The rest of December...

The day after Christmas we knew we needed to get out of the house so we decided to head up to the mountains to find a place to sled.  We drove up towards Snowbasin and found a little place off the road to sled.  We were the first ones to venture there and had the hill to ourselves.  It was a perfect sledding spot! I didn't get any pictures of me, but I did sled down the hill like a pro!

On the 27th of December Nate and I celebrated our 13 wedding anniversary.  It is so crazy to think we were married 13 years ago!  Time sure flies.  I am grateful every day for Nate and everything he does for me and our family.  I married way above me!! :)  For our anniversary we went on a date to lunch and to see the movie "Into the Woods"  It was great!

We were lucky enough to get more snow over the winter break so we spent one morning shoveling the driveway and enjoy all the snow!

Since Great-Grandpa and Grandma Kohl were only here to visit for a week we tried to see them as much as we could.  They came to visit us at our home which was awesome!  We also met them for dinner in SLC the night before they left.  It was so great to see and spend time with them. 

4 generations!

We also spent 2 days down at my sister's house before New Years.  Our kids love playing with their cousins. We don't get to see them often enough.  Of course, I forgot to take any pictures of the fun we had on our visit. 

We ended our Christmas break with some sickness, but luckily it was mild.  As usual it was hard (mostly for me) to get back onto a schedule and face reality again.  It was so nice having Nate home for the whole month of December, so when he had to leave this first week of January it's always hard.  I am excited for a new year and a fresh start on life.  Looking forward to a great year!

December flew by....Christmas Day 2014

Christmas day came early with the kids coming in our room at 6:30.  We managed to stall them until about 7 before we ventured out to the family room to see if Santa and stopped by our house.  As usual Santa came and brought way too much. (when will Santa learn?)  The present opening lasted about 2 hours and then it was on to playing and eating breakfast.  We went to bed with no snow, but woke up to a few inches of the white stuff with it still coming down.  It was so nice to have a white Christmas and to be able to stay home in our pajamas all day! 

I love this picture of our kids eagerly looking for presents with their names on them. :)

The long awaited Elsa dress.  She has wanted it since last Christmas.

Liam was shocked to get the video game Minecraft, especially since Nate had told him we would never own it.  Santa never listens to our requests. ;)

New ski googles, ready for the slopes!

Enjoying the first real snow of winter on Christmas day!

We had our traditional Christmas dinner of prime rib with mashed parsnips.  It was VERY yummy.  I love being married to a great cook!

Gavin's lego set from Santa.

A building set for the family from Santa!

This was how Nate and I felt before noon on Christmas day!  We had a much needed nap after a late night and early morning.  The kids entertained themselves with their new stuff while we snoozed.  It was great!

December flew by...Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was really nice.  It was great to spend some relaxing time with just our little family.  We played games, did a puzzle and watched movies.  We also made and decorated gingerbread houses.  Yes, Nate makes the gingerbread and creates the houses.  A lot of work, but he enjoys it.  We had a dinner of leftovers (from the previous two parties).  We went and looked at Christmas lights and came back to find our Christmas pj's from The Elf.  The kids were in bed by 10:30.  It was a late night for us, but lots of fun!

If you look at my blog heading you will see a bunch of the pictures we took in our new pj's.  Nate couldn't remember how to do the timer on the camera and when he finally figured it out he didn't know it would continue taking pictures.  :) After the first picture, Nate stood up to go and the camera kept going. We were all laughing for the remaining pictures and had a good laugh for a while after.  Fun times!

Next up, Christmas Day!

December flew by....Kohl Christmas Party

This was a year of firsts with having Grandpa and Grandma Kohl living close to us for Christmas.  We got to see them multiple times over the Christmas break.  It is sure nice to have them close for our kids to get to know them better!  The best part about this Christmas was that Nate's grandpa and grandma Kohl flew out here from South Carolina to visit for a week.  It had been many years since we last saw them, so it was wonderful to reconnect and spend time with them.  We had a fun Kohl family Christmas party the day after the Hess family party.  We once again had lots of good food, played lots of fun games, and spent some time hearing about Christmases of the past from great-grandpa and grandma Kohl. We were quite partied out after two days of it, so it was nice to spend the next day, Christmas Eve, at home as a family. :)

Nate's mom had a bunch of Christmas minute to win it games that we played as teams.  There was marshmallow snowman building, balancing the ornaments, paper cup Christmas trees, marshmallow (snowball) toss, and balloon filled panty hose.  The last game was the left/right game where we passed around presents while Nate's mom read a story about the right family.  :) Everyone ended up with a dollar store gift.  Some of those are displayed in pictures below.

It was a great time and we look forward to this new tradition at Christmas time!!

December flew by....Hess Christmas Party

The annual Hess Christmas Party is something that the kids talk about and look forward to every year.  It is the first question that is asked on December 1st, "When is Grandma Hess's party?". It is a long month waiting for the party day to arrive.  

We had the annual party on the Monday before Christmas and if you are keeping track it means we had something going on every Monday in December. :)  The party was awesome as usual.  There was lots of fun games, tons of good food, and a great nativity acted out.  The thing the kids were most excited about was the white elephant game played at the end of the party.  We gather white elephant gifts all year (or bring ones we got last year).  This year Nate just had to buy a few off of Amazon such as: bacon band aids, an inflatable unicorn horn, and dragon meat.  Nate also received a Justin Bieber poster last year as a white elephant gift so we re-gifted that with a creepy mask that Nate made.  :)  Pictures below!

Playing pool, a cousin favorite!

Card games!

The kid table.

The adult table. Very peaceful. ;)

Nate not wanting to be photographed.

The whole cousin gang!

Game time!

Creepiest mask ever.  It was such a fun night.  Can't wait for the next Hess Christmas Party!