Christmas 2015

Christmas this year was so much fun!! We went up to Riverton for Christmas Eve and just spent time visiting with Jon's family. I don't know why I am so terrible at taking pictures when we are up there! I always get so so angry at myself when I get home and realize I don't have any pictures. But we did have a good time. We stayed until after dark and it was so nice to be able to see them. Crew especially had fun with all of Grandma's singing and dancing toys. When we got back to Orem we stopped by my parent's house and sang some Christmas songs with them for an hour before heading home for the night. 

Papa playing the with most of the grand kids in the play room.

The next morning was so much fun! It was so exciting for Jon and I to help Crew open all his presents and watch him get so excited and play with all of them. 

The rocking horse was from Santa, and Jon and I got Crew a bunch of books and I think 1 other toy, and all of the rest of his toys are from his Grandparents and Aunts and Uncles! He got spoiled by his extended family! Most of the presents you see under the tree are not from us! Ha ha, He is so loved! 

We took a little break to change Crew's diaper and eat some breakfast. Crew never gets to see Daddy at breakfast time, so this was a special treat!

After breakfast and more playing with toys. we went over to my parent's house again. We were so glad we had gone to Riverton the night before because it had snowed a ton overnight and the roads were terrible! We had fun opening more presents and watching family open presents. My favorite part was when my parent's opened their gift from all of us kids. We got them a washing machine and to tell them about it (since it wasn't being delivered until the next day), we wrapped a small washer in a box and tried to have them figure it out. It was great!

We went back home for Crew's nap time, then came back again later that afternoon just in time to see my cute little brother Skype us for an hour from California! He is on a mission there and has been gone for almost 6 months. It was so nice to see him and talk to him. I didn't think we were going to be able to Skype him but we got lucky! Thank goodness for modern technology!

The rest of the day was spent playing, relaxing, and trying to keep cousins from fighting over new toys. Ha ha ha. It was a good Christmas! Here is a little movie I compiled from videos I had taken throughout the day. Sorry it's kind of hard to see the video of my parents opening their present. I got the video from a sibling. Enjoy!

Christmas Eve Eve and Temple Square

On Christmas Eve Eve (December 23rd) I took Crew sledding for his first time with my Mom and 2 of Crew's cousins, Kannon and Britian. There was a blizzard just an hour earlier and even though it had cleared up it was still freezing! Crew seemed to enjoy it, but he didn't like it when we got to the bottom of the hill so quickly and stopped moving. We didn't stay for too long, but I'm glad I was able to give him the experience. 

After Jon got home that evening we all bundled up and drove up to Salt Lake City to see the lights on Temple Square. Crew loves looking at Christmas lights so we thought he would love it up there. He was a little cranky because he only had 1 nap that afternoon, the car ride up had been way long thanks to the horrible traffic, and all the crowds of people were a little over stimulating for him, but after a while I think he started to settle into it and he liked it. It was still freezing though!! 

Sunset on the drive up

This was me trying to take pictures at night with my phone. That's what I get for always forgetting my nice camera. I'm too worried about making sure I have everything I need for the baby that I never remember my camera.

All bundled up in the cold.

Look at that red nose!

We also stopped by the City Creek Mall. Crew loved the toy store and had to touch every toy and every book he could get his hands on. He also loved the Disney store. He wanted to cuddle with every stuffed animal Disney character in sight! We also got to the fountain just in time for the little water/fire show. I took a little video of it, but my phone ran out of room about a minute in, so I'm sorry for the abrupt ending. But Crew was fascinated by it!

We were actually supposed to meet up with our friends Lacey and Jonathan but they had something come up so it just ended up being the three of us. We had such a good time though! Although I'm not a big fan of crowds (mostly it's just that slow walking people are a huge pet peeve of mine), I really think it's worth it to go to Temple Square every year at Christmas time. This is definitely going to be a Baxter family Christmas tradition!

Failures Turned Good

This past weekend we went down to the Riverwoods for their free carriage rides. Well, we saw the signs for it, we waited in the right place, and we were there at the right time, but no carriage came. We don't know what happened. We even asked some store employees who all said that it should be there, but they didn't know why it wasn't. Fail.Oh well. We got to walk around and enjoy the lights down there again. It's so fun to watch the wonder on Crew's face when he sees all these lights and decorations.

Also this weekend we stopped by a small arcade to give Crew a little ride on the small Merry Go Round (since he enjoyed the big one several weeks ago). Let's just say he did NOT enjoy this one nearly as much. He screamed and cried until I took him off. Not wanting to waste a good quarter, Jon had himself a good rest of Crew's ride. 

With all the snow we have been getting, we decided to get Crew some snow boots. He has been wanting to go outside a lot lately and I don't let him because it's cold and snowy and I don't want him to get his feet all cold and wet. We have snow pants for him though, so we thought we might as well get him some boots and let him be his Mama's son and go outside where he is happiest whenever he wants to. So we looked. And looked. And looked. And looked some more for some good snow boots. Everywhere was out. They had lots of girl snow boots, but not boys! Walmart, Target, Payless, Shopko, University Mall.... we looked EVERYWHERE! Finally we thought we were going to have to buy some online (which would have been fine, except that Crew's cousins were all going sledding and they wouldn't have gotten here in time so he wouldn't have been able to go), but we decided to drive down to Provo and check the mall down there. We checked store after store after store. There was literally one store left and wouldn't you know it? They had a cute little pair in just his size! And they were on sale for a very cheap price too!!!! We lucked out!

Finally, on Saturday Jon and I went on a double date with our friends Lacey and Jonathan to go see Star Wars: The Force Awakens. We had been looking forward to seeing this movie for months! We bought the tickets in advance and had been counting down the days until we could go see it! And it was AMAZING!!! Until something happened. I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but if you have seen it, I'm sure you know exactly what I am talking about. And it RUINED the whole thing for us. We left the movie so upset and depressed we didn't even get a picture or anything. But! We had some leftover candy, and Crew was very excited that we brought it home for him.

December So Far

Here's a little of what we have been up to so far this month:

We decorated the Christmas tree! Someday we'll be able to get a fresh, good smelling tree every year. But until then we'll save money with our fake tree. I thought Crew was going to tear it apart and take everything down. He really doesn't care about it. We even have presents under the tree and he could care less. The most he does is keep unplugging the lights. I'm okay with that. Lucky us!

A new favorite toy. The second we open up the dishwasher, he comes RUNNING. Well, crawling. Really fast.

Have you been to the Provo Town Centre this month yet? Holy huge Christmas Tree! We couldn't stop staring!

While shopping at Walmart one weekend, we noticed they were doing free Santa pictures for kids! We couldn't pass up a free photo so we decided to give it a try. For the past few weeks I had been showing Crew every picture of Santa that we passed or every Santa we saw in the mall and I had been repeating his name over and over and Crew even started to say his name so I was hoping he wouldn't be scared of him. At first, he seemed to be okay. Just curious for a few seconds....

And then....

 There was also a Santa at our ward Christmas party. Crew seemed to enjoy watching the kids sit on his lap, so we decided to try again. Our mistake. There was no curiosity this time. Just sheer terror. Oh well. Maybe next year.

Also... WE ARE GETTING SUPER EXCITED FOR THE NEW STAR WARS MOVIE COMING OUT THIS WEEKEND!!!

And sometimes in the evenings we will drive around the city and find awesome Christmas lights. Crew loves it too. The car is filled with lots of his "Oooooooo"'s.

And last but not least, here are a few videos from this month.

Crew makes a mess:

Crew says "yes:"

And playing Star Ship Enterprise with Daddy: