Maycie is Finally...5

Maycie has waited a long time to turn 5. Many of her Primary friends have already turned 5 and go to kindergarten, but Maycie is the youngest in her primary class and so she has been couting the days until she is also 5. On Thursday, which was her actual birthday, she opened her family gifts, went to dinner at the Pizza Factory, had a crazy game of bowling at FatCats, and ended it with some arcade games. On Saturday we had her friend birthday party. Including Brilynn and Maycie we had......20 little girls. They were all so cute and sweet and we are so thankful that Maycie has such great friends. Happy Birthday Maycie!!!

7th Memory of Christmas

Tonight we loaded the girls up and headed to Layton Park to take a quick stroll around the park to see the lights. We were supposed to go home and have hot chocolate with jr mints...but that didn't happen. Brilynn and Maycie continued to fight after I told them to stop so guess what...no hot chocolate tonight. I know I am such a mean mom, but I did tell them they could earn it back tomorrow night. If not, I am going to freeze the jr mints and have them for a midnight snack:) I thought Preslee and Payge looked so sweet in their little hats. I was actually really surprised they left them on. They both enjoyed seeing the twinkling lights, and I think Preslee's face says it all.

6th Memory Of Christmas

The girls recieved a new blanket and we watched the movie "The Dog who saved Christmas." We are starting to get a pretty good collection of christmas blankets but the girls love the new ones as well as the old ones.

Maycie is so sensitive, I love it!

The other day Santa sent the girls an email that had a video for them. It showed Santa opening a book with their picture in it and also what they want for Christmas. It also told them a few secrets of the North Pole and that he knows that Brilynn has been a good student at school and that Maycie has been a very sweet sister. As Maycie was watching her video from Santa I noticed that she had tears rolling down her face. I was worried that maybe she wanted something else from Santa. When I asked her why she was crying she sniffled for a few seconds and then said, " I am just so happy that Santa would do this for me." It was so sweet to see her so sensitive and be able to appreciate something so small.

Snowflake continues to...

Snowflake continues to get into mischief and do funny things for the girls to wake up to. One morning she was in my clothes and left a sweet note for the girls. Another morning she wrote on the mirror with lipstick and said "remember baby Jesus" and was sitting up on the ceiling fan. The night before Maycie woke up to having chicken pocks all over her face. It's been much easier getting the girls up in the morning because they are so anxious to see what Snowflake has done.

Payge aka AG

Payge's nickname has become AG since that is what her sister Preslee calls her. Love this girl and love her eyes!!!

5th Memory of Christmas... A snowglobe

Snowflake the elf gave Brilynn and Maycie their own snowglobes. Usually the twins are in bed when we do the gifts, but tonight they were up a little later than normal. When Brilynn opened the gifts, the twins quickly grabbed the snowglobes and weren't about to give them back to Brilynn and Maycie. Snowflake may need to deliver 2 more snowglobes ASAP:)

4th Memory of Christmas...A visit to This is the Place Monument

On Thursday night John's sister and her family came to stay with us. We thought it would be fun to take the kids to This is the Place. We double layed the kids in their pants, socks, shirts, hots, and gloves. Beth had the best idea ever...to get the hand and toe warmers. That ended up being a life saver. It kept everyones hands and toes nice and toasty. We left the twins home with a babysitter because we knew they would only be miserable in the cold. This was so much fun for the whole family. We loved it and will continue to visit every Christmas.

The pioneer children would write their letters to Santa Claus. Instead of mailing letters to him, they would place them in the fire and the letter would magicly be sent to him. The girls weren't too sure at first about burning thier letters they just wrote but soon decide to be like the pioneer children.

The elf village was very cute. It was fun to see all of the little houses with elves doing Holiday activites.As soon as we enterd the doors into the dance hall, we were invited to come learn the Charleston Dance. John and Brilynn were partners and Maycie and I were parterns. The girls loved learning the new dance and their favorite part was being able to stomp their feet and clap their hands!!!They do a wonderful job of creating a pioneer atmosphere.

In two of the buildings they had crafts for the kids including, an advent calander, a gingerbread necklace, an ornament, a beeswax candle, a woven basket, a gingerbread sticker scene, and a wreath ornament. We had to stop by the ZCMI store and buy some of their penny candy (and no, it wasn't a penny it was 10 cents a piece)At the printing press they showed the kids how the first Christmas Cards were made. They each got to bring home a replica of the card.At Brigham Youngs home they had live reindeer and Father Christmas. Father Christmas was very quite and really didn't say much to the kids. Much different than the Santa Claus that we see at the mall. We don't have a picture though because we didn't pay the $5.00They also had a live Nativity. Before we walked through they asked us to please remain very reverent, so I didn't feel comfortable taking a picture. This morning John asked Maycie what her favorite part of last night was. She said that it was seeing baby Jesus in the manger. She was so sweet when she said, "It almost made me cry when I saw Joseph looking at baby Jesus."

We had such a fun time together as a family, we missed the twins but at the same time it was really fun to be able to have one on one time with Brilynn and Maycie.

3rd memory of Christmas...Christmas Chimes

The girls were a little disappointed at first when they opened this gift since it wasn't something new. However, once we started playing them, their attitudes completely changed and then they were upset when it was time to stop and go to bed. Thanks again Grandpa Batty for the chimes!

2nd memory of Christmas

The 2nd memory of chrismtas this year was a trip to the mall to get their ears pierced. This was something that they both had been asking to do for a couple of years. We decided that they were old enough to take care of their ears on their own and we would finally let them get their ears pierced. Maycie went first and didn't even bat an eye. They only had one person there so they could only do one ear at a time. When it came time for Brilynn we could tell she was very nervous. She jumped on the first one and her eyes started to water on the 2nd one. However, she knew that Maycie hadn't cried and so she had a little pressure to be just as tough. This was a fun christmas memory and one I think that they will remember for a very long time. I loved this picture of the girls. This is such a classic picture of Preslee and Payge. Preslee will just get mad out of the blue and Payge just looks at her like she is completely crazy. I'm pretty sure they are complete opposites in both personality and looks. Love 'em!!!