Christmas Day

Since several have asked, and I was very unclear, I was in the hospital last week for Crohn's. I was diagnosed about 5 years ago and ever since I have had Eliza it has been out of control. I can't keep food down. I went 2 months without eating becuase it hurt so bad. It has been really hard being mom and being so sick. It has changed our lives completley. I felt pretty hopless for a while but now I have some good doctors and I am confident that they can help me. I didn't understand why people would give me their sympothy after finding out, (becuase it use to be not bad at all) but now I understand the sympothy. I have lost a lot of weight and feel so guilty when people say man you look so good becuase I haven't been trying and honestly I would much rather be completly fat than to deal with what I am. Right now I take everything day by day. My goal is to have more better hours in a day than bad. This Christmas has been very strange for me becuase I am the one busy busy busy but I have just had to take a back seat and let others serve me. I am so grateful for a sweet husband who becomes mom as soon as he walks in the door and older children who see the need to help the little ones. And what was suppose to be a simple explanation has now turned into a book so without further adooooo.... THE CHRISTMAS PICTURES!!!!
What can be better than Christmas chocolate? She could care less about the presents but she loooooved the chocolate. She kept batting her eyes at Tom and he would share his chocolate with her. SUCKER!!!! WHo could resist those eyes though??
Maybe now she will stop messing with my camera?
These were a huge hit even though he doesn't like wearing clothes.
NOw this picture must say it ALL!!! This was Santa's doing. I am going to have to have a talk with that big man. Seriously it is a fun little game. Even I have played. Despite the gifts it was a nice easy going Christmas. We felt like it was just right. FUn with gifts and family time getting to know the Savior. I am so greatful for him and the example he is to us. I am so grateful for the strength that he has become in my "sick" times. I am constantly amazed that when I am really needed then I have the strength and when it can just wait then I am sick. He has done that for me. I am grateful for healthy children and modern medicine that can help when we need a leg up. I love Christmas and everything that we feel during this time of year. I pray that you all had a wonderful Christmas!!!!

Christmas Concert #2

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I have been really sick and in the hospital. I have had very little energy to do the daily things in life. I am praying that all the new things the docs are doing will help me. So here is our 2nd Christmas concert. Only I went with him because we had sick kids at home. They have to hold it at the local college because they are just too big to do it in the school. I was quite impressed and proud of my beginner band student. They were more disciplined than my high school band was. They take it seriously and prided themselves in doing a good job. I played the clarinet in school and so a little of my pride came out seeing my son up their playing "my" instrument. I wish you all could have heard them. They really sounded good. The only thing that closely made them sound like a beginner band was an occasional squeek but even those numbers were very low especially considering how many beginner band members there are. There are 54 clarinets alone!!!!!!!!! That was my whole band gowing up basically. Crazy. The picture below was just a small part of the band. The beginners sat in the middle. The Jazz band was on the stage. The concert band was to the right. And the symponic band was to the left(not really seen in the picture) The symponic band was my favorite. Aaron told me that is the one he wanted to try out for. Secretly that is what I was hopeing for. They seem like they get the most diverse music to play. Can you tell I am proud?

Christmas concert #1

I know its a little dark. I couldn't get any picture that were any lighter. Daniel is the one in the back with the striped sweater. So he was invited to participate in his school Choir directors church choir. (thats a mouth full!!)There were a select few who were asked out of Honor Choir and he was excited. He loves to sing and be in the choir. They were having an orchestra play as well. All in all it went well. I was a tad disappointed because I thought it would be lots of Christmas songs but half way through they did a little sermon on even passed the collection plate around. It was nice being among others not of our faith who really do love the Lord and want to celebrate his birth. The childrens choir sounded wonderful and were not at all intimidated by the huge number of people on stange from the church choir. They sounded wonderful and I love watching my children perform. He took everything his teacher taught him to heart. YOu could see his little chest rising filling up with air in the end to get ready for the big finale. The little things make them so happy and proud of themselves. The fact that we came to see him and made a big deal of it makes him so happy. We are proud of him.

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Parades are suppose to be calm right?

We went to one of the many Christmas parades that they have around the are. It was chilly and Eliza was sick so unfortunately Tom was at home with Eliza. As it turned out it warmed up a bit and I had wished they had been there. Either way we had a good time. We got there just before they closed the road down. But it still took about 15 minutes for us to see any parade.

So what else would any normal person do while waiting for a parade to start?
Walk on their hands of course!!! Both Sarah and Emma were really good at this.
Then we were so excited to see a friend of our is the parade. The kids shouted with excitement in seeing someone that they knew from church.



Then comes my favorite part of any parade. Some how I realized my chest got a little bigger and I stood a little taller when the band came along. Pride comes out and I start talking about my "glory days" in the band and leading the whole band down the streets during parades in my little town. This one was a little bit smaller than my band but they played with just as much heart as we did.

Last but not least we saw Santa coming down the lane in his big old red chariot. What parade would be complete without Santa!!! Parades are suppose to be calm and exciting and if I could have cocooned my little children then that is what it would have been like. But all around us there were people running out almost getting hit for candy and everyone had this mentality of give me give me more. Yes its fun to get candy thrown at you but I draw the line at fighting with other kids over some little piece of candy. One lady was worse than all the kids. She would walk up to everyone in the parade, say Merry Christmas, and expect them to give her anything they were throwing at the crowd. She on more than one occasion sent her children running down the street to catch someone whom they had missed and get the "things" they were passing out. It made me sad but still somehow I was able to mentally cocoon my children and we all had a good time despite almost being plowed over for candy. Life is changing and it was testament to me that we must continue to be in the world but not of it. I know that my children had a good time and they are still so innocent enough to be oblivious to what happened around us thank goodness. I love the Christmas season and a good parade helps kick of that spirit of Christmas.

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I HEART Cousins!!!!

Kate just loved Eliza. She would go around and kiss her and hug her. She even would try to sit on Eliza's lap alot. We think that maybe she must have done that in the womb with her sister Anna. It was so sweet to watch the two of them together. When my sister first got here with the kids Eliza didn't know what to think about Kate's affection but by the end of the trip(when Kate wasn't feeling good) Eliza was the one to shower the affection.

I know that this isn't a very flattering picture of me but I love how everyone piled around to get into the picture. And it turned out just so cute. If I could add makeup and have my hair done magicly it would be the perfect picture.

After seeing this picture I realized that we don't have even one picture with all of the kids in it. this is the closest that we came to having all the cousins together in one picture that were at my house at one time. All of my kids are in the brown shirts, then there is my mom and dad, and Isabel. We were missing Gabe(who hates taking pictures) and then Anna and Kate (who were at home with their dad who also hates taking pictures. I love the holidays. It is a nice excuse to be around family and eats lots of good food and not have to work and just spend nice time together. We didn't do a whole lot but we still enjoyed one another. We just wished the rest of the family would have been with us too. We miss you all!!

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