Hans and Stephanie: Christmas 2010!

Alright everyone. It’s time for the dreaded Christmas post. Yes it will be long. You have been warned.

First things first! My brother Skyler got his Mission call!! He will be teaching the people in New York, New York NORTH in the Spanish language!

We are so excited for him! We had no idea where he would be sent, and we were checking the mail all last week, and it finally came on Christmas Eve! We opened it up about an hour or two after we got it out of the mail, and It was an exciting moment. I can’t believe He’s leaving on his mission! Time has gone by so fast and everyone is growing up…. It turns out,a couple months after Skyler leaves (April 20th) Han’s brother Conrad (whom I have never met) will be getting back from his mission! You loose one and gain another…..

It’s hard to think about what it will be like when Skyler is gone, but I think it will be very different at home, and we will all be sad not to have his happy personality around to add to the mix.

I feel lucky to have a brother who is worthy and willing to go on a mission. So proud of him!

Here are some videos/pictures of him opening up his call

The chair Skyler was going to sit in and my dad calling everyone to put them on speaker phone :)

Unsure…

New York, New York… exciting!

Now on to Christmas…

Before we left, one of the days I had to work, they asked me to bring the treats for the pregnancy class at work, they were supposed to be healthy. I wanted to make them festive so this is what I came up with.

Bagels with cream cheese and bell peppers… they actually tasted really good!

When we first got to Colorado only my mom was home, everyone else was out of town until that Wednesday, so we got a few days of mellowness with my mom, before all the crazy partying happened, which was really nice. We spent most of that time baking treats to give out to friends for Christmas. Here is the end result of that.

When my siblings and dad got home, we were all able to get our new Christmas ornaments for the year, a tradition in our family. It is something that I’m sure we will adopt for our family too.

Each year (since I was born) we have each gotten a new ornament that sums up the biggest accomplishment/ fun thing that happened to us that year. Since I have been married Hans and I have been getting ornaments together from my parents, but soon I will be taking my ornaments from the years, and we will start the tradition with our children!

Krista got a present ornament because this year she got baptized and received the gift of the Holy Ghost.

Cameron got a Hawaiian Santa because he got to go to Hawaii this year.

The funniest one… Skyler got a Hershey's “KISS”. I let you figure that one out. haha.

Together Hans and I got a graduation cap :)

My Grandma (mom’s mom) and Grandpa along with Ali and Isa (my cousins) drove down from Oregon to spend Christmas with us this year.

Here are some pictures of the things we did leading up to Christmas.

I went to the store with my mom and Grandma numerous times and my grandma had fun finding some singing Christmas tree hats that she proceeded to press until my mom decided to act like she didn’t know her. Funniest thing ever.

We also introduced Just Dance on the Wii to my family, I have some good videos of them dancing but my mom mad me promise not to put them on so here are just some pictures….

Frosting Sugar cookies, Haha Ali and Isa….

Me, Grandma, and Mom 3 generations!

Another one of our Christmas traditions is going to see santa and sit on his lap… which I still do! :)

We went a few days before Christmas, so we had to wait a long time in line.

Waiting in line…

Brothers!

Santa!

After Santa we went to dinner… another one of our traditions! Every Christmas, we pick a night to go out to dinner. My parents pick a new restaurant that we have never been to, and on the car ride there we try to guess what it is! This year we went to Cheddars. It was so good I think it may be my favorite out of all the ones we have been to!

Not the best pictures I have ever taken….

Since we had to wait a long time to get a table at the restaurant, Hans and I walked with all the kids over to target, where Cameron bought an electronic bug to “occupy” himself. It was fun… and funny to me.

Aw man, I love my brothers. Crack me up!

Yet another one of our many traditions is to open up one present on Christmas eve…. which is new Pajamas!

New Pajamas!

We went to a party on Christmas to our good friend’s house, the Todds. Here are some pictures of that. We played some games and ate good food, and read the story of our Savior’s birth out of the scriptures.

When we got home from that, my dad read “ t’was the night before Christmas”

We laid out our HUGE stockings and left out milk and cookies for Santa!

Christmas morning

yeah the whole morning look… not our thing…

Does everyone else get their presents from Santa wrapped? because Santa has always brought our presents unwrapped….. I love it that way! And none of me or my siblings have ever “peaked” at our presents, even though they were left unwrapped that night.

We got a Keyboard! We were SO surprised and SO happy! best Christmas present ever! Santa sure knows what he’s doing!

One of the biggest excitements of the morning was when Cameron got an iPod touch from one of his friends. He had been wanting it SO bad. Yeah he started crying. It was great.