Christmas Gifts and Winter Break

I felt like a little bit of a slacker not doing tons of big home-made Christmas gifts this year. One year, we were up to 32 plus 50 or so neighbor/friend gifts. It was a stressful but excited time of year when we did that!
This year, we mostly just sent out Christmas cards (which I guess was my home-made part for this year). But I did decide to ask a friend who knows a lot of the same people and do something small to let people know we were thinking of them. After I made up a cute tag and got the stuff, Amy came over one day to help me put our "home-made Christmas Fudge" together. I think they turned out way cute! We ended up making like 70 of them. Holy Crap! We really need to stop meeting people! LOL {Just Kidding... here's to meeting tons more friends in 2015!! ;)}

Other Christmas Vacation fun:
After Christmas- this Electronic Basketball Game was on clearance. Justice & Victoria put it together. The family has really liked it!

We also have collected quite a few Indoor Snowballs. It's so fun when an unplanned Snowball Fight erupts! :)

50th Anniversary

We used to "Home Teach" Dave & Marlene in our last ward. We got invited to attend their 50th Wedding Anniversary. It was a great night!

Paynes Sledding & Games

We had the Paynes over today to do some sledding & play some games. It's so fun to get together with friends. The Paynes have become like family to us up here and we love to get together with them. The sunset was beautiful!

The Paynes brought a new game over. It's tricky to learn the rules- it takes a great deal of strategy. But it was super fun!

We even had the pleasure of a Puppet show with concessions. LOL The girls are so creative and fun!

Thanks guys for hanging out with us!

Christmas Card 2014

Tubbs in the Snow

The Tubbs boys came to play in the snow for Christmas. They brought over one of their 4wheelers and their big black sled. The boys took turns pulling the rest of the kids around on the sleds. We also shared some hot chocolate and a little bit of lunch. We had a great time! 

Christmas Day Fun

It was a pretty laid back Christmas Day!  Much different than the chaos of my growing up years- a dozen places to visit and running from dawn to dusk. It's different but good!

After cleaning up the Present disaster, the kids enjoyed a special Treasure Hunt in their individual rooms for 15 one dollar bills. It was a  fun way to give them part of Grandpa Randy & Grammy's Christmas gift. They were so excited!

We had some friends over during the day. Then in the evening, Brett made us an amazing dinner! So good!

Hope you had a wonderful Christmas! 

Love from us to You!

A SUPER Christmas Morning

Everyone got up sometime before 9. I love that we all are night owls and enjoy sleeping in. All the kids came and snuggled in bed with us for a bit and then started our morning with our family prayer.

We had a great morning. Keeping the cost down this year, we bought a lot of gifts at the Thrift stores or making our own. Everyone was just as excited as uif we had spent tons of money. I love it! We even did a few prank gifts which turned out to be some of their favorites. LOL
"Santa" fancied up the little girls American Girl Dolls. Victoria & Glory had ratted their hair and left them naked for him. LOL It was tricky but they looked fabulous Christmas morning.

After presents, we made our Cinnamon Roll Wreath. So pretty!

I mentioned we made home-made gifts this year. It was really special to see people put a lot of thought and time into their gifts.




Victoria made several different coupons for a special Christmas Massage. SUPER thoughtful and creative!

Brett helped Justice make wooden swords for everyone. They are super neat! He decided to let us all paint them the way they want to so we'll do that as an activity together. Glory bought belts at the thrift store and made a scabbard for each person to slide onto the belt and hold the sword. 

{And remember- I made the PJ pants}

Brett made us all a Super Hero Shield out of wood and attached an individual Superhero that represented each of us. Super cool! Brett is a super handy man!

