Christmas Celebrations

Since we drove to my parent's for Christmas, we decided to have Natalie open some of her bigger toys before we left. The trampoline was from Grandma and Grandpa Corn, the rocking horse was made by Grandma Blazzard and the wagon was from Justin's brother's family. 

She was excited and surprised, and could not decide which toy to play with first. 

I don't have a close up picture of the rocking horse, but Justin' mom is very talented and it is very cute. 

We call her "Molly" and Natalie loves to rock on her and give her kisses. 

This was Christmas morning at my parents. Natalie did alright opening presents at first, but after a while got tired of it and just wanted to sit on the cardboard box with a book she got.

Notice her lovely runny nose. She fought a cold for a little over two weeks.

Poor girl.

We had a wonderful time with my family. We had not celebrated with them in about 3 three years, so it was especially nice for me to be there. We had  a lot of yummy food, fun games and visiting. Natalie enjoyed seeing her cousins, but she especially enjoyed them when it was on a smaller scale. 16 of them were there on Christmas Eve night and it got a little overwhelming. My parents were so kind and patient to let us stay with them. Natalie had a hard time sleeping while we were there. Usually she just ended up in bed with us, after crying very loudly. We even had clear roads on the way there. Coming over the Blue Mountains on the way back was treacherous, but we made it and are grateful to be home sleeping in our own beds.

It was also important and good to be able to see my grandparents on both sides. They are getting older and I know they won't always be around. These years every time I get to see them I am grateful for. Christmas is a peaceful time of year.

Justin and Ruth Blazzard

Christmas Time

I had been hoping to get a picture of Natalie with Santa this year, but since our ward party did not include one and I didn't have time to search one out I kind of gave up on the idea. Last Saturday Justin and I were finishing up Christmas shopping and while we were at Cabela's we spotted the jolly man himself. I think this picture sums up her feelings pretty well on the subject. She was only on his lap long enough to snap the picture. We got a good laugh at it.

This is how she likes to study her scriptures in the morning.

Actually, this was just while I ran up stairs to get her clothes after breakfast. She does love to look at the scriptures and the Gospel Art Kit book. This makes my heart happy when I catch her doing this.

I took some time to make this flannel Christmas tree in hopes it would keep her out of our real tree. She really hasn't been to bad about getting into our tree, or this tree in fact. The benefit is it stays looking nice at almost all times.

Tonight is Justin's work Christmas Party. Unfortunately we aren't going. Last weekend and Monday and Tuesday of this week Justin and Natalie have been really sick. Justin went to the doctor's yesterday and they told him he had bronchitis. Natalie just has a bad cold. We are staying home and resting. That sums up our Christmas parties for this season other than our family Christmas Eve Party. It is crazy that Christmas is in only about a week. We are excited and hope to be feeling better by then.

Christmas Eve and Christmas Morning

 What our Christmas Eve looked like before putting Natalie to bed

 You like the shake weight Justin won at a white elephant gift exchange? 

He is excited to get super toned arms with it.

 

 Justin was reading a John Deere 'Johnny Popper' story to us. 

It was a gift from my parents for Natalie and Justin. 

He then read from the Bible the story about the first Christmas.

  

After Natalie went to sleep we watched "It's a Wonderful Life." I had not seen it in quite a long time and thoroughly enjoyed it. I do believe life really is wonderful! Especially at Christmas time.

Lastly,

 Santa made it!

Christmas Morning

 Natalie enjoyed ripping the paper.....

 and some chocolates, and then she headed off to do her job for the day of unloading the DVD's

Justin and Ruth Blazzard

The Christmas Season

Our ward had their annual Christmas part last weekend. I had the opportunity to be the over seer of it and what a blast it was.The theme was "Christmas at Winter Quarters," and we had a wonderful old fashioned roast beef dinner, sang Christmas Hymns, and Square Danced! For any of you who have never square danced, as hick as it may sound, it is so much fun!

Natalie was very curious about Santa Claus. When Justin went to gather her up from Santa she swatted him away because she was still looking at his beard. We brought the 90's back that evening as she sported an outfit from my youngest sisters closet.

Thanks to my mom for shipping it to us so quickly.

Lastly, her Christmas dress! I was so excited to buy this for her as it was a tradition that I always grew up with. She likes it except for when it is time to crawl in it.

  

The night Justin carried in the Christmas tree she lit up with excitement as if to say, "I always wanted a real tree in my house." She likes to look at it especially when the lights are on, but has been pretty good about leaving it alone. She doesn't know what is coming, but she is going to love the wrapping paper on Christmas morning!

