December goodness

Catch up of fun stuff from December...

City Creek Center

We like to go on little field trips on Friday afternoons in December. First up was City Creek, where we looked at the candy displays in the Macy's windows, the giant Christmas tree, and the other Christmas displays inside the mall.

Writing letters to Santa

The Grand America

We went to the Grand America with our cousins (altogether there are 8 girls, no boys!) This is probably my favorite December field trip. It's inside so you don't have to worry too much about kids complaining about being cold. The window displays are so fun and the toy store is my kids' favorite!

Mailing letters to Santa

I didn't think we would get responses because we mailed our letters so late this year, but on Christmas Eve there were letters in our mailbox for Tempe, Helena, and Juno!

St. Lucia girls

Jason and I were co-chairs with another couple for our neighborhood Christmas party this year. We had a Scandinavian Christmas brunch and it was a lot of work! As part of the program, we invited any girls between 5-18 to participate in the St. Lucia procession. We had about 20 girls participate and they were so darling and sweet, walking in to the gym with the beautiful music playing and distributing authentic Swedish buns. It was a really fun experience and made our party so special!

Bethlehem dinner

This is a new tradition I want to do every year. On the Monday before Christmas, we had a very special dinner where we ate foods similar to those that Jesus would have eaten. We turned out all the lights and ate by candlelight and oil lamp and then read the Christmas story from Luke by the fire and sang Christmas carols. It was so beautiful!

I served fish cooked simply in oil with salt and pepper, lemon, flatbread, olive oil (one with fresh rosemary, one with pomegranate vinegar), and dried apricots and figs.

Salt Lake City library

We've never been to the Salt Lake City library, but I've heard it's cool, so we went there a few days after Christmas. We had fun exploring the Crystal Cave and the Grandmother's Attic, riding the elevators up and down, and exploring outside. The roof was closed because of snow and ice but we will definitely go back in the spring when we can have a picnic on the roof.

Through the Magic Door

Last night our local library system had a big children's event called "Through the Magic Door".

It was a fun fantasy-themed party after the library closed for the night. They do a big event like this every six months or so. The last one we went to was a Space activity.

The library was divided up into different sections: The Shire, Fairyland, Down the Rabbit Hole, and a princesses and knights section (I didn't see the official name for that one).

Here's Helena kicking over the dwarves in Dwarf Bowling in the Shire (she isn't a good bowler)

Tempe and Helena playing "minute to win it" games in the Shire (cup stacking, cereal box puzzles, and bean sorting)

"Crazy Croquet" in the Alice in Wonderland section. They also had some really good storytellers!

 The croquet balls were really hedgehogs!!

Tempe and Helena both made shields and crowns. We made one for Juno, too!