The Pack Family

Coins for Kids

One of our Christmas season traditions is going shopping for Coins for Kids. We meet up with Bryan at the Bloomington Walmart and shop. We only had time this year to shop for 1 family but it was fun to pick things out. There are always so many people that it makes me anxious but we were able to just leave Bryan with the cart while the kids and I picked things out. I think we did a good job picking clothes for 2 boys. And it's nice to get out and serve others.

Here are the kids waiting outside before they would let us in. They had 3 moving vans in front of Walmart that they filled with the purchased toys. I was crazy how many people come out to help.

Deacons in my Kitchen!

The Deacons Quorum had an activity where they needed to make cookies and then deliver them to people in the Ward. Ethan volunteered our house for the activity, which was absolutely fine. Courtney was gone to a birthday party so he boys had it all to themselves.

There were about 10-11 of them with 2 leaders and then Bryan and I. I got out all the ingredients and gave Ethan the recipe. He has made cookies enough that he was able to help the other boys through it. But it was pretty hilarious! They almost put in 2 1/2 CUPS of baking soda instead of 2 1/2 TEASPOONS of baking soda. And the cookies weren't a very uniform size so they cooked a bit strangely. But they had a lot of fun and were able to help some people in the Ward.

I didn't grow up with brothers so it is an odd experience sometimes seeing the interaction between boys. But Ethan is in a good quorum with some great leaders.

Run Run Reindeer

Every year we do the Run Run Reindeer 1 mile or 5K to get the Christmas season started. Ethan got out of doing it this year because he had a camp out. He was actually bummed because last year we had a huge snowstorm on the same day as the race and he thought it would happen again. But it didn't so he didn't miss anything.

Courtney ran the 1 mile while Bryan did the 5K.

Courtney before the race...

Courtney after the race when she had eaten her finishers donut and had some juice...

Donuts make everything better. ;)

Ornaments

We make glitter ornaments each year and it is a lot of fun. I found some cute little ornaments when we were in Denver so we tried to decorate those but it was really hard. The hole on top is so small that we had a hard time getting the glitter into the orb. But it was fun to do a few and then do some larger ones. Ethan did some also but Courtney was the only one who wanted her picture taken.

O Christmas Tree

On the first Monday of December we put up our Christmas tree. The kids have a great time looking at all the ornaments and remembering when they were "little." We have been making ornaments each year so it is getting more and more crowded. But it's fun to see it all decorated. And I didn't drop a single thing and nothing broke! It's a Christmas tree miracle.

Ethan!!!

These are Chicken Pockets...at least that's what we call them. I think we called them something different when I was a kid. Anyway, they USUALLY have a little knobby thing on top where I have twisted the sides of the dough together but these don't. Why? you may ask. Because ETHAN goes through and EATS OFF all the knobby top bits! You can see where he has rudely ripped off the tops parts. And he does it with an innocent look on his face.

Thanksgiving in Arvada

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving we began our trip to Arvada for Thanksgiving. We let the kids decide when we would be leaving and so they set their alarm clocks for really early. They woke us up, we got ready and were off. It was so early when we left that it was hours before we saw the sunrise.

It was also hours before we stopped for some food and to get gas. As we were getting ready to get out of the car I heard Ethan say, "Mom, where did you put my shoes?" Oh no! I didn't do anything with his shoes. Somehow Ethan had just assumed that I would grab anything he left behind that he would need. Nope. I was lucky to get myself out the door at that early hour! We had brought our snow stuff so Bryan got Ethan's snow boots out for him to wear. Ethan wasn't too happy with us.

We had a great time at Grandma and Grandpa Pack's house with David, Jenny, Andrew and Jessica. Here are some highlights...

Courtney and Jessica put on a wonderful magic show for us all.

We did the traditional Thanksgiving Day bowling games with their Stake. It was a lot of fun!

The kids got tired after a game and began fighting over who got to sit in which chair. But they had fun bowling too.

We went to Boondocks and played laser tag, arcade games, bowling and Courtney got to drive the bumper cars. We decided this is our favorite place because there is a lot to do.