Happy New Year and more!

I’ve never been one that really enjoys celebrating New Year’s Eve because I normally like to go to bed at an early hour...and somehow staying up until midnight just to welcome in the New Year, that’s going to come whether I welcome it or not, doesn’t sound all that exciting! It’s not that I didn’t use to try to celebrate with the older boys when they were younger and it’s not that I haven’t celebrated in years past and enjoyed it, but I enjoy sleeping more. It doesn’t help any that my husband can’t stay awake much past 10:00 either. For a lot of years, I’ve done my best to at least stay awake (or wake up) long enough to see the ball drop and then I roll over and go back to sleep. That hasn’t been the case for the past two years though!

Last year Hayden planned an all out “party” for us to celebrate the New Year, including making a hanging snowman, coloring some name things that he made, playing games and watching the last few minutes of the New Year celebration in New York...and then we went outside and banged some pots and pans and watched a few fireworks going off throughout the valley...and then we went to bed! That’s exactly what he wanted to do this year too...but somehow it wasn’t quite as novel as it had been last year…and by 11:15 we had run out of things to do! Connor only made it until about 10:30, but it’s no wonder because he was up at 6:30 this morning to go spend the day with his grandpa and grandma Mosher!

The snowman that we made

As it was, Hayden and I did our best to stay awake while we watched America’s Funniest Home Videos on the TV (the New York celebration wasn’t exciting enough for Hayden), but it was truly a struggle to keep our eyes open and a few times we both started dozing off...just to be woke up by the other one of us that had stayed awake! Finally it was time for the ball to drop, but we didn’t feel like going outside in the cold and banging pots and pans...so we didn’t! Instead, we watched the fireworks out the back window for a few minutes and then we called it good and went to bed. For Hayden, going to bed consisted of climbing under the cardboard table in the family room that he and Connor had turned into their own makeshift hut and had been sleeping in for the past week! It didn’t look all that comfortable (or roomy) to me, but he and Connor seemed to have fun in it!

New Year’s Day is kind of an anticlimactic day after just celebrating Christmas the week before, but we try to make the most of it by spending it with family. Every other year it is the day that we get to celebrate Christmas with the Carlings, and this was that year…so we got to have a second Christmas on New Years day.

Cate with her new Dora guitar

Paige would literally squeal as she opened her gifts

Nyayla with all of her "bootie"

Vicki, Jan and Mom

The older grandkids in anticipation of opening the gifts

The 4 little boys, Teegan, Connor, Tyler and Mac

Doug teaching Mac how to play his new DSi

The day is actually most exciting for the kids because they’re the ones that get all of the gifts, but the rest of us just enjoy being able to get together to eat and visit. My favorite part of the day, besides hanging out with my brothers and sisters, is the “all you can eat” candy and nut trays that mom puts out for all of us to enjoy...and I usually do! My second favorite part is being able to play games with my siblings...but I usually don’t get to take part in that because by that time of day, Rod is more than ready to go home!

Now that the holidays are over, it’s time to get back to my “normal” routine...whatever that is! And as much as I’ve enjoyed spending the last two weeks having the little boys home with me...it’s actually kind of nice to have them back in school! I’m not looking forward to the homework that comes along with going back to school, but I am looking forward to having a clean house again!

Holiday festivities are fun, but we also had a couple of other fun things happen this week. One of those was our eagle sighting! The boys and I were just getting ready to go to Walmart one day and as we were pulling out of our driveway Hayden said “isn’t that an eagle mom?” Sure enough right across the street from our house at the top of our neighbor’s big willow tree sat a huge bald eagle. That’s something rare to see in Clinton! I immediately pulled over so we could get a closer look at it but I just had to have some pictures of it, so I turned the van around and went back home to get my camera...in hopes that the eagle wouldn’t go anywhere while I was gone! Obviously, the eagle was still there when I came back because I got some awesome pictures!

The bald eagle we saw

Also this past week, I was able to go to lunch with my old R.C. Willey buddies, Sherrie and Melissa and we had a lot of fun “catching up” on the events from this past year. We decided that the best Christmas gift we could give each other wasn’t an actual “gift” but to spend time together, so we’re hoping to make this an annual tradition. I’m just grateful to have such great friends!

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!