Three happy dogs...Remmy, Rockee and Rio!
Zac...a full time student + Emily.....a first grade teacher = Christmas Vacation for two weeks. It was a good time! The first weekend we decided to stay in Boise....start and finish our Christmas shopping and just relax. It was wonderful!
Nana with Bry sledding...two happy faces!
Aunt Anna with Bry.
Bry started out sledding and then tried out her new skis. Building a snowman was in the works, but the snow wasn't so great for packing. Too light and fluffy, which meant great skiing snow. On our second excursion outside we started sledding. We quickly discovered that if one person stood down on the road and watched for oncoming cars....the driveway was the perfect sledding hill. We had saucers and little kid sleds with a horn to hang onto. We're all kids at heart anyway. It was a lot of fun! We even had a jump. Mom and Cam joined in on the sledding adventures! Before long we were soaked (none of us had our snow gear on besides Bry, Zayden and Cam), so by sunset we called it a night of sledding and headed inside to warm up and dry out.
Uncle Jonathan helping Bry for her first time on the mountain on skis.
We had a great tournament of shuffle board going on....Mom and I finally beat Jonathan and Zac...well actually they sort of beat themselves. Bumping the table could loose the game for you....lesson learned. After that....Anna and I ruled the table. It was lots of fun! We took our traditional Christmas Eve shot (or maybe two or three...this year was Jager) and continued the night with all sorts of games! Zac was the winner of Things and the boys beat the girls at least 4 times in Pop 5. Good thing Zac and I were taking out the chips (to keep track of score) to make the games last longer. We were having too much fun! We even played a homemade version of Minute to Win it! By 1:00am we were all ready to hit the sack. After all, Santa won't come down the chimney until everyone is asleep and Bry had already sprinkled reindeer food outside on the snow and left cookies and chocolate milk for Santa and carrots for Rudolph.
Christmas morning we enjoyed some coffee and a made from scratch danish in the shape of a candy cane (good job, Monica). Eventually we opened presents. Zac and I got the best present ever....a personalized calendar created by Anna. It even brought tears to my eyes. It's the type of project/present that really comes from the heart and is sooooo memorable. The best part about it, is she took pictures from our blog and paired them up with the month they were taken in. It's like reminiscing all of our favorite memories throughout the year. I love it...thanks Anna.
After gifts, Mom, Cam, Jonathan, Anna, Zac and I, with all of the dogs went for a snowshoe behind the house. It was a beautiful blue bird day....which isn't very common in McCall, especially being used to frequent blue bird days at home in the valley of sun. Monica and Rob stayed back to get the kids a nap and in the meantime they had the entire Christmas dinner ready. We enjoyed smoked turkey, wild rice casserole (my favorite), green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, stuffing and of course olives, pickles and celery. It was delicious!
We watched the Holiday Bowl (BSU vs Utah) with Jonathan and Anna, which really means with Jonathan, since Anna could really care less....she's not so much a die-hard....to give her credit she enjoys a stress-free evening reading a good book, while the rest of us enjoy stomach knots from a roller coaster ride lasting a few hours. I wouldn't trade being a Bronco Fan and bleeding blue for anything though! GO BRONCOS!
ANYWAY....enough with BSU....they won their bowl game and now we have to wait another 8 solid months until next season. At least Coach Pete is coming back....I was a little nervous (okay VERY nervous) that Standford was going to snag him.
After the game, we packed up and headed up to McCall for our first Christmas back in McCall since 1992ish. WOW. Crazy. The house was so festive and looked so good! (Nice job, Mom). Mom and Cam and all of us kids were up to McCall by Thursday afternoon.
After the game, we packed up and headed up to McCall for our first Christmas back in McCall since 1992ish. WOW. Crazy. The house was so festive and looked so good! (Nice job, Mom). Mom and Cam and all of us kids were up to McCall by Thursday afternoon.
Nana with Bry sledding...two happy faces!
Uncle Zac and Zayden sledding.
Aunt Anna with Bry.
Uncle Jonathan and Zayden sledding
Monica wiping out on the jump half way down the driveway.
