Our December started with Colby's birthday! Justin was out of town visiting his family for his actual birthday, so we celebrated on the weekend. He sure enjoyed digging into his cake - with the minor hiccup of Emmett blowing out his birthday candles!
One of my biggest parenting flexes was I bought a homeschool Christmas curriculum. It had four weeks of crafts, activities, baking/snacks, etc that all correlated with Christmas read aloud books. I was able to search for the books on youtube so we were able to listen as a family while doing the activities. The activities were hit and miss so next year I'll probably try a new curriculum and take what worked from this one and leave the rest. The kids are soap carving here while we listened to a story about a carpenter.
The kids made their Jupiter planet craft.
The kids weaved "Christmas mats" while listening to a book about a Christmas tapestry.
We have had some truly lovely December days considering our Idaho climate. We spent a lot of time outside with mostly 40 degree weather all month!
Emmett has sure come a long way in his reading. I didn't plan for this to happen, but he finished his Reading Level 1 (from the All About Reading curriculum) just in time for Christmas break and we'll start level 2 tomorrow when we start our homeschool back up. He will still tell you "I don't know how to read," but the reality is he can read a lot more than he realizes. He's grown so much. I'm looking forward to watching him grow and become an even more confident reader.
Logan is always excited whenever he can be helpful in the kitchen.
The kids here were pretending to be youtube tutorial artists - I love to see their imagination! Check out what they drew below.
We invited friends over to make crafts with us.
This was one of my favorite Christmas activities by far. We took Christmas string and made homemade garland. It didn't take many supplies but this felt so magical. We hung them on our tree when we finished.
Emmett made a video game controller
Another activity was making bird feeders.
Going to hang them on our itty bitty tree.
At the Christmas party the kids sang with the primary and I sang a solo while playing the piano. Emmett held the mic for me and Logan turned my piano pages. Logan's kindergarten teacher snagged a picture of us.
I attempted to make caramels as part of our Christmas goodies...I failed at least 3 times before finally getting them right! Yeesh!
Christmas mocktails
The kids were sick the week of the ward Christmas party. I made them wear masks and I masked up myself while we all diligently washed hands in my attempt to not get sick!
This is the most we've ever made!
He wants to come do chores but he doesn't want to do chores... toddlers.
Logan walked across the field with me to Grandpa's windbreak to get some twigs for one of our Christmas crafts
Making mini Christmas trees.
I played for one of the community Christmas "concerts" - there were maybe 20 people total but hey it made me dust off my piano bench and reach for a goal so that was good.
Emmett's creativity at work.
The boys looooove to watch Justin play video games.
On Christmas Eve I gave the one and only talk. I prepared for a long time and felt good about it - Mom and Dad both had really nice things to say about it afterwards along with a few others from the ward. We had our regular Christmas Eve traditions with Mom and Dad at their house. The two big kids sang "We Three Kings" while they wore crowns with Colby (Beckham wasn't interested in wearing a crown and a costume, thank you very much). Then we came home to get Christmas set up at our house. I had the most fun I've ever had that Christmas Eve getting everything ready. Nobody tells you this, but being a parent on Christmas is way better than being a kid! It was so much fun to play Santa and get all their gifts ready for them to open the next morning.
A Christmas to remember: the first in our new house! I am obsessed with my tree!
After opening gifts we headed to McCall! Gabe invited us to the cabin so we went to play in the snow and with cousins. Beckham and Luke played together thick as thieves - it was soooo cute! I took Logan skiing one of the days and we took the big kids ice skating. It was the perfect Christmas getaway.
matchy matchy
We hosted a New Year's Eve party that Saturday night, then headed to Chase and Rachel's for actual New Year's Eve on Sunday. The kids loved playing with their Burley Beal cousins.
It was finally time to cut this mullet! I got haircuts for the two big kids and cut the two little's hair myself. Everyone is looking sharp just in time to get back to school.
From Justin's Phone:
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