It's The Holiday Season!

The holidays are over and they were soooooooo fun!! We went up to Snowflake the week before Christmas to visit with Laney who was visiting from Florida! It was so great to see her!

On the Thursday before Christmas, we went to Grams' house for our annual "baking day" with the ladies. Here is everyone saying "Merry Christmas!"

The rest of the time I was very bad at taking pictures. For some reason my camera ended up in all the places I wasn't. Oops.

So let me tell you about it...

Laney opened her Christmas presents. We got to get

to her know her Roommate (who I named Roommate, but her real name is Allison) and she is very sweet. The two of them were so funny!

On Friday Laney and Roommate had to head back to Florida so they could go back to work, so Grams, Mom and I drove them to the airport. It was sadto say goodbye, but Laney is experiencing the opportunity of a lifetime!

The rest of the day, we went shopping and went to lunch at the Cheesecake Factory (yummy)! It was sooooo fun to hang out with the girls!

Sunday we went to Grams' ward's Christmas program

that she is in charge of every year. It was really nice - she does a great job every year!

We spent some time just hanging out with the "Rhineheart" side of the family, an we went to the "Saline" side and spent some time with them! It is so fun to spend time with the families!!

Then, Christmas Eve came!

We headed over the Great Granny and Papa's house to see the entire extended family. I can't believe how big the kids are getting!! They used to be so tiny and now the girls are starting Young Womens! Holy Cow!!

After that we headed to Grams' house for our PJ's and annual Christmas program stuff. The little ones did their live nativity, and I got to be in charge of it in Laney's place (she is usually in charge, but since she was in Florida, I took over - she does a much better job, but it was fun to do it!) Here is a little video of it:

Then, we sang some Christmas songs and opened our "drawn name" gifts. We had drawn Aunt Mindy and Uncle Jason and Jon made a beautiful cutting board that we put in a basket filled with gourmet treats and a pretty little knife and stuff. I thought it looked really nice and I think they liked it

Uncle Sammy and Aunt Reah drew our name and they made us

this amazing picture of the Snowflake temple with pictures of us around it and our names and the date we got married! It is soooo a

mazing!!! And...the wrapping was pretty cool too! :)

After that we headed over to Saline's to play a Bingo/White Elephant game that was so fun! When you got a Bingo you got to pick a present and when someone else got a Bingo, they could choose to steal or get a new present. It was really exciting!!!

Then, Shaunalee, Beau, Keagan and Kaleb all went in and put on their pajamas - here is a picture of the cute little family in their feetie pajamas!! Doesn't Shaunlee's belly look cute? She is pregnant with her first little girl!

Then, we went over the Rhineheart's to do our "Christmas Ever Slumber Party". This year I was outnumbered by boys, so I told Tanner and Jon they could pick the movie as long as they didn't spend the night playing video games - bad decision!! They chose an anime movie called "Princess Mononoke" - it is the strangest, longest, most miserable movie experience ever!!! But it was so fun to stay up all night and watch it together (and make fun of it at every opportunity) so it was a great night!

At 3:30am Christmas morning, we got Mom and Dad up and headed in to see what Santa brought for us!!! Just like always, we got totally spoiled!!

Then around 5:00am we went up to Show Low to visit Granny and Papa and eat some breakfast! Every year Granny makes biscuits and gravy

and it is soooooo yummy!! It was great to visit them!

Around 7:15am, Jon and I headed to Saline's where we set up the rocking chair Jon had refinished for Lon and Kimbalie (who are expecting their first baby - a little girl) and we watched Keagan and Kaleb open what Santa brought them and we opened up our presents. Again, we got totally spoiled!! Especially by JoyLynn who drew our name. She made the most amazing journals! They are covered in leather and it has gold letters (mine says "Memoirs of Malori Jo with a beautiful crown in the middle, and Jon's says "Adventures of Jon Saline" with a really cool compass in it) They are so cool!

At noon, we went over to Grams' house to see what Santa dropped off there, and again, we were totally spoiled!!!!

Christmas was awesome!!!!!!!!! Thank you everyone who made

it so special!!!!!!!!!!

Eventually we came home and tried to catch up on housework and laundry, and then, before we knew it, it was New Year's Eve.

Jon's family all came over to play games and eat snacks while we waited for the clock to strike midnight.

Here are some pictures of everyone playing, the little boys hanging out (Kaleb fell asleep early) and everyone just hanging out. It was really fun!

That night, Shauanlee, Beau, Keagan, Kaleb, Keith, and Shelly all stayed the night at our house. It was really fun in the morning when we got up and ate some breakfast!

Later on New Years Day, we all went to the movies! Most of the "grown ups" went to see the Avatar movie, but Jon and I had already seen it, so we went with Shaunalee and Beau and the kids to see Alvin and the Chipmunks (and I was singing "All the Single Ladies" for the rest of the night!)

So, the holidays have been wonderful!!! We have had so much fun!! Sadly, we have to head back to work and "real life" on Monday....wish us luck....hee hee hee!!