Bry started out sledding and then tried out her new skis. Building a snowman was in the works, but the snow wasn't so great for packing. Too light and fluffy, which meant great skiing snow. On our second excursion outside we started sledding. We quickly discovered that if one person stood down on the road and watched for oncoming cars....the driveway was the perfect sledding hill. We had saucers and little kid sleds with a horn to hang onto. We're all kids at heart anyway. It was a lot of fun! We even had a jump. Mom and Cam joined in on the sledding adventures! Before long we were soaked (none of us had our snow gear on besides Bry, Zayden and Cam), so by sunset we called it a night of sledding and headed inside to warm up and dry out.
Before...Cam gets a push and then Em......
And after....wipe out!
Oh...the things you do as an aunt!
Emmy and Bry sledding behind the house.
Beautiful view of Payette Lake off the backside of Brundage.
Friday we all headed to Brundage for some family skiing. Rob stayed home with Zayden. Bry tried skiing for the first time and she had a grin from ear to ear. Zac even gave skiing another shot. He did well considering he hasn't been on skis since 5th grade. Eventually he switched back to his board, but he does want to try skiing again. Maybe after a few more times we can get him to convert back!
Cam and Zac.
I reminisced about the first time I was on skis....I got left at the top to figure out my way down. Granted the "top" was only the top of the little rope tow (before Brundage remodeled), but still I managed my way down and never looked back.
Zac and Em...beautiful view.
Monica, Cam, Jonathan, Mom and Anna...beautiful day up at Brundage.
Uncle Jonathan helping Bry for her first time on the mountain on skis.
Uncle Jonathan, Bry and Monica riding up the chair. Bry was all smiles!
The snow was good, and for being Christmas Eve I was shocked that there were so few people. It was great. Unfortunately, we had to skip the bar this time after skiing because we were on a strict time schedule to make 5:00 mass. Amazingly, we were 20 minutes early (not late) and we still got stuck downstairs in the cry room in the very last row and the volume for the speakers didn't work until half way through the service. We ended up leaving after communion to beat the crowds and headed back to the house for corn chowder....our long time Christmas Eve dinner.
We had a great tournament of shuffle board going on....Mom and I finally beat Jonathan and Zac...well actually they sort of beat themselves. Bumping the table could loose the game for you....lesson learned. After that....Anna and I ruled the table. It was lots of fun! We took our traditional Christmas Eve shot (or maybe two or three...this year was Jager) and continued the night with all sorts of games! Zac was the winner of Things and the boys beat the girls at least 4 times in Pop 5. Good thing Zac and I were taking out the chips (to keep track of score) to make the games last longer. We were having too much fun! We even played a homemade version of Minute to Win it! By 1:00am we were all ready to hit the sack. After all, Santa won't come down the chimney until everyone is asleep and Bry had already sprinkled reindeer food outside on the snow and left cookies and chocolate milk for Santa and carrots for Rudolph.
Bry heading outside to sprinkle her reindeer food on the snow.
Zac and Anna successfully were able to get the cookie from their forehead to their mouth by only using their facial muscles.
Mom and Cam playing a Minute to Win it game....sucking up an M&M and successfully balancing it on a straw. They both did it!
Christmas morning we enjoyed some coffee and a made from scratch danish in the shape of a candy cane (good job, Monica). Eventually we opened presents. Zac and I got the best present ever....a personalized calendar created by Anna. It even brought tears to my eyes. It's the type of project/present that really comes from the heart and is sooooo memorable. The best part about it, is she took pictures from our blog and paired them up with the month they were taken in. It's like reminiscing all of our favorite memories throughout the year. I love it...thanks Anna.
September page of the calendar....of course I had to pick a BSU page.
After gifts, Mom, Cam, Jonathan, Anna, Zac and I, with all of the dogs went for a snowshoe behind the house. It was a beautiful blue bird day....which isn't very common in McCall, especially being used to frequent blue bird days at home in the valley of sun. Monica and Rob stayed back to get the kids a nap and in the meantime they had the entire Christmas dinner ready. We enjoyed smoked turkey, wild rice casserole (my favorite), green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, stuffing and of course olives, pickles and celery. It was delicious!
We enjoyed another fun night of games...shuffleboard, Wii, and board games. Sunday we all packed up, helped Mom undecorate and headed off to Hailey for part two of our Christmas Vacation!
