Bon Fires and Horse Drawn Sleigh Rides

I love the school my children attend.  Besides the super friendly staff and beautiful location, the school has amazing programs that they offer for free.  One such program happens on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons right after school.  The PE teacher (who has already teaches each grade 3 times a week) stays after to teach various sports in the way play used to be.  The rules are explained and boundaries are set, but then the kids just are free to play with lots of kids of all ages for an hour.  We have done soccer, ropes courses, broom ball (which we missed out on because of sick kids one right after another), and now we get to enjoy a month long of ice skating at the school before we switch to snow shoeing, and then cross country skiing!  I get to come and bring my younger two and we love it.  They feel like they are one of the big kids.

Musically, the kids can be in Pipes and Drums learning bag pipes or two types of Irish drums from a teacher (Mia's teacher actually) who competes frequently and even played for the music on Brave!!  Famous connection---I know, impressive ;).  And/Or, you can do choir which preforms at such fun venues as the Tree Lighting Ceremony in our sweet and quaint "downtown".  The kids haven't selected those activities mainly because I needed a chance to slowly fill up my family schedule to a balanced place.  But the one they have signed up for that takes place during the next 3 months is learning about music, art, story, and songs from Africa and Australia from a teacher who spent 10 years as an Artist -in-Residence.   And yes, I am living vicariously through them by tagging along when allowed.

Tonight was just the icing on the already amazing cake.  Tonight was a family fun night with chili and hot cocoa, ice skating with friends on the the school's out door ice skating rink, a bon fire, and a sleigh ride pulled by beautiful horses and a cute old man who was informative in that silly trivia sort of way.  I almost started tearing up while riding along the snow covered tree lined street that looked like we had left all civilization.

I feel so blessed that my kids get these amazing once in a lifetime opportunities.

Merry Christmas

This season was wonderful even though there were a lot of flubs.  The three biggest flub ups--putting up Christmas lights 4 different times because the first was just to put on the hanging plastic things.  The second trip to the roof was to put up a set of icicle lights that wouldn't hang down due to the sub zero temperatures (that's right--I said sub zero in the same sentence as light hanging).  The third try was fantastic except I would of had to have an outlet for each set!  Who invented those lights needs to be fired.  Fourth and final try was twinkling snowflakes that ran the perimeter of the house.  Even though 2 casings of snowflakes busted and a row of 5 snowflakes won't stay lit, I am not going up again until March or April when Alaskans take down their lights.

Number two and probably the most difficult for me was the live Christmas tree that didn't happen this year.  We tried the weekend of Thanksgiving (our usual Christmas tree purchasing time) and found over priced trees that already looked like a fire hazard.  Weekend after weekend, we searched. We even tried to cut down our own Christmas tree on base.  We went several times to sign in at an office that always seemed closed when we got there.  Then on a -1 degree day we discovered that we signed in on line.  The waist deep snow and freezing temperatures should have made us leave before we started.  Bent on finding a tree we trudged through the snow and found a bunch of Charlie Brown trees in all heights.  When I could no longer feel my toes, I decided we should hike back to the van.  Tiago, not wanting to leave empty handed, chopped down this sapling and we left with all our fingers and toes attached.  Luckily, I got a free fake tree for helping sort things at the Airman's Attic.  The kids decorated it in their toy room and that was about the extent of Holiday decorating.

At least there were awesome icicles.

Trying to find the tree.

The extent of my crafting abilities--our advent calendar!

Aside from that, we had fun with our Advent Calendar with various activities that matched up with scriptures.  For example, we read Mark 10:13-14 and talked about how children were very important to Christ.  Then we went sledding to try to be childlike.  Another night we read Doctrine and Covenants 1:37 about how we need to study and obey Christ commandments.  We talked about how it can be easy or hard sometimes to obey.  We then tried to draw snowmen on our heads without looking (for hard to obey) and then made a snowman on our fridge for an easy obedience activity and hand snowmen pancakes for dinner.

Yummy Pancakes

Joaquin discovering whipped cream!

