Christmas at Mt Baker

We spent Christmas with my parents and my sister and her husband at the base of Mt Baker. Despite all the extra snow gear, boots, gloves, hats, pants, and even sleds, there was.....

NO SNOW!!!

It was wet and rainy instead, but we had a lot of fun anyway!!!

We spent a considerable amount of time making the ornaments for the tree. All the decorations were made of paper: origami cranes, geometric boxes and stars, frilly snowflakes, and a paper chain garland. It turned out beautiful!

Ethan made this beautiful and elaborate star which adorned the top of the tree.





On Christmas Eve night, Grandma and Grandpa read the Christmas story. Erica fell asleep in Grandma's lap by the end.



Christmas morning was all about the presents!!! To Erica, it was all about the candy. She ate so much she got sick! Her favorite present was this Dora doll that Santa brought her.







We had such a wonderful time, creating memories I will always cherish!!

*Playing Christmas carols together on the musical instruments we brought.

*Heidi and Ethan's first ski/snowboard adventure at Mt Baker.

*Cooking with my mom in the kitchen, and enjoying her amazing cinnamon rolls.

*Playing games together.

*Watching movies together.

*Listening to the CD that Diana and Jordan made, with Christmas songs they recorded themselves.

*Experimenting and getting photo tips from my dad. (All the best photos here are his.)

*Relaxing in the hot tub, in the rain.

*Being completely surprised with an amazing diamond necklace from my sweet sweet husband.

*Making all the fun ornaments for the tree.

*Spending quality time with everyone, with no phones, and very little television.

Commitment

Today was a busy Sunday.

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I sang in a quartet this morning in church. Heidi was teaching her Sunday School class. I was supposed to teach the Beehives (which I ended up getting a sub for, thank goodness!) Eric gave a talk at another Ward. I had choir practice, with the song that I am accompanying on the violin. And tonight was the Adult Christmas Fireside, in which I participated in three of the numbers, one being the violin piece.

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Last night as I was stressing over the song to be performed this morning, I was agonizing over the fact that Eric wouldn't be there to hear it. He would be going over to another church building to speak instead. Eric was also stressing over the talk he had to give. We were each pretty wrapped up in our own commitments.

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This morning I sang my song. It turned out great. I was a little sad, though, thinking that Eric wasn't there to hear it.

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After the meeting I decided I would slip out and go listen to Eric speak. When I got to the building, I could hear his voice piped out into the foyer, but I could tell that he hadn't been speaking very long yet, so I slipped into the back of the chapel. We caught eyes for a moment, and he continued on with his talk.

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After the meeting, I waited for him in the back of the room. He told me it surprised him to see me walk in and it threw him off for a minute since he wasn't expecting to see me. We laughed about that.

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Then he told me that he heard me sing. He stopped at the church before he went to his other meeting and was able to listen to it from the foyer.

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That warm, wonderful feeling of being loved and loving in return is something that I never get tired of. Something as simple as being there means the world! Even though we have a list of commitments a mile long, number one on that list is each other.

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I feel like I am the luckiest woman in the world.

Food for Thought

I had this really crazy dream....

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Eric and I were housing several inmates in cells in our basement. They were complete prison cells, with bars and everything.

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Then we went on vacation, and were gone for a week.

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When we returned home, we realized we had not provided the means to take care of these inmates. No food, no water for one week.

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Frantic, I told Eric to run downstairs and see if they were still alive while I called 911. I went through every agony of revulsion and despair thinking of what it would be like to be without food and water for a week. Then I rationalized that surely they would yell and scream until someone rescued them, but what if nobody heard??? And then I thought in great detail how we would be arrested and charged with neglect and abuse and possibly even manslaughter.....

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As I woke from this dream, trying to shake myself out of that crazy in-between world of dreams and wakefulness, I described my dream to Eric. He said, "That's crazy! We don't even have a basement!"

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Want to know the interpretation of the dream?

We ran out of fish food.


But that's another story.....

Family Portrait: Take 2

Yesterday we headed to Mukilteo Beach to try for another family portrait session. It was cold and breezy, but the sun was out so it was a good day for picture-taking! Over-all, this was a much more successful session!