Christmas

We spent our first Christmas ever not in Utah and not with Family.  But I must say, it was a very enjoyable Holiday.  The Webb's, who also have 5 girls, had us over for Christmas Eve.  We had delicious food, a program and sing-a-long

Here's the program, all the kids performed.  Lisel played Choose the Right, Britta played a duet with Rachel, Anslie played We Three Kings and Estelle and Ava sang a Chubby Little Snowman with actions....too cute!  Then our girls did a little skit.  It was a take off of the Priscilla one, they made her Noelle and added a Christmas twist.  So creative

This is a fun, young couple in tour ward that came also, the girls said they reminded them of their aunts and uncles.   

pics of our Nativity

Julie and her girls are amazing pianists.  It was so fun to have Julie play Christmas songs while we sang.  They had typed the words to the songs on the program and we had a great sing-a-long.  It felt so comfortable and fun to be in their home.  We are so happy to have the Webb's in Singapore!

Christmas Morning in Grandma's new jambes!

Ans, our little teacher, got a whiteboard easel.  She couldn't have been more thrilled

Stell school class theme this year is Pirate's.  She was pretty excited to get a Pirate dress-up

Taylor Swift tix...she's coming to Singapore!

Ava's fav was Pinky Pie.  It's a moving, singing, talking My Pretty Pony.  She has added her to the collection of friends she sleeps with overnight.  Anyone have an extra king size bed, she's outgrown her twin!

Lis and Brit got these sweet hard case carry-ons.  They promptly filled them with  all their garb and hauled them around all day

 We invited 3 families on Christmas Day.  We ate, (of course!) played games and talked.  I loved getting everyone's gifts put away so quickly so the house was tidy for guests.  We enjoyed the evening so much.

Mike likes to hang with the girls!

We really enjoyed our Christmas this year.  I was a bit anxious about the whole thing so I began praying and making preparations early.  I really wanted this to be a special Christmas for our family.  I knew it would be very different for us.  We are so spoiled in Utah to have so many things going on around Christmas time that remind us of the Savior.  We were able to do some things that really brought the Spirit of Christ into our Christmas, even though we are not even living in a Christian country.  We had some special family home evenings talking about the time leading up to the Savior's birth and reading some of the prophesies of his birth.  We also prayed about and decided upon 2 families that we delivered a wrapped piece of the Nativity to every night.  On Christmas Eve we delivered the baby Jesus with the Christmas Story.  It was a great activity for our family and the 2 families still don't know it was us.  We also found a life size nativity put up on Orchard Road that we went to see.  The Nativity at our church was also special.   Christmas Eve after our festivities we came home and the girls opened their jams, then to candlelight did my childhood tradition of reading the nice things each family member had written about us through the month.  The girls really enjoyed that.  We ended with a reading of the First Christmas, testimony and a prayer.
I feel so blessed to have a happy healthy family, and to have the knowledge of a Savior who was born, lived and died for me.  I am so grateful for this Christmas season that brought me closer to Him.