Addie- Pattie

Meet my adorable three-year-old niece Addie. She is independent as they come and only if you make friends with her will she actually talk to you. I luckily am one of her friends. Over Christmas, Addie offered to paint my fingernails. What an artist!



She even did butterflies on them.



I let her borrow my camera to snap some pictures. When you are 3 I guess this is what you see.



Addie you are fantastic and I am so grateful you are my niece!

Justin and Ruth Blazzard

Merry Christmas!

We were playing around with our new camera and trying to get a great Christmas Pic. These are a few of the photos that turned out. :)



And our camera has a smile detector, so while I tried to set it, Justin said he wanted to be angry in the next picture. I clicked the wrong button, it captured these three amazing faces of my man right in a row....









Justin and Ruth Blazzard

Temple Square

A couple of weeks ago one of my best friends, Amy Petersen came home from her mission. We had her over for dinner and she had a brilliant idea, to go see the First Presidency Christmas Devotional and see the lights on temple square.



I had never seen the lights before and have always wanted to, but for one reason or another something comes up every year we try to go. With the possibility of moving away from Utah in the near future, I decided nothing would stand in our way this year!

I invited my younger brother Kevin to come with us and my little sister Rachel to meet us there. Kevin drove since he has my grandpas four door pickup. We figured it would be the most comfortable and safe of the three vehicles we had to choose from. We probably should have printed out directions to the Triad parking garage before we got there because traffic was horrible and we didn't know exactly where we wer going. When we finally made it to temple square we were on standby for a while waiting to get in.





When we did make it into the conference center, it was awesome! They had it decorated beautifully and with so much more than you ever see on the broadcast. My nephew who lives in Oregon told his mom that he was very dissapointed he didn't see us on the broadcast.

The lights were also a sight to behold. We all agreed we were thankful that was not our job to string those lights around every single last limb! I loved the nativity depicted on the reflection pond. It was very tranquil.



We even got to hear an awesome caroling group inside the building where the Christus is. There costumes added to their overall effect, but without them they would have still been superb!



We did see Amy on the square, but weren't able to meet up with her before the devotional. She brought her way cute cousin, so we talked a while but they went their way and we went ours. Still fun to see her for the little bit we did.

I am so grateful for all the work and effort the church goes to for the Christmas season, but I am even more grateful for my Savior Jesus Christ and that we get to celebrate His Birth. It truley does bring Joy to the World!


Justin and Ruth Blazzard

Baby Jesus or a Space Ship?

This is a picture of the gingerbread cookie I figured was Baby Jesus for the Nativity cookie cutter set, Justin said it was a space ship.


Justin and Ruth Blazzard

Why I am Not a Decorator

We were invided to a neighborhood party and were asked to bring a treat. For some reason I thought it would be great to try and be festive for the holidays and decided to make gingerbread cookies. Before I began I had this great image of having perfectly shaped gingerbread boys with red hots for buttons and cute white icing to accentuate the legs and arms of the little boys.



What really occured: good tasting gingerbread cut into some weird looking nativity characters with no icing.

I made gingerbread when I was like 12 and remember liking it, so I thought this would be no problem. Well, I didn't have a gingerbread boy cookie cutter, but I did have a set of nativity cookie cutters from my wedding. They were interesting looking. I showed Justin what I thought was supposed to be the baby Jesus and he said it looked like a space ship and refered to those cookies as such the rest of the day.

The icing- really runny, until I added too much powdered sugar and then it didn't decorate very well either. At this moment I realized why I don't decorate cupcakes, sugar cookies, or really anything. I hate the little details and spending so much time on something that is just going to be eaten! I told Justin I am never making them ever again.... I guess we will see.

I took them to the party anyways and some even got eaten. We will be enjoying them with our hot chocolate this week. Justin informed me he only had to eat 8 cookies a day for them to be gone in a week, anybody want some gingerbread cookies?

Justin and Ruth Blazzard

Christmas

We found this beauty the Friday after Thanksgiving in the dark with a flash light. Because of the lighting, you will notice there is a spot where it needs another branch, but overall I don't think we did to bad.

We really love this time of year. It is great to have the Christmas decorations out, and my favorite is our nativity.



Things that Christmas means to me:

Another reason to celebrate the birth of our Savior
Time to spend with family
Excuse to eat lots of cookies and hot chocolate
Coming up with what to give to those you love(and I may be selfish but I do like getting a gift too)
Magical Snow (not the yucky stuff you get in March when it is time for snow to be gone)
Christmas music
Great cheezy happy ending christmas movies
A happy magical fun time of year!

Merry Christmas everyone.

Justin and Ruth Blazzard