Christmas 2012

 Christmas Eve

We celebrated Christmas with my dad and his side of the family at the annual Cook Family Christmas Eve dinner.  Crazy cousins at the kids table...

 Annual Picture with Great Grandma- Only missing one great grandchild- Baby Ceci who lives in Brazil :(

After everyone went home, Hunter was very concerned about having the house cleaned up and getting to bed before Santa came.  He made sure to put out lots of snacks for Santa and the reindeer!

Christmas Day

Finally Christmas morning!  Waiting in Mom and Dad's bed for Tanner to wake up...

 Reading the letter Santa left for the kids...

Could it possibly be?  LEGOS!  Just what he's always wanted!

Lego Wii game!

A stroller and new dolly makes for a happy baby!

 

Next, off to Grandma Cook's for yummy breakfast, more presents, and watching "A Christmas Story"!

Looking at calendar we gave Grandma...

Charity loved the new coat Monica gave her-perfect for Big Bear!

 Thanks Grandma and Monica for a great Christmas morning!

Christmas Cutie...

One more Stop:  Grandma and Grandpa Hoyal

The men are solving the problems of the world...

While the kids anxiously await present time!

Aside from a scary horse *incident- Christmas was really fun this year!  So glad we have 365 days 'til next years festivities though!

*Heidi's horse collapsed while Peri was riding on him!  Luckily Peri, the oldest cousin,  got off in time and a really nice vet came to save the day with a shot for a colicked Dominee! Who knew old horses got colic?

Cub Scout: Bear Award!

At our last pack meeting, the Bear den were "Mad Scientists" who taught the pack about the scientific method, volcanoes, and chemistry.  They did a great job!

 Making a volcano...

Tanner earned his Bear Award and Religious Emblem award.  It has been fun being involved with scouts.  I have such a sweet bunch of boys in my pack right now and I look forward to meeting with them each week!  Congrats Tanner on earning these important awards!  

Tanner "pinning" me, still in his Mad Scientist lab coat!

Advent Calendar Fairy-Take 2

Here are a few other things the Advent Calendar Fairy invited us to do leading up to the big day...

"Go see the Nutcracker Ballet with friends from school..."

I LOVE the ballet and think it is fun to expose my children to this artform.  We went to Inland Pacific Ballet's school performance, so it was a bit shorter than their regular performance and the director does some teaching before the performance and at intermission.  It is perfect for school aged kids!

Go to the Bourgeous' house for a Christmas Workshop!  

 The kids got to make gingerbread houses, make cute ornaments, and have fun with friends, while Mommy got to get a few of her Christmas chores done at the same time!  Thanks Julie!


You're invited to a Christmas Party with some of your favorite friends:  Nikko and Sienna!

 The boys were in a gingerbread making contest (boys vs. girls) and had a blast doing a few other fun holiday games! What a treat to be invited to such a fun party!

After 24 days of coming up with fun things to do, the Advent Calendar Fairy is officially pooped out, but promised the boys she would see them next December!

Merry Christmas!

I decided to keep it simple this year and do our family Christmas greetings via Blog this year.  So, here it goes:

Dear Family and Friends,

We are so grateful for this time of year where we can reflect on what 2012 has brought us.  We truly are grateful for our wonderful family and friends and the impact you make on our lives.  Our greatest regret is that we are not able to spend more time with all of you whom we love.  We sincerely hope this letter finds you with health and happiness.

 12 Verbs that kept us BUSY in 2012

Ladd: 

1.  Reading about, Worrying about, and Passionately Discussing the Romney 2012 campaign

2.  Creating a FUN filled life for his kids when not working hard for the family or serving the ward as a member of the Bishopric 

Melissa:

3.  Inspiring a Fourth Grader and Kindergartner to stay excited about learning with lots of field trips, reading, projects, activities...

