Christmas happenings

We had quite the experience (read frustration) putting up our tree this year. Our pre-lit Christmas tree was spotty at best and so one by one I clipped off all the lights. It took more than 4 hours. After a trip to Fred Meyers we had a string of lights and we were up and running. The boys helped hang the ornaments too. Every night Nathaniel was in charge of turning the lights off before bed. He took his job seriously. We continued spent the afternoon creating graham cracker houses with my friend's daughter Jourdan. We made it to Zoo Lights. It was super crowded since it wasn't raining and not too cold. We parked in the overflow lot and walked a good mile to the zoo. They didn't have the train this year but lots more lights to look at. The boys had fun with their cousins. We had a tough time managing the crowd on the way out and got split up. We were thankful once we found each other. We spent time with Ken's family: We spent time with my family (even if some of them were skyped in from Peru): The boys enjoyed opening presents. And much more went on, including me picking up a contract job for a few days at the end of the year. We were busy.