn't it was still cute.

   

Angel, Mary, Shepherd, Joseph, Wise Man/Innkeeper, Charlie (he didn't really want to be on stage.)

Why are the cutest pictures always blurry?

Angel visits Mary

Angel visits Shepherds

The part where the 2-year-olds have a knock-down brawl over Baby Jesus

Oh, and we finally had semi-professional pictures taken for our Christmas cards this year.  A friend of ours who lives a few blocks away agreed to the difficult task of making us look decent, and I think she did an awesome job of it!  By the way, I  thought that these pictures would be downloadable in their original size, but that doesn't seem to be working.  If anybody wants digital copies of any of these, just let me know and I'll email them!