4.  Training for, and then running in a Ragnar Relay Race 

5.  Chasing around an adorable, yet mischievous, little 18 month old Monkey

Tanner (age 9):

8.  Organizing a "Neighborhood Newspaper" that he's got all the neighborhood kids working on

 9.  Diligently Practicing his golf, piano, art, cub scout, and lego building skills 

Hunter (age 6):

10.  Playing with cousins and visiting Grandmas

11.  Attempting to Convince mom to let him play the Wii, computer, iPad, anything with a screen...

Charity (18 months):

12.  Providing her family with lots giggles and sweetness!

Although we may have been very busy this year, we sure have been blessed in many ways!  We are so grateful for the Savior and the love that we continue to feel from Him throughout the year! 

 Merry Christmas to all!

Love, The Hoyal Family

'Tis the Season...

I tell my boys that they must be really good, because not only does Santa visit our house in December, but so does the Advent Calendar Fairy!  We started this tradition years ago, thanks to my friend Sarah and her awesome blog.  The Fairy leaves a little note each day in our Advent calendar.  She usually tells us something to do that day that has to do with Christmas, like go Christmas shopping for your cousins, Cuddle up with a Christmas movie while drinking hot chocolate with a candy cane, or make Christmas cards for your teachers.  Here are a few of the bigger things we've done thanks to this magical little fairy:

"Start off the month of December right by visiting a Creche Festival"

"Find the true meaning of Christmas at a Living Nativity"

"Meet up with Friends and go see a Winter Wonderland of Christmas lights!"

I can't wait to see what the Advent Calendar Fairy has in store for us for the next 13 days...

Book Club Catch Up

Boys Book Club is so fun!  Here are our past two book clubs:

The Boy of the Painted Cave 

by: Justen Denzel

 After playing Mammoth tag, and then discussing the book, we made our own egg tempera paint, and made a cave painting with it.  I liked how the paint turned out shiny!  

We made cups of dirt for our snack!

Tale of Despereaux 

by:  Kate diCamilo

Tanner said this was his favorite book club book so far!  We did a fun comprehension game with what we pretended was red thread (goes along with the book), but all I had was green yarn.  It ended up making a big web that the boys thought was cool.

 We painted cute little mouse pictures...

and made Ratatouille soup with lots of veggies!  All the boys were a little nervous to try it at first, but everyone asked for seconds!

 Proof that veggies are delicious...

I love that the boys are having conversations about the books they are reading without my prompting.  I love that they recommend books to one another and get excited to read a book that their friend has read.    Book club is fulfilling its purpose-getting BOYS excited about reading!  I really want to start a Jr. Book Club for Hunter's friends, but two book clubs, plus everything else I've got going on is not feasible right now.  Maybe next school year...

18 months

Charity is officially one and a half!  It doesn't seem like she is that big yet!  But, she sure is turning into a busy little girl.  I fall more in love with this little angel everyday.  I love this age.  She is learning so much each day.  She is interested in everything and as curious as can be!  She loves to learn what noises animals make and then try to mimic it.  She knows that Santa says "Ho-Ho" and that a motorcycle goes "vroom, vroom".  She likes to ask "Go?"-as in where did something go and put her little hand out as if asking a question.  Charity knows she needs "shoe" before she goes "out?" She loves to eat everything and wants to feed herself.  She loves babies, doggies, and balls.  So cute, she melts my heart.  The boys still treat her like a little princess and absolutely adore her.  We are all tickled to have Charity a part of our family.

San Diego Zoo

We trekked down to the San Diego Zoo last week.  It was a beautiful day for the zoo!  The animals were all up and about and we had lots of fun watching them.  We went with our school group and got a school rate of $6 each.  What a deal!  The zoo is in Balboa Park, where there is a Globe Theater that does Shakespeare field trips.  The older kids spent part of the day there, while us with younger kids stayed at the zoo.  It worked out really well!  This was a great field trip where we all had fun and learned something-even Charity.  (She has been walking around the house beating her chest like a gorilla all week!)

This Orangatang got right up to the glass to check out the kids.  Charity loved it and kept waving and saying "HI!" 

 The Rhinos were "playing" by smashing their horns together.  Very entertaining!

 Cutie Pies free from strollers for a moment!

The kids loved playing in these little caves in the polar bear area.

Wild animals everywhere, oh my!