SURPRISE

For three week now I have been planning this Birthday Surprise for Jared.  NOBODY knew about this!  I flew his parents up for his big "40!"  Jim and Kathie Cocklin picked them up at the airport and taxied them to our house.  They arrived and Jared was totally surprised, as you can tell by his face!  It was a struggle to pull this off, but well worth it!

SNOW much fun!

Josh and Spencer spent one afternoon out in the snow.  They had so much fun.  With the lack of snow this year and warmer temps., the snow isn't that great....but they didn't care.

Christmas

We had a wonderful Christmas.  The boys were spoiled...as usual!  Jared actually did most of the shopping this year, because both boys wanted new fly rods and reels.  I splurged and got new stockings this year.   We had a relaxed morning, which didn't start until 9:30 (this is the plus of having older kids!)  After hanging out in our jammies all day, we showered and went to Les Miserables.  It was a great movie, but Josh described it as the "most boring 3 hours of his life!"  We feel very blessed!

Our good friend, Narda Townsend, made us homemade tamale's....the were delicious, and Jared was in Spanish Heaven!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was so fun this year, full of friends and activities!  When we live so far away from family, it is great to have friends to fill the void!  To start the day off we had some good friends over for brunch.  Yummy food, sledding for the kids, and lots of great conversation.

 After that, Jared took Joshua (Nathan wasn't feeling well) cross country skiing.  The only problem was Josh took 2 left handed gloves, so since he couldn't hold the poles, they skied pole-less!

We had some other families over for appetizers and fun!  We also did a White-elephant gift exchange, which was the hit of the party.  We had decided before hand, that for the men's gift, we would wrap something they really liked, hoping for good reactions.  We were literally laughing so hard when those were opened...Brian's ski hat, Jared and Todd's ties, and Marriner's hat collection.  Then men were shocked and somewhat disappointed that their wives would give away their prized possessions.  But no worries, we gave it all back at the end!

We ended the night with Christmas Jammies, from Grandma Swenson, as is tradition!

Our Piano Player

EARLY MORNING WALK

Last Friday Kathie, Bonnie and I decided to go for a walk on the Eagle River (Kathie's idea).  I was a little apprehensive once we got on it, but the ice was VERY thick and we didn't have a problem at all.  It was cold, but I dressed for it and was actually really warm.  It was so beautiful!

Christmas Tradition

Any of you that know me know that I am not fond of decorating "food" items!  Joshua asked me a few weeks ago if we were going to decorate our Gingerbread house this year.  I thought maybe I could forgo this tradition, but after that I had to go buy one.  We had to do some prodding to get Nathan to help, but they had fun, and it turned out cute!