Our three days of Christmas

With the swapping my ex Thanksgiving for Christmas it threw our schedule off.  Normally we have both exes on the same weekend and same holiday schedule, so we either have all our kids and can be together as a full family, or we get to be together as a couple.  We like it this way.  But with the switch it made us a little off.  So we had to have two Christmas Eve's and two Christmas mornings, one with Jayme and Sean, and the regular one with the other four girls.
Christmas eve eve:
Christmas eve eve started with lunch with Grandma KC and Aunt Jessica and her crew at Cafe Rio.  Grandma decided to come for a visit for the holidays and this would be the only day while she was visiting that we would have the full circus.  She'd been working for a year and a half on quilts for all her grandkids and they were finally done.  The kids got to tell Grandma what colors they wanted their quilts and they were super excited that they were finally done.  I didn't get a closer pics of Sean, his was done with Sponge Bob material:

That night we celebrated Christmas eve eve.  And of course, no Christams eve eve is complete without a family throw down while watching Christmas cartoon specials on TV:

And of course, the pajamas.  We just gave them comfy bottoms this year so that would be why they're all raising knees and legs.  They wanted to make sure their bottoms could be seen in the picture:

Christmas eve morning Jayme and Sean got to open all of their presents from us, and we let all 6 kids open the presents for the names that they had drawn with each other.

And Papa Mike showed up with his gift, sleds for the entire family:

Which will be awesome if we ever get any snow this year...
I made our traditional Swedish Pancakes for the kids and then Jayme and Sean went off the spend the rest of the holiday with their mom.  Sad for us.
The rest of us cleaned and cooked for the family Christmas eve dinner.
I love my family.  They make me laugh.  My mom was there, with my brother Bill and his family, and my sister McKell and her family.  As well as the world's most awesome father-in-law, Mike.  We laughed and giggled and ate a lot of food.  Thank you to pinterest for the cheesecake filled strawberry idea! Oh, and we had fun watching Sam-I-am and the dogs tease each other:

We also watched Santa's progress across the world with Norad Santa Tracker which was so exciting, even for me.  I think that's going to have to become a yearly thing.  Cali pleaded with me as she went to bed, "Mom, please don't stay up too late.  He's getting close!"
Christmas morning was as magical as it should have been.  Cas got her long awaited for camera and the other girls got their American Girl dolls, which of course, looked just like them. 

And being as Christmas fell on a Sunday this year Santa brought the girls Christmas dresses for church:

Santa also brought me the softest robe I've ever felt in my life *sigh* and Grisham's new book :).

And don't forget about the puppy boys who got a nice cushy new bed:

And although we certainly enjoyed the gift giving and receiving, we didn't forget about the true spirit of Christmas.  There was much love and gratitude expressed and their was a wonderful peace in our home.  As well as, for me, thoughts of my Savior Jesus Christ and not just his birth, but his life.  And his atonement for me.
I have been given much.

The Prodigal Dog has returned

We used to have these dogs:And they drove me crazy. Meet Marley (black) and BOOGER (white). We got these dogs at the age of three, they came with the names and refused to change. I hated taking them on trips with us. We'd stop at a gas station and let them out on the grassy area to do their business and Booger always, with out fail, would take off on me. She wanted to be back in the safety of the truck. Which always left me torn. Do I really have to call after her so she doesn't get hit by a car running across the parking lot? I'd usually end up just hissing "Booger!" after her. And you know people looked at me. "Who's the crazy lady yelling booger in the gas station parking lot?"
Our problem with these dogs lay mostly with Booger, though Marley followed in her footsteps to be sure. It wasn't that they weren't trained, because they did know better, but they had attitude problems. They knew better, but they just didn't care. They knew that blankets were off limits to them. They had their bed and if they wanted to snuggle they were more than welcome to do it there. But every time we walked into a room, Booger would dart off a blanket, showing 1. she knew that was a big no no, and 2. she didn't care as long as we weren't looking. So you may be thinking "so?", but it wasn't just the blankets. It was the fact that they hated being outside, and thus would go potty inside. Constantly. We couldn't keep up with the messes. And we tried for three years to train these dogs. But I believe it results in the attitude problems. They never messed in the house when we were there, only when we weren't "looking". So they had to go. It was ruining our house. We placed them online "free to a good home". And we meant it. We're not cruel. We wanted them taken care of. We informed every potential family of the issues, not wanting them to take them unless they felt they could handle it. We finally found a couple we felt were good for them, and she being a stay at home mom, felt she could handle the training issues.
So we did our homework, and found a breed of dog we felt fit our preferences and lifestyles. We still wanted a smallish dog, but ones that would train easily and behave well. So we found these cute Pembroke Welsh Corgis:

Meet Strider (black) and Milo (Tan). They are so smart! And I, not being a real "animal person", have found myself talking baby talk to them. Really? They lick my ankle and I don't get shivers. We've done our homework on training and are pushing through with consistency on house training these little piranhas. Any issues with these dogs falls back on our lack of training and we realize this.

But two weeks ago we got a call about Marley. Someone had found her alone in a park, and had watched her for a long time to see if anyone would claim her, but no one was. So they checked her dog tag and found our phone number. We were puzzled. It had been two months, why had the new owners not changed the tag? So we drove out to find her, and in the process were able to get a hold of the new owner. She met us at the park claiming Marley had gotten out and gotten lost. We told her she needed to change the tags so people could call her if it ever happened again.

Last night we got another call about lost Marley. She was wandering in a neighborhood and very scared. Why had her tags still not been changed? Especially after the incident two weeks ago? So we went and claimed her. And brought her home.Our concerns are, where is Booger and is she OK? Because these dogs HATE being outside. They only came outside when we were out. And if they found themselves "locked" out of the house, they sat and whined by the door. They didn't run off. They didn't even want to be out. So we're finding these "lost Marley" issues peculiar, to say the least. She's been put in the gated room with the boys. She's going to follow the same training patterns that they are. I don't care if she's 6 years while they are 4 months. We'll take care of her, but she WILL be trained. And we can only hope that Booger is OK. (Though I probably have to admit that I'm not feeling too upset that she's not the one who kept getting lost. That dog was a Super Freak.)

Pretty in Pink