Santa, Santa Everywhere

Above was at the U's opening gymnastics meet, and these are from our ward party.

We have seen many a Santa this year, though the girls were never overly excited to sit on his lap.  Carson always seemed to be absent or asleep, but he was there for a really cute cousins one.

Park City

A while ago, a friend of mine had a week at a condo in Park City, but couldn't stay the entire week, so she split it with me!  My family and I headed up for some relaxing time and had a blast!  We swam, used the spa and sauna, ate from one of their restaurants, watched lots of movies, played games, had cocoa and cider by the fire.  It was an all around good time! On our way back to town, in some serious snow, we stopped at the Olympic museum.

10 years in the making...

This month, my Jeffrey achieved his goal of earning his Bachelor's Degree!  He graduated with a BS in Criminal Justice, with a minor in Psychology.  I'm so proud of him for hanging in there and getting it done.  All the while, he has been working full time and supporting his family, and still even has a great GPA.  Good work, Daddio!

In other related news, Jeff was recently offered the position of detective for SLCPD!  He moved over after only 4.5 years on, when most usually move with closer to ten years behind them.  He has always wanted to do that and has been loving it so far. It is so nice to have evenings and weekends again, and it conveniently gave him Christmas and New Year's off!

We're triple proud of you this month, dad!

YWE 2012

Our Young Women in Excellence program was a few weeks ago, and frankly, it kinda took us by surprise. (I work with a very fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants kinda presidency, and it drives this list-making micro-manager absolutely crazy!) So, anyway we went with a Christmas tree and "gifts" theme.  It was much more basic than some of the other big activities we have put on, but I was totally in love with the tree and cake we had, so I wanted to document them.

All the value colors, plus the ornaments are gifts with value experiences the girls have completed, and the presents underneath have some of their 10-hour projects.

Presents cake!

Christmas Performing

Amelie's dance crew was back in action for Christmas, and though she is older and experienced, she still doesn't always do all of the singing and dancing, but is always cute!

She also had her first school program, in preschool at Challenger. It was super cute! She, again, did not always do all of the performing (she gets easily distracted on stage) but still sings the songs and poems daily.