Christmas has now come and gone and we are enjoying a lazy Sunday afternoon snuggled in brand new p.j.s and entertaining ourselves with family games and left over Christmas treats. It is a good day!
This past Monday we left to go to the Parker Cabin in Island Park. There was just enough snow to enjoy a little sledding and snowboarding. We also "ate good food at the cabin" (Lexi noticed), and played games together, and watched movies. It was so much fun to be together. While we were there, Stephen decided to change the snowmachine battery with the replacement one his dad sent up with us. Mason and him were in the garage when Stephen decided to clean off some dirty wrenches. He carried them far way from the fully gassed up snow mobile and lit them on fire (to clean them). While this was happening I was tucked snuggly away in the warm cabin preparing my lesson to be given in RS today, when Mason came running in the cabin exclaiming,"Dad is on fire come quick!" I bolted out of the door in my slippers and found black smoke spilling out the opened doors of the garage and a panicked Stephen. This is something I have only seen a few times in my life. He is always cool and collected in dangerous situations – I’m sure being on fire, having your eyebrows and eyelashes scorched, and not being able to breath, could quicken the pulse rather rapidly! We (Stephen, Mason, and I) began shoveling snow onto the snowmachine while sliently praying the gas tank wouldn’t explode or the fire spread to the wood pile. Eventually we put the fire out enough that we could pull/push the machine out the garage door tip it over and load snow over the track. BTW – All of the other children had been out playing in the snow and hung out over by the swingset watching the craziness, but they were safe! To say we feel blessed that we didn’t blow the cabin up and all die is an understatement. We feel like some gaurdian angels were looking out for us (a few mentioned were Michele and Grandpa Parker – I think Grandma Parker was there myself, she was always so concerned that things were in order at the cabin!) Anyway we look at it we were extremely grateful and know it was beyond our measley power and abilities. After talking to his dad, Stephen, Mason, and Lex, changed engines with the other snowmachine in the shop at the cabin that had a good body but a not good engine. They were so proud when they heard it purring in the garage after 5 hours. Our cabin excursion strengthened our family bonds by learning how to work together and it also deepened our love toward one another.
After we came home from the cabin, Mason and Stephen decided to work on the old snowmachine at our house to see if they could get them running. They were successful and have had oodles of fun playing in the little snow we have here. Lily has even been found driving so that Mason and Stephen could be pulled on their snowboards. We can’t wait for it to snow a little but more!
Christmas Eve we went out to the annual Burton Christmas dance and saw Santa Clause. This was the first year Olivia sat on Santa’s lap willinglly! She asked him to bring her a flying doll. After the dance we came home and ate Chinese Food complete with fortune cookies, had a talent show, watched Luke 2, and played games. We also finished up all of our gifts we have been working on. We decided to do a homemade Christmas after hearing about other family members from years past. Alexis was especiallly excited to go this route. Stephen and I summed it up by saying it was a lot more work but also a lot more meaningful. We ended up being very creative and tried our hardest to use what we had around our house. Lily and Olivia left notes to Santa (Lily’s requested a signiture as proof of his existance) along with chocolates, an orange, and glass of egg nog.
At 7 o’clock Christmas morning, we went downstairs and found our children excited and waiting! It is a record at our house – we are usually up at 5 am. We must have all been exhausted. Santa found us and we were happy to get a quick visit from Grandpa and Grandma Parker bringing a breakfast of delicious orange rolls – just what Stephen had been craving! We were able to skype Grandpa and Grandma Baldwin and tell/show them all of our Christmas morning splendors. Later that night, we had a wonderful Christmas dinner with the Puzey family and played games and watched movies until we couldn’t keep our eyes open any longer. We like to claim them as an extension of our extended family. JT just loves them all as much as we do.
Yesterday we woke up and took all of our decorations down in preparation for our wood floor to be finished. As much as I love Christmas and all of the fun decorations I always love it when my house is less cluttered of it all and back to "normal". Stephen was a life saver helping get it all done as I was feeling more than a little overwhelmed!
This Christmas season has been a wonderful one, we are happy that we could savor every moment and cherish the memories until next year.