Last but NOT least by any means- Liberty and I put our efforts together for her to make the family an Avengers Monopoly Game. It is SUPER awesome! We got an old Monopoly board from the thrift store and redid the whole thing.We decided to do bunkers & secret bases instead of the houses and hotels but still use the pieces. We did RUN and take some money with you for the Go space. We included JARVIS and the ARC Reactor for the Utilities. We also did Training Fees and Super Hero Dues. We made the rest of board spaces into places that were associated with our favorite Avengers. {tricky to come up with actual places to use. LOL}  We made the Railroads into the Hero's Weapons. We changed the Community Chest to Nick Fury 's Briefcase. We changed all the cards to the Chance and the Briefcase piles. We came up with some great ones like "Two of your Bunkers blew up. Return them to the Bank. "Tony called. Visit Stark Towers." That was a Heck of a mission! Pay $50 to each player." "Tried to pick up the Tessaract. Bad Idea! Pay  $50." For the Free Parking Space we did "Conquer Evil & Eat Shawarma" which we think is hilarious! And it worked out perfect becuse when you land on it- you take all the money out of the middle. You know... to buy Shwarma. LOL For the Prison ones- we did an Asgardian Prison with a picture of Loki in there. And then a "Bad Guys always go to Prison" space. SUPER creative, are we!!

Here's a closeup of our finished board. SUPER amazing!!!

To a very Merry Home-made Christmas! Best one yet!

Wisemen Gifts

When we got back from our busy night, the Wisemen came to visit. 

I love that they all want to dress up as the wisemen and come bearing gifts. It's super sweet! Victoria even made herself a crown. It said Merry Christmas and had a baby Jesus drawn, cut out and glued to the top. What darling kids I have!

This year, we tried hard to keep the cost down and also make it a little more of a home-made Christmas. So for our PJ tradtion, I decided to get some Avernger fabric and make us all pj bottoms to match. They were way trickier than I had anticipated but so worth it!!! Everyone LOVED them! And we look SUPER awesome in them! Seamons Assemble! LOL

Before we sen the kids to bed- we also watched The Nativity video as a family. Perfect ending to our night in preparation for our Christmas day!

Live Nativity

Last year, we started the tradition of participating in the Live Nativity at our Stake Center. Luckily, Brett chatted with the right people and we got a spot for late this evening. It's such a special time to be together and remember the true meaning of Christmas! Love it! This year, Liberty wanted to be Mary. Unfortunately, they weren't able to get any animals this year. The kids were a little bummed but... things happen sometimes. And it was still a special night. We are so grateful for our Savior and the chance we had to share his story with others on this special night!

Since we needed another wiseman, one of Brett's Seminary students, Kreston joined us. It was fun to chat and spend with him (and his mom). Nice people!

After our shift, we enjoyed some hot chocolate and cookies. Glory even scored an entire box that was leftover since it was almost over. (plus she's got s super sweet smile) Wahoo! Fun times!

Caldwell Christmas Eve

For the last several years, our friends, the Caldwells, have thrown a Christmas Eve Party for those without families close by. We were lucky enough to be invited this year. It was super fun to spend time with friends. They had tons of people come. {I was whimpy and didn't take a whole lot of pictures. I always kick myself when I do that but oh well... next year, right?}They had lots to eat and plenty of room to spread out and enjoy ourselves. Their home is beautiful. 

We'd never been up there before so the adventure beforehand was a bit scary! LOL It decided to be a WHITE Christmas which made us very happy! It dumped several inches of snow on us within hours of the party starting. Driving up a Montana mountain in the dark (no street lights) in a minivan was literally putting our lives on the line to make it there! ;) So worth it though! 

We all ate and visited with some friends. The kids got to play cards and ping pong downstairs. Brett & I joined Allie & Brian in a few carols at the piano before we left. What a great night!!!

Christmas Eve Puppet Show

Victoria & Glory made us Golden tickets and put on a special puppet show for us in the playroom doorway. It was silly and a bit violent for a Christmas show. LOL But I love their creativity! Cute girls!

Gingerbread cookies

Every since Gingerbread Fred- Glory has been asking to make Gingerbread Men Cookies. Today we finally fulfilled her request. Not sure anyone is going to end up a huge gingerbread cookie fan but it was a fun project to do together. Merry Christmas!

Later during our Christmas break, we got around to decorating them. By then- almost all of them were in pieces but we made it work!

