Christmas 2009

We had a nice Christmas this year. The season was busy with parties and shopping but Christmas eve and day were really nice and spent with family.

We did Christmas eve like we always do with my Mom but this time it was at her new house. I am still having a hard time adjusting to this new way of life with her. I am not comfortable in Garry's home and miss the way life was before she got married. I miss her. But I digress. We had a great dinner and gift exchange and stayed up way too late. They gave me a Lion House cookbook that I love and Brad and cool flashlight that has a tripod for a handle. How cool is that? And then money for the Bosch mixer that we are saving up for. My life will be complete once that appliance joins our family. My sister Janeen just got her Young Women medallion again since she is in the YW in her ward. For one of her projects she transcribed my dad's journals and had them bound and a copy made for each of us. It was the most amazing, treasured thing anyone could've ever given me. These journal's were written when I was young and to hear how he talks about his love for us kids and his hopes and dreams for us was incredible. He also expressed the love he had for my Mom and he loved her in a way I didn't even realize. I hope Brad loves me like that. He was also so hard on himself and had high expectations for himself and it was painful to read some of it. It also made me understand him more. It is a beautiful and bittersweet memory I will treasure for the rest of my life.

Christmas morning we opened gifts at our house before going to Brad's parents for breakfast. We tried not to go overboard on spending this year and I think we did pretty good. All Tyler wanted was "100 sets of Lego's" (that's an exact quote) and Trevor really didn't have any specific thing he wanted. They both go Zhu Zhu pets which are my kind of pets. Brad surprised me with a pink Creative Zen mp3 player. It's pink! And he got me a rice cooker/steamer and a hot cocoa maker. I love them all! I got him a Blue Ray player and a Guitar Hero guitar.

After we filled ourselves with food we did presents with Brad's side of the family and that was fun. Lynette made me a Family Home Evening assignment board which I have always wanted and Lynn & Margaret gave us all season passes to Lagoon. I guess we will be spending a lot of time there this summer.

We missed great-Grandma & Grandpa Newman at breakfast. Grandpa wasn't feeling well from the Christmas eve party he went to the night before so they stayed home. Turns out he was having a heart attack and wound up in IMC's Cardiac ICU later in the day with 2 new cardiac stents. Little 90-year-old man gave us a good scare. He's doing excellent now. We got another treasure of a Christmas gift, this time a book made of life stories written, and typed on a type-writer, by Grandpa Newman. One of Brad's cousins then illustrated each story and it was hardbound. Too special for words!

Wanna know what my best gift this year was?? Trevor deciding to potty train. Oh yes folks, it's finally happened. I thought he would be wearing diapers into college. It was our Christmas miracle.

Overall a great ending to the decade.