DDDDecember

Still on a roll....I just might actually catch up here!  Woot Woot~ :)

I hope I do...cause I have some exciting things to post about, but I gotta be in the RIGHT month to do so....Anyways...here we go~!

So, back to my last post, the first thing I wrote about was the AWESOME run I took in the SNOW with my friend Emily! 

It's the reason for this app I downloaded.....Anyone ever used it????  

It is awesome! It tracks EVERYTHING as you are running. Then it saves each activity so you can back track to see when you went running, how far, how long, etc.....LOVE it.

Well, thanks to this, it has MOTIVATED me to want to run ALL WINTER LONG cause I hate that dreaded horrible feeling that seems to hit mid Decemeber from eating all that DELICIOUS goodness of:

 baking,

 cooking,

 treats,

 candy,

 goodies,

 you know....the holiday happiness????  Well, Emily and I struck up a FABULOUS plan so that we could still have our evenings to spend with our hubbys and our mornings for exercising...

So we  switch off our children in the mornings and take off on a LOVELY ...shall we say... cool morning  run :)?  Well, it is cool, and sometimes downright

 COLD, 

snowing,

 icy,

 foggy

 but sometimes we luck out and get gorgeous blue skies, sunshine, crisp (yes, very cold) morning air and a chance to run and enjoy it. 

I took a screen capture on my phone right before I went running....As you can see...

I starred the temperature of that morning ! :)

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OK, now that the exercising part of the month is down, I can get to the rest of the month!

December is busy.  Like SUPER BUSY.

It's unreal how many things happen and go on in this month! Why can't we break up the millions of fun things to do at Christmas time over like a 3 month time period??  One month is just not enough!

 Of course, decorating the tree, is always A FAVORITE thing to start with....

A few of my favorite ornaments to hang on the tree.........

It takes awhile to get this baby up and running, so we start early....

(maybe even in November) shhhhh!

 We got our letters off to Santa in plenty of time for him to send his response!

The kids were pretty excited to say the least!

Morgan knows how to throw a PAR-TAY! This was divine! :)

Visits from old friends are my favorite!

 Ang texted me one day and said she was coming to Utah to visit and so she stayed with us for part of the time!

Emily joined us too but we didn't take pics from that day, :( I love being with my girls!

I went to high school with Ang and we were the BEST of friends.

 We went everywhere and did EVERYTHING you can imagine together.  Then she got married and moved across the states and I never get to see her.  Sometimes growing up isn't fun. :(

My boys LOVED her! Cam and Ang drew pictures for each other before she left. 

We were super sad to see her go.

More parties make for more FUN!

Of course, we had to have a lil chat with Santa, make sure he REALLY got our letters!

(Korver wouldn't have ANYTHING to do with the jolly ole' guy)

......then that night  we were off to our:

UGLY sweater PARTY!

It wouldn't be Christmas without hitting one of these parties! :)

My new Christmas hobby~

'Dippin' Chocolates!

This tradition has been in our family for years!  I remember my favorite thing about Christmastime growing up was watching my mom MAKE this creamed fondant.
 She would get a big marble square out,
 and pour the HOT boiling liquid on it,
then she would get her big square wooden spatula out
and start twisting and turning the liquid.

It was an art. 

We would sit up to the bar and watch as she turned the liquid candy for 20-40 minutes until it turned to cream and was holdable..... And when she finally could pick it up, the 4 of us kids, dove for that wooden spatula with all the excess candy dripping off of it!
 It melted in our mouth as we devoured every single piece of it on.
 ahhh it was heaven. 
I loved it.
 I'd do anything to go back to those nights for just a minute with my family and be a kid again.
Well, my mom still does this EVERY single year.  She makes a bazillion plates of chocolates to take to friends and neighbors and she gets so many comments each year about how they can't WAIT for Nancy's famous chocolates!
 She is AMAZING AT IT.
The above pics were some of my first batches of the creamed fondant I made. ( side note...this is not like the fondant you put on cakes, that crap is gross, this is like REAL smooth creamed fondant.  the stuff inside the chocolate that's flavored vanilla, or mint, or lemon... ya know, the GOOD stuff!)
We won't mention that the batch before this one was a DISASTER and didn't work :) (That's what happens when I have like 10 people over watching me....then they leave and of course it works!)

After many years of Rex asking when I was going to pick up this hobby, (I was terrified to do this, I saw how stressful and time consuming it was) I decided to call my mom and tell her to order me a sheet of chocolate along with hers. I was ready to learn! She taught me what she knew....
And the "sittin' up to the bar, watchin' mom" scene was all to familiar again, only this time I was the mom doing the work!
 I would much rather be the bar sitter!!!!!! :)

So we started making the trips to Brigham to learn the tips and tricks and just how my mom  made these perfect choc-0- lates!  All I have to say is.....I definitely have MUCH more respect for her, the candy, the wooden spatula, thermometers, temperamental chocolate and pesky little children that sneak pieces here and there!!!!!

