SKYPE!!

I LOVE technology!!! I LOVE SKYPE!! It's amazing that we could visit with and see our family that wasn't here on Christmas!

We set up our SKYPE headquarters!!

Testing testing!

There's Dustin in Afghanistan

Lyndi's first skype... she was not impressed!

Oh what a CUTE missionary!!!

We talked for over an hour with Trent. So glad they got permission to SKYPE!

Everyone is having a good time visiting with the fam!

And we talked to Aimee and Jackson!

It was so fun talking AND seeing everyone! SKYPE is so cool... I can't wait to see what technology they come up with next!!

Christmas morning!

Woo Hoo! It's Christmas morning!!

 HA! Aren't we cute covering up our bed heads with lovely Christmas hats!!

 Santa always leaves his bag for the young ones in the house!

 Wow! A scope... I wonder just how Santa knew exactly what scope Mike wanted!

 Tools!!

 Brandon definitely needed a first aid kit.... no more duck tape band aids at work!!

 Mmmmm snacks!!

 Some of the loot!!

 We are SO excited!

Yep... excited alright!!! Fun Christmas morning!

Now in just a little while we will do some Skypeing!!!

Christmas Eve evening

Christmas Eve was an eventful day... but the main event was the annual Christmas eve adult party... This actually only officially started last year. My brother is always here visiting and we have done different things on Christmas eve for entertainment but came up with this idea last year to have an adult party while everyone else is home with kids getting ready for Santa and the reindeer.

 The guests were greeted by Mikes major award.... the sign that this was for adults (HA!... I thought it was a cute idea!)!

 It must be an important party cuz I got out the milk glass dishes and gold silverware!! We have a steak dinner, with shrimp cocktail and sparkling cider

 Everyone is SO excited!!

 THEN.... when dinner is over.... we get out a pile of gifts! (cost was NOT an object... or was it ... objects did NOT cost... anyway.... there were gifts!)

 Yep... we got out the Christmas snacks too!

 Then we played the left center right or right left center ... game!!!

 Some people had all the luck....

 Hmmmm.... others not so lucky....

 But after about 20 rounds, everyone had valuable prizes to enjoy!!

What a fun evening! I think we partied til almost Eleven!!! Woo Hoo!!!

Christmas Eve afternoon...

We had surprise visitors from Eugene Oregon (Trent's mission on the way to Brazil!) Christmas Eve afternoon.

This is brother and sister Hooker.... They knocked on the door and said we have pictures of Trent! Of course I let them in immediately! I would like to say they made a special trip here just to bring me pictures of Trent... but they were here visiting family. They had the missionaries over for dinner and took pictures for their families and mine just happened to get hand delivered. What a great surprise and what nice people. We sure enjoyed visiting with them and greatly appreciated the pictures they brought!

Christmas Eve morning...

Christmas Eve morning all the guys went shooting...

What an arsenel of weapons of mass destruction!

So what did I do while they were gone?!?.... Cooked and baked of course and Krisitn came over and joined me. Fun times!

KFC night!

Whenever my brother Dan comes in town we have a big dinner of KFC... compliments of Dan!

 LOTS of KFC!

 Then we play the gift game... but it has a theme... this year the gifts had to start with a K, F or C!

You can see we had a LOT of fun! Thanks everyone!

Temple lights!

Last night my brother got into town so we grabbed a bite to eat then braved the rain to go see the temple lights! Poor Mike had to get up at 2:30 to go to work so he missed all the fun!

 Brandon is standing by a tree he helped decorate!

 That's me... standing by my favorite purple tree! I've got to get me some purple lights for next year!

 Brandon, Erin, me and Dan all huddled under the umbrella!

 In the visitors center to see the Nativities and dry out a little.

 We found a few things from Brasil...

Going on a rainy night was great... no crowds!!! It was fun and it wasn't raining very hard anyway.

BUT... before we went home we did a VERY fun thing that Brandon and I haven't done in a few years...

It was almost 10:00 when we left and they turn out ALL the temple lights at 10:00...  ALL of them at once! You have to watch very closely and don't blink or ya might miss it! Try it sometime... it's way cool!