Christmas with the Cousins

We spent Christmas this year in Seattle (Renton) or (technically unincorporated King County). We had a great time, as you could tell from the previous fatty post. But food was not the only focus of our time there. There were plenty of cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents to entertain, feed, and tease Will.
We'll start with cousin Hailey. Some of my friends and old roommates will be shocked to see this picture and realize that she's headed to high school next fall! I'm officially starting to get old.
Aunt Sara spent a good amount of time with the Willster. She probably fed him less cookies than most hence the sad face, but Will really does love his auntie Sara.

Matt was Will's favorite name to say during our stay there, and even a few weeks later. Cousin Matt was an expert at making Will laugh.
Matt also let Will play with his LightBrite! Will's new favorite toy.
Will didn't want to participate in the annual nativity. The kids did a great job this year with some fantastic costumes.
Christmas Eve was well documented by our paparazzi. But somehow we didn't get ANY pictures from Christmas morning, day, or evening!
I have to admit Will plays favorites. His all time favorite cousin, by far, is Natalie. She lets him squeeze her face, and mess up her toys. Will adores her and follows her around like a little, cute puppy.

Other stuff we did while on vacation was another murder mystery dinner. Here's the whole group "Cruising for Murder".
We didn't have an ugly sweater contest, but if we did, these two would have won!
We went to Snowflake Lane in Bellevue where there was dancing, holiday music, and fake snow falling from the mall. Will missed out because he was too tired.
We enjoyed some Washington nature going running in the neighborhood, hiking on Squak mountain, and exploring the woods behind my parent's house. I kind of miss being so close to wilderness.
Britton read, and cried, while reading The Christmas wish. Or was it called Christmas list, Christmas jars, Christmas shoes, Christmas orange, Christmas ice pick... It was some kind of Christmas noun.

Good Idea Bad Idea

Good Idea: Celebrating Thanksgiving in Utah with all the extended family.

Bad Idea: Take a three month old baby on a 12 hour car trip to celebrate Thanksgiving with all the flu infected family.

Good Idea: Stay at home with your new baby.

Bad Idea: Let time lapse between insurance coverage because the next day after insurance runs out your baby gets really sick.

It's so sad to see baby Will so sick, but our trip to Utah was really great. The car ride wasn't that bad either. Will was an amazingly well behaved baby on the way there, and then he was sick and a bit fussy on the way home. I only have a few photos because I forgot to upload the ones I took on Papa Olson's fancy camera.It was a full suburban!


We stopped in St. George to pick up Grandma, and there was a mishap with the sink. Doesn't Margo look lovely?
After we arrived in Nephi, Will loved hanging out with Uncle Derek...and then puking on him. Somehow I was able to time it so every time I handed the Will to him he would spew.

Memorable moments from out trip were

-The food of course. There was a lot of it because there were 30-something people. 3 turkeys alone! All the traditional stuff--mashed potatoes with gravy, cranberry stuff, yam stuff, many varieties of Jell-O salad, and lovely Vodka crust pies! Britton made his banana cream pie again, and it was the first pie to be completely devoured!

-The games. We played the traditional bunko after the feast, and I was introduced to a new, hilarious game called "Curses" I think. It took me a while to stop talking like Scooby Doo after that. There was another one we played that Rachael and Celeste made up. Everyone picked a piece of paper with instruction of something you had to do that day. For example Celeste was supposed to offer to clean people's glasses, and Derek had to challenge everyone to a dance off. Then at the end of the day people guess what your task was. Sometimes people don't catch on to your weird behavior. Celeste's parents thought she was so thoughtful to clean Grandma's glasses twice in one day.

-Murder mystery dinner. EVERYONE got into the spirit and dressed to fit their parts. Will even became Toothless Willy, owner of famed treasure. I really wish I had the picture of him in a pirate hat.

-"Zapping". I think Will and I were the only ones not zapped by Uncle Jens new machine so I can't really give a good explanation of it. All I know is that it had something to do with healing energy, and revealing what type of element people were. Britton is fire. Lots of energy I guess:)

-Derek brought a girl! She wasn't the only one there though. There was quite a few boyfriends/girlfriends and just "friends".

-Heading back to Provo to visit friends. I have such fun memories from college years, but I still don't really miss the place.

Glad to be home again! Love that humidity!