And lets not forget the times when my children take advantage of the fact that I CANNOT attend to them while I am making the fondant.... so they destroy their rooms and jump off the mattresses!

Here is her "special" green bowl that I remember her using all those years as she dipped the candy in the chocolate.  

This was actually hard. I never could get mine to look PROFESSIONAL like hers!

 

Once they are dipped, and have sat for 24 hours, they are ready to be assembled onto the plates. (that is if there is any left):)

 

 The trick is making sure to get a good combo on each plate, cause everyone likes different flavors!!!

 Then once assembled, packaged, and tagged....The delivering begins! 

I gotta be honest, I now know why my mom said so many times it was her last year doing them.....Ha ha! But, she has done it for 20+ years and they are amazing! Both of my Grandma's made them as well! So I couldn't be the one to break the tradition, and I'm glad I didn't! :) It was worth all the fun nights having Rex sit up to the bar and having chats, the mornings the kids watched as I whipped up a batch of fondant, and the trips to Brigham to spend the day with my mom...OH and having a never ending supply of chocolate in the basement. :)

 Thanks mom, for your never ending supply of patience with me and teaching me all that I know now!
♥

 We decided this year, that we wanted to do the 12 days of Christmas for someone...and it was such an amazing experience teaching the kids about giving rather than getting.  Cameron asked us EVERY night if it was time to deliver the prize and make "someone" really happy. :) He even told me as we were delivering the last day, that he was pretty sure this person was so glad we visited them every night.  Made my heart melt listening to a 5 year old understand the 

true meaning of Christmas. :)

 I love going to Temple Square to see the lights, even though I see it every year, there is just something about being there, around the temple and seeing the huge manger scene that really brings the true meaning of Christmas to life.

 

 The kids were so good and had so much fun...when I wasn't trying to get pictures of them!

 My Uncle had told me to try Starbuck's salted carmel hot chocolate..... so we stopped off at the gateway and had some fun! Is starbucks ever BAD though...come on?? :)

Our friends invited us on this little excursion and had the idea to take the Trax down.  The kids had a blast riding the "bullet train" as they called it!

 Korver LOVED sitting bugging Sam on the ride back! Poor kid just wanted to sleep, but Korver just couldn't resist! :) They had so much fun!

Things I LOVE during this month .......

I loved it when packages arrived in the middle of the day, especially when they say *MAGIC*!

I  LOVE when we got to take a break from shopping, and the hustle and bustle of the season, and just spend the evening going to a USU game with our lil Aggie! :) 

I LOVE seeing my lil boy all dressed in his snow clothes and his rosy, chubby lil cheeks after playing in the fresh snow! (Nice that lil Sam is just across the street to play with too!) :)

 I love our FAMILY Christmas parties and watching ALL the kids anxiously open their gifts!

(sorry, all I had was my phone for a pic)

I love that the Holidays bring family back home! I was always the best of friends with my cuz Adam and now he and his wifee live in South Carolina, (she) being a cute lil dental hygienist and (He) going to Wake forest for his Masters....   and I NEVER get to see them, :( So, when they were here, we got to go see them! Oh how I miss those faces. Cameron LOVED that Adam turned into a "machine throwing man" throwing him on the Love sac! Sorry Adam, hope you weren't too sore!
 I love them to pieces.. she is PREGO too and we are STOKED for them! Now if they only lived closer!


**KING CHRISTMAS PARTY**

The kids opening their gifts from G & G King........
Rexy's fam always holds their big family party the night before Christmas Eve, so Christmas starts for us each year on December 23rd and WE LOVE it! :)
This year we went to Jill's new home and we went out caroling to her neighbors. It was fun seeing how happy caroling made people.  Next year I just need to remember warmer shoes!

 I'd say they were all PRETTY excited about their new blankies Grandma MADE for everyone!

All the kiddos actually held still for a picture..... That was amazing! :)

 Korver loved his little dog bouncy thing!  Nice that lil Rylee had one too! They were pretty entertained while the adults started their gifting session :)

Classic Rex moment. 

The girls wanna give him sisterly love, and he wants to tease them.....

I love how they all adore him. :)
I wish we had a picture of the whole entire fam together.....but it was a little crazy that night! 
Thanks again  Mom and Dad King for EVERYTHING this Christmas! We love you! :)

My mom and her glamorous Christmas Eve dinner....
I love being able to help put the scene together! She is so sweet to do this every year, and it's one of my most FAVORITE evenings of the year!

After Cam told us the story of Jesus being born....
We let the boys open their new jammies and one LITTLE toy! G&G Travis usually come up to celebrate the evening with us, The boys LOVED giving hugs to them!
And of course...it wouldn't be Christmas without a pic of Cam and his Aunt Katie!

Then once the excitement dies down, Cameron knows the last thing to do before he headed to bed....

But of course, while doing that, we heard Santa's bells, and the boys were DETERMINED to "catch" him flying around in the sky.....
So much for the excitement dying down......:)
Hey, that's what Christmas Eve is all about...Right???

Looks like Santa eventually made his way back while the kids were fast asleep.........