Christmas Prep

I have been LOVING my new house and the opportunity to decorate for the Holidays again. Seriously, I am in LOVE with my house. I realized that I didn't take pictures of everything but here are some of my favorites: Merry Christmas!!!

And Christmas Cards make me so HAPPY!!!

The kids set up their tree downstairs and put all their ornaments on it. Super fun!

Smørbrød Party 2: VT

I had planned to have my Visiting Teaching Companion & all our sisters with their families over to our house for Scones this evening. Unfortunately,  two of them got sick so we adjusted plans. We made another batch of Krumkaker and a few more sandwiches to enjoy a Smørbrød Party: Part 2 with the Stranges and the Browns. So fun! We had a fabulous time eating and chatting and laughing! Great people! [even if Brett and I are WAAAY old! LOL]

Smørbrød Party 2014

We decided to start up our Smørbrød Tradition here in Helena. {Check out our past documented parties from 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009.}
As a brief explanation- if you aren't brave enough to check out all the past info about it. LOL--
Smørbrød is pronounced Smurd-a-bra. The word smørbrød in Norwegian means "buttered bread" or aka the Scandinavian open face sandwich. Every year growing up, my Bestemor (Norwegian for grandmother) had a Smørbrød party around Christmastime. A couple years prior to my documenting phase of our lives, we started our own Smørbrød Party in Fargo. It's a tradition that our family loves & wanted to share with our new Helena friends!

MENU

We always have tons of Scandinavian food and desserts. There's open-faced sandwiches of every kind. . We made ones with crab salad, chicken salad, goat cheese, tomatoes and egg, ham, turkey, chicken, Munster cheese, Gouda cheese and pepper-jack cheese. We love trying all the different breads. We had wheat, white, pumpernickel, a couple different ryes, and a fancy red & green white bread.
For dessert I, of course, made Krumkaker. We love it! I made small batch of Berlinikranser. {Both of which were done with the help of Brett at 2 am the night before. We are CRAZY!}  The kids helped make brownies and we found some rosettes at the last grocery store we checked. It turns out that Helena is not very strong in it's Scandinavian roots. LOL
We also always have hot chocolate with home-made whip cream. Yum! Last year, we bought a family sized hot choco maker. It is so fabulous! And let me tell you- we get sooooo many compliments on our hot cocoa even though it's the generic kind made with water from Walmart. There's just something about it heated & frothed from a dispenser that makes it FABULOUSO!

FESTIVITIES {TALENT SHOW}

Along with the food, we have added a few of our own traditions to the evening's festivities. Tonight was a night of some amazing talents. LOL
Brett made a set of pipe chimes several years ago. We love pulling them out with a group of friends and trying out our musical abilities. ;) We rocked it! I think?
The little ones even put on a concert of their own with our "Elf" microphones. They were quite the hoot.
We had a budding model in our midst which wouldn't get off the bench until I took a million pictures of her. Cute baby!
And there was even a little hula-hooping going on in the cold backyard. Talent galore, my friends!

AND... it's not a Seamons Party if you don't get a few shots of the families. Oh how I love pictures of people! Thanks guys for joining us! We love you all! Until next year...

3rd-5th Winter Program

Mrs. Nelson also highlighted some individual talent during the Prelude Program which was held between Glory & Victoria's Programs. We knew quite a few friends in this part. Such talented people we know! Way to go, girlies!

Then it was Victoria's time to shine in her performances of Noel, Northern Lights and Hip Hop Reindeer. She takes her roles very seriously so she was pretty nervous. They did a great job! Way proud of you, Sis! [I went to take a closeup pic of her beforehand but she wasn't quite dressed up yet so we decided to wait. But then we forgot. Oops!] It was awesome that we knew someone in every grade level. It made listening to all of them more enjoyable because we had a vested interest. ;) What a great day!

P.S. The kids all got out of school after the concerts. Victoria had her friend Sophie over for the afternoon. People think they look a lot alike {besides the glasses} so we always giggle when they get together. So cute! They played some game today where the bad guys were afraid of RED. Silly girls!