Holidays

The day after Halloween, I went on a girls weekend with some girls in the neighborhood. We just drove an hour or so up the mountains to Midway and stayed in a little Airbnb. We went to Olympic park in Park City, had lunch, went shopping at the outlets, and ended it with a buffet dinner. It was a fun weekend, and such a nice opportunity for me to get to know the girls here.

 
The holiday season was bittersweet. Daniel was the first one to get sick with a stomach bug, the week before Thanksgiving, and then he proceeded to get a cold that lasted for 3 weeks.

We spent Thanksgiving at Gramma and Grampa Holbrook's house this year. It was nice to be spending it with family so close. Almost everyone was there, contributing with something. And Gramma planned a fun activity for after dinner for the kids: decorating gingerbread houses. The kids loved it, and I was glad that that particular Christmas activity was already in the books for the year.

The week after Thanksgiving, we started getting sick. Every few days, another person would drop. Jack started, and he was weirdly sick. He threw up once or twice every couple of days, and it lasted for almost a week. Then Camille got sick. Then Brooke. I was thinking I might escape it this time, but no such luck. I got sick a few days after everyone else seemed to be over it. So, for over 2 weeks, we were basically quarantining ourselves, not going out much, not seeing anyone. We went to things a few times in between people getting sick -- there was the ward Christmas Party, and a caroling activity with our neighbors, which were both fun.

We made a calendar with Christmas activities to do, including some things from Light the World. And I also planned to do this special scripture study for the month of December focusing each day on a different story from the life of Christ. But since we all got sick for 2 weeks in December, we didn't get much done on our Christmas Togetherness list, and my scripture lessons stopped after about a week. I'm hoping next year will be better. I'll have my stuff together better, and we won't get dismally sick. I hope. Of course, next Christmas, we'll have a little baby, so who knows what'll happen.

We went to Oregon for Christmas this year and stayed for about a week and a half. It was a fun trip. We played with our cousins, ate good food, sang Christmas carols together, went to see Christmas lights, went to the cultural hall to play, went to movies, the girls went to a tea party, the boys went shooting, went shopping, hung out... We did all the things. It was very fun, and hard to leave.