The best two Christmas packages just arrived.....MY PARENTS!

My parents decided to personally deliver our Christmas presents this year.  I was so excited to have them come and share some of our Christmas with them.  They came for four days and they came baring gifts. My version of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Stephen's hot cocoa, cinnamon bears and grandma sycamore bread! Big ole YUMMY!

Brynlee and Grandpa met for the first time.  She took to him quite well.  He was always willing to hold her so I could get some things done.

First, we made sugar cookies.  I love sugar cookies but sometimes the production is overwhelming.  Well, I learned the key to decorating sugar cookies is.............. GRANDMA!  The cookies turned out so cute and SO yummy.  Grandpa was in charge of holding Brynlee during the event.

 Some good snuggle time with Grandma.

 And of course what is a visit without getting your hair done by your granddaughter?

Lunch at school with the kids.  Grandpa always buys the school lunch just to try out the food.

I was so excited that the timing of their visit coordinated with our Stake Festival of the Nativities. It is always so nice to look at all the nativities. Plus it brings back so many memories of putting together the event with mom in Twin Falls.  They had a kids room where the kids could do a craft, color, and dress up. So here is our little Gremmert nativity.  Notice the baby Jesus.  Cassidy of course had to be the angel since she was an angel for Halloween. 

Grandma and Grandpa bought a whole slew of presents.  The kids were so excited and wanted to open them all.  We let them open one present.  They loved what they got!

I just loved that they came out to see us.  It meant so so so much to me.  I loved sharing some of Christmas with them.  I was able to shop a little with my mom and wrap presents with her.  I love doing that with her.  It was a great visit.  Thank you Grandma and Grandpa! 

Thanksgiving without Ryan

In five years of being at Chautauqua Ryan hasn't missed a Thanksgiving until this year.  We were all very sad about it but tried to be thankful that we had had so many Thanksgivings with him.  He had a really positive attitude and didn't grumble at all.  He even was able to go to Cracker Barrel that night where they served him a version of Thanksgiving dinner.

We on the other hand had Thanksgiving with some good friends.  The Clowards hosted and the Andersons and Christensens came.  It was quite a crew.  7 adults and 14 kids.  We made a menu and made assignments.  We were very ambitious because we had SO MUCH food.  We divided out the leftovers so we all ended up with at least another meal.  It was perfect.  Who doesn't want Thanksgiving leftovers?

Kids' table

First Thanksgiving

Adult table

 

I wanted a picture of her mowing down on the drumstick but she wouldn't go for it.

The dads were even good enough to get a little Thanksgiving football game going.  It was great! 

Facebook posts:

"Happy Thanksgiving! We have good friends who are taking care of us this year while Ryan is taking other people to see their families. He has such a good attitude about being gone today. I am so grateful for him, my cute little kids, my parents, in-laws, siblings, and friends. I miss all of you that I am not seeing this year. And lastly I am grateful for my Savior and that I know He lives. Have a great feast!"

"It's no fun to make fudge without my husband here trying to snitch. Miss you!"

It just wasn't the same with Ryan gone.  No football. No skittles and M&Ms. No cuddling while watching a movie and falling asleep. We surely missed him.

Trick and Trunk and all other treatings

Figuring out costumes for the kids this year was really a breeze.  I was so surprised.  I only had to buy a couple of items to make them work.  We had them ready pretty early too so they were able to wear them four times to different parties and functions.  It was great.

This year we had:

Clark Kent

Aidan has been watching a tv show with me called White Collar. He really wanted to be the main character in this show, Neal Caffery 

The guy wears a suit and a fedora hat all the time.  Aidan had it all planned. He would wear his suit, we could buy him a fedora hat, (yes, I have taught him some fashion terms) and then we could make him a security ankle bracelet like the guy has in the show.  He was really excited but I told Aidan that no one would know who he was so we needed a new idea.  I saw on Pinterest a cute boy dressed up like Clark Kent and thought we could go with this idea.  Well, while looking up pictures of Clark Kent to see what type of glasses he wore,  I found that he too wore a fedora hat all the time.  I knew this would convince Aidan to be Clark because he has been eyeing a hat at Target for months now.  So off to Target we went.

 

Lacey wanted to be a black cat because her best friend, Allie was going to be a cat.

Our Angel

Cassidy decided to be an angel when I pulled out our costume box and she found this tulle skirt and white butterfly wings.  She was smitten with the idea from that moment.  I did get her a halo and some "real" angel wings instead of butterfly wings.  I loved her in this and she loved the makeup and glitter.

And miss Brynlee was a pumpkin.  Since she was less than 2 months not much fit her but we found this cute tulle skirt that had pumpkins on it and I had the big green flower.

Before the trunk or treat

At the trunk or treat

Aidan and George

My costume?  A post partum mom suffering from sleep deprivation.  I'm convincing huh?

Trick or treating: 

The whole gang

 The whole Gremmert Gang

Cassidy and her best friend

We go to the same neighborhood every year.  It isn't our neighborhood but it is relatively close.  The houses are really close together and tons of people participate.  They are very festive with their decorations too.  The kids had a great time trick or treating.  Cassidy finally got the concept this year.  She was so gracious too, she said Thank you every time.  Usually it is the boys running door to door but this year the girls were the ambitious ones.  The weather was just cool enough but not freezing!  It was a great Halloween season!

Oh and here is my one Ghoulish treat I made 

From Patch to Porch

We went to a local orchard to pick out our pumpkins.  We took a little hayride out to the patch to pick out our pumpkins.  It was pretty chilly and my kids were really not dressed for the occasion.  I had envisioned cute pictures in the patch with cute fall outfits.  Instead I got soccer jerseys and flip flops.  Oh well.  We had a great time.  We had to go through huge mud puddles on the way out there and the kids thought that was the best part.

 jumping off the haystack

 My kids are always so disgusted by the goop inside of the pumpkins. They never want to touch it.  It makes me laugh every time.

We opted for old school jack-o-lanterns this year. We normally do two intricate pumpkins and it takes us over an hour.  Tonight is took us maybe 20 minutes. love that.

 Cassidy's, Lacey's, Aidan's, and Nick's

We loved having Nick, Granny, Martha and Grandpa Arden joining in on the fun!