We have loved living here because it is really easy to find activities to get into the season.  The city just north of us (Palmer AK) had a huge Christmas celebration.  We didn't understand the extent of it and so we missed most of the fun the first day.  Sunday, we drove up for the Nativities and the kids accidentally crashed a live Nativity play.  They told us we could dress up.  So we did.  Then we were ushered on stage to take part in their ward's rendition of the Nativity.









We went to a tree lighting ceremony with a Santa who was pulled to the tree by several live reindeer in an open sleigh.  There were cookies and hot chocolate and choirs of angels (or at least sweet little kids singing).

Joaquin pointing downhill to let me know it's time to stop the pictures and go!

We went sledding tons (joaquin loves sledding) and even got the chance to ride around a frozen lake in a dog sled.  I was so glad we had just bought hand warmers and mitten style gloves and brought blankets cause it was a chilly ride.
















Christmas Eve we dressed up as Santa, reindeer, and an Elf to score free lift tickets at the ski resort on Elmendorf AFB.  We didn't really make it over to the lifts and practiced skiing down the bunny hill.  Then joined our fellow ward members at their yearly sled and feed at the Golden Corral.  It was fun.  Tiago loved Golden Corral.  He said "That was the best restaurant ever.  You can eat until you are full!"  I think we need to start saving for teenage years.

Corraling it up!

To make things a little more exciting, we moved the Christmas tree from the upstairs toy room down to the living room while the kids slept.  We also put on the Christmas tree lights and star with gold dangling stars hanging from around the tree on the ceiling.  Christmas morning they woke up to this obstacle course outside their room.  It was so cute to hear their exclamations upon finding this red streamer surprise.  Talia exclaimed "Oh, Santa is such a good man.  He decorated our house for Christmas!"  Tiago said "He is so clever."  Mia just giggled and all of them tried it multiple times.

Joaquin Antics

I love Joaquin.  Everyone in our house is in love with him.  It is so fun to watch him do his little antics. For example, when he sees a stuffed animal, he will pick it up and give it a hug and a kiss.  (probably because that is what everyone does to him).  Also, he will go to whomever is crying to hug and kiss on them until he feels like they should be better.  When you tell him you love him, he will make a kissing sound.  I could go on and on, but thought I would share this silly habit he has in video format.  He has found the best way to store all the toys he is interested in playing with for now or later.

The Spirit of the Season

Santa Has Come to Town

Even though it was negative some odd degrees tonight, it was magical watching Santa pull into our little town on a reindeer pulled sleigh to light our town's Christmas tree.  It was really fun listening to our school's choir sing Christmas songs while we enjoyed free hot chocolate and cookies.  The kids were sad (read furious) that I didn't remember to bring sleds for the hill.  I am glad we didn't though.  It gets dark at 4:00pm these days and I really didn't love the idea of trying to see my kids slide down the hills in the dark.  Super fun way to bust into the holiday season. (thank heavens a friend got this video.  I was busy trying to keep Joaquin from frost bite and keep my eyes on the rest of my crew since Fernando got stuck at the hospital).  Luckily, we got an accidental sneak peek when we found the best parking spot of the night.  I happened to see some Reindeer in the adjoining parking lot and suggested that we take a look while everyone was distracted by the freebies.  While watching the reindeer romp around the parking lot, Talia saw Santa.  We quickly (upon her insistentce) over to see him.  He politely asked everyone's name and then took a picture with us.  He also then politely reminded us that we should have been waiting for him over by the festivities.

Biting off Too Much?

A resounding yes--I have bitten of more than I can chew on many counts (my backside and middle can attest to that) but now I have really done it.  Frustrated with the various fundraisers forced onto my kids at the various schools they have attended, I decided to do something about it besides gripe.  I am hosting a Turkey Trot for my school the day before Thanksgiving in hopes of getting more funds for cross country skis.  Nothing says "the Holidays" like running in below freezing temperatures, right?

Is that an Idol?

While walking onto the grounds of the Alaska Museum of Art, Tiago saw this sculpture and asked, "Is that an idol?"  Though difficult to see from this picture, it happens to be a metal statue of a walrus, polar bear, eagle, and a few other arctic animals swirling in a wave of . . . .intrigue?  Anyway, I am glad he listens to the scriptures and we had a great discussion between art and worship.