Christmas Evening

We went over to Mom and Dad Rigtrup's home in the evening to celebrate Christmas with family. I was so tired from the days festivities that I didn't get a whole lot of pictures.

Grandma and Grandpa had given their 3 granddaughters a special gift this year. They had gone to the Shakespere festival in Oregon and had picked up these Renaissance outfits for the girls. It must have cost them a fortune! They are quite the outfits for dress-up. I can see these might be used for Halloween. The girls squealed with delight. It was really fun to watch. Grandma had also found the butterfly wands that lit up and played some Chinese rock song that drove us CRAZY all night. They had fun and she still loves dressing up in this outfit!

The beauties - Avery, Gabriella and Lydia

Butterfly Power! Max and Vance are the two looking longingly at the all important wands!
We (or I should say Gabriella) had drawn Lydia's name for Christmas. We decided to do a Pinkalicious theme (it's a really cute book). We gave her the book, pink skirt and I made the shirt. (I love it!) She looked adorable!

Roxie's Present

Gabriella had been saying to me during the Christmas Season, "Mom, when are we going to get a present for Roxie?" I kept putting her off and forgetting about it with everything we had going on. So Christmas Eve she asked me again just before she went to bed. Oh crap! I totally forgot! She said it was OK because she had made her a gift. This was so precious I wanted to be sure it got on the blog! The next morning after we had our Christmas, Roxie got hers from our blessed Ellabee! So here's the gift....

A Homemade Puppet!

You can't see it here, but Roxie was afraid of this. I'm not sure if it was because it was attacking her (Ella's way of introducing the puppet) or if it was because she stuck it on her face. Either way Roxie had a present of her very own!

Ella's actually telling Roxie to be careful and not rip the puppet. She didn't want to "fix it" again!

Christmas Morning 2008

Christmas morning tradition for the kids is you don't get to go downstairs until Mom and Dad are up. I like to go turn on the lights and music while Hyrum gets the video camera ready. I'm not sure how many more Christmases we have of them following this tradition. I could hear them yelling about the gifts before they made it to our room. It was a fabulous morning, a fabulous Christmas!

First Look (or was it...)

Gabriella so excited to see what Santa brought!

Bailey's new skateboard
A new doll for Gabriella (I think this makes 11. I know, but she asks for a doll every year for christmas and Birthday! What are you going to do? She's got her own orphange in the playroom!)

Loves and thanks! It had to be documented!

Christmas Eve 2008

We had a different Christmas Eve this year - a very laid back evening. (Thankfully.) We had our good friends the Paternoster's over for dinner, decorated sugar cookies for Santa, talked about the Birth of Christ, saw Santa run across the yard, and then put the kids to bed. It was great!

Watching where Santa is on the computer. This was really cool because it showed the different time zones and how he was making his way toward them. (We started this in the morning!)

Marcie, Erik & Brooklyn and Bailey and Ella

Decorating cookies for Santa. More like eating cookies for Santa.

Mr. C's note to the kids
Goodnight to all and to all a Goodnight!

Winter Wonderland

I love snow in the month of December! It makes Christmas! I think it's so beautiful. It's when it goes into March and April that I begin to really hate the white stuff. But it was really fun to watch the kids get giddy with excitement while playing outside.

Goody Gumdrops! It's the Rigtrup Christmas Party! December 20th

So Hyrum and I have had a Christmas party for the last 4 years. I LOVE Christmas but I especially love this Christmas party. In the past it's been mostly an Elder's Quorum party but since Hyrum is no longer President, we decided to expand the guest list and make this an Annual tradition. I was really surprised we had as many guest show as we did since there was a serious snow storm outside!

One of the funnest things about the party (next to "no kids allowed") is the White Elephant gift exchange. It's hillarious! There's always such a selection of "gag" gifts. I think people plan for this all year! This year we had a box of junk (literally), men's thong underwear (with happy faces all over it), a "how to kiss/treat a girl" book from the 1950's (with personal notes) and a bunch of crazy other stuff! My stomach muscles hurt from laughing so hard!

Don't miss next year's "Ugly Sweater Christmas Party!" Game on!

Gary & Christi Jacobs, Krista Mitchell, Kelly Jensen and Jake & Cindy Rigtrup

Gary measuring how much is left in the bottle.... Making sure the Peguin lights up! A HOT gift this year. Remember to raid your local Big Lots for next years bird light up!

A VERY cold train ride to see Santa! December 20,2008

Mom and Dad Rigtrup decided to take everyone on the train to the North Pole (Snoqualmie) to visit Santa. We were so excited for the train ride until we discovered there is absolutely NO HEAT on board the train. WHAT?! I think this was the coldest day of the year.

We then had to wait outside to actually get into the building to visit the bearded man. Seriously, I don't think I've been this cold since I lived in Idaho during the Winter! The kids had a great time until they froze up but we are really grateful to Grandma and Grandpa Rigtrup for the experience and I think we all have a true appreciation for Santa! Thanks to Grandma and Grandpa!

Bailey and Caleb

Hyrum and Dad

Me (just before my frost bite)

I tried to prolong this picture and visit as long as I could because we were warm and indoors!

The kids thought this guy looked cool in his vintage sheriff's outfit.