Days 4 & 5: Carrie's House

We spent the weekend before Christmas at Andrew sister, Carrie's, house.  It felt magical, like we had stepped into a movie.  Carrie's house smelled like the homemade gingerbread she was baking (from scratch of course), every room was decorated for Christmas (even wreaths and trees for each bedroom), holiday music was playing in the background, and there were loads of kids to play with. 

The girls had loads of fun doing traditional holiday/winter activities starting with playing in the snow.  While this was going on, I enjoyed vising with Carrie and Wayne.  It got even better when my teenage niece came in and asked if she could drive the kids to a nearby sledding hill.  Um, yeah.  Of course you can take my kids sledding while I sit in the warm house and visit with the grownups.  It was fabulous!

I didn't have enough snow boots for all my girls so Ellie stayed in to help with the gingerbread .  .  . 

When all the kids came back from sledding they joined in the gingerbread fun.

SUNDAY COUSIN TIME:

Luke seemed to be particularly found of Emma.

Ellie, Clarissa, and Alaina really enjoyed their time together.  I especially liked seeing Clarissa and Lainey holding hands while they walked to class Sunday.  Speaking of church, Lainey and Ellie happily went to class while Lizzie got scared and begged me to let her leave early.  Of course since it was just before Christmas all the teachers were passing out candy and other little gifts so by the end of the three hour block Liz was pretty happy to be there.  Also, when I pulled out of my SIL's drive way I got stuck in the snow and Wayne had to take over the driving for me.  I guess I'm a little out of practice after living on the east coast for so long.

 

Luke and Lizzie played a lot of computer games together, especially minecraft.

Sunday's main after church activity was decorating gingerbread houses.   (Carrie had made the dough from scratch, cut out the house and train pieces, and baked them the day before so they would have time to harden).

  Alaina and Clarissa made a house together.

Collette helped Ellie with her house (I'm pretty sure Ellie spent most of her time licking the frosting).

Seth and Liz worked on their projects (train & house) the longest.

Lizzie's house ended up pretty detailed.  It was hard for her to stop adding things.  Even Monday morning, while I was packing up our gear so we could head back to Utah valley, Liz was adding to her house.