December Time

November was so so busy for us, and I was actually really hoping December would slow down a little. Silly me to think that Christmas time would be like that!  It was a busy month full of shopping, concerts, and traveling!  I'll try to remember things the best I can.

First off, David came home one day with this little thing!

Teacher of the month!  I have no idea how often teachers at his school normally get this, but I thought it showed how much hard work David has been putting into his job.  He doesn't get a pay raise or a bonus, just a nice mug and something to put on his resume!  

Next semi-exciting thing is we got new couches!  Well, Brian was getting rid of their couches and they were very nice and gave them to us!  The hard thing was they wanted to bring the couches over the night of David's Christmas concerts.  I had to go to the concerts to help turn pages and tune and direct kids around, so Joy, Kahea, Brian, and Brittany moved our couches while babysitting!  It was so nice of them to do that and I felt bad that we couldn't be there (not that either of us could've done much lifting at that point because my belly was getting a lot bigger and David was still getting over his back injury).  But for about 3 weeks our living room looked like this!  It was very...cozy...and our living room felt tiny, but Asher thought it was great to have lots of couches to jump on!  David thought it was great because when we watched movies, he could lay on one couch, I could lay on another, and Millie (the spoiled dog) would get tucked in on the third. ;)

David loves to spoil Millie and always tries to sneak her into our bed at night, tuck her in on the couch, and play all rough with her when he gets home from work.  Because of that, this happens almost every night.  David will call me on his way home from work, and Millie knows that means Daddy is almost home and she'll wait either by the window or by the door waiting for him.

I'm not a morning person anyways, but since I've been pregnant it's been even harder to get up.  One morning, Asher got into the candy David brought home from school.  He unwrapped about 10 pieces of chocolate, then put them back in the box without eating one.  He doesn't really love chocolate and/or candy and I don't know where that came from.  Certainly not me.

As part of David's parents gift to us, they sent us the cutest Christmas ornament!  It's very fitting for our family.  I'm really hoping this one will survive the next few years!

On the 23rd, we drove up to Rexburg to spend Christmas with my family.  It was very cold, snowed a few feet while we were there, and we got to spend lots of time with cousins!  I think some of the most memorable things was when I made sugar cookies with lots of little toddlers (I started out just making them with Asher, but soon Ledger, London, and even Isaac joined in!  I don't have a picture of it, but it was very crazy!), watching David shovel off my parents deck while Asher "helped" by using a dustpan to shovel, and just seeing the general craziness with having so many children under the age of 5 in one house.

On Christmas Eve, we were going to go see a live nativity that my cousins put on every year, but it was really cold and snowy so we decided to stay in.  So my mom got out one of her nativity sets and narrated the story for all the little people!  It was very chaotic and I was laughing very hard!  This video was at the beginning when they were still kind of paying attention.

Asher thought it was great fun going through his, mine, and David's stockings Christmas morning!

On Christmas, it was snowing so bad that my parents, who had gone to church 20 minutes before us, told us not to even try going because our car would probably get stuck.  So we stayed at their house and let Asher open one of his presents to tide him over until they all got home!  We spent a little more than average on him this year because we both felt bad about how boring things have been for him and how crazy things are going to be this year.

Cousins wear Asher out.  He had so much fun with them!

David with Ledger and Asher at McDonald's.  There was lots of giggling when this was taken!

My parents found out their dog, Oscar, has diabetes along with arthritis and just being an old dog.  He was very spoiled during our trip because everyone knew how sick he was.

During the holidays it's one of our traditions to go to my dad's school and play in the gym.  It is great for all those little people that like to run around!  They have scooters and basketball and jump rope there and everyone has a lot of fun.  Normally we do a family game of lightning, but I wasn't going to play (too big of belly) and my mom and dad had both had surgery in the last month (we were the medical leave bench and just sat on the side and held my sisters baby), and there were a few people missing.  But hopefully next year sometime we can start that up again!

We had so much fun in Rexburg and it was great to see all my family again.  I'm sad I didn't get any pictures of David's family (my bro, not my husband), but we got to spend some time with them too!  It was good to get home, though.  Asher was in desperate need of his regular sleep schedule (and a little alone time, he's not used to being around other kids all the time yet), and Millie was getting bombarded by all the attention all the kids were giving her.  So we had a few days at home to relax before getting back into our routine.

My sister gave us Candyland, which Asher caught on to really fast!

We gave Asher a bunch of puzzles and so did my sister, so we usually end up doing about 5 puzzles a day with him.

We were boring on New Years.  Asher fell asleep on the couch at 6, so I just moved him right to his bed.  I was so exhausted from our vacation that I ended up going to bed at 10:30 (and even that was a stretch for me). David was the only one who was awake to ring in the new year, and I think he even came to bed shortly after that.

Judy sent Asher this adorable shirt.  I may have to take it in a little because he is just so darn skinny, but he looks very cute in it!

For mutual, we combined with the young men and played human hungry hungry hippos.  It was  a lot of fun!  I took Asher with me and he had so much fun throwing the balls back into the middle that came our way!

December was busy, and it looks like January isn't going to slow down much!  David's work will ease up a little.  He's been teaching an extra class so he has been working 10-11 hour days this school year.  But they recently hired someone to take over the choirs so he can go back to working his regular hours.  It will take a lot of stress off of him and he won't have to work so long.  That will be nice especially the further along I get in my pregnancy.  And Asher will love having his playmate home more!  We gave our old couch to my brother, so our living room feels much more open now.  And now our focus is just to make it through the next few months!  It's going to be difficult financially, emotionally, and physically, but we're going to do the best we can.  Here's to an exciting year ahead of us!