Six Flags

The Monday after Christmas my parents took us to Six Flags. Since the Mildensteins have season passes they had discount tickets so my parents decided that since they ditched us and my brother Johnathan when took everyone to SeaWorld and Disneyland days after Kennadee was born for my brother David's boot camp graduation, that they would take us to Six Flags to make up for it! It was really fun.
    I went on lots of big rides with my sister and nieces and brother and parents and since Russell couldn't do the big rides for fear of losing another contact he took Kennadee and went to the kids section. They rode on rides and played at the playground and had a blast.
    Since we divided up a lot we didn't get many pictures but here are some that Russell took when he was taking Kennadee around.
                                           .
                                                                                                              

Kennadee not too thrilled to ride this one

                                          

  Kennadee loved the Carousel she went on it like 5 times in a row.

The Tea Cups were really fun Patience and Diana went together, Me and Nate went together, Kennadee, Gabe, and Hannah went together. Kennadee didn't like going with Gabe because he spun the cup to fast and she got scared.

Six Flags had an "ice skating rink" made of this special plastic that you can skate on but since they didn't have a plastic Zamboni it was really hard to skate with all the scratches from the skates so I went around a couple times and called it good. Kennadee put on the skates and made it to the edge of the rink and then decided it would be too hard so she went and watched from the sidelines.

       After we were done at Six Flags we went out to Chuy's for a late dinner. It was delicious!! If you ever go there try their chips that they bring to the table and ask for Ranch to dip it in. So good!! And if you like spicy everyone else really liked the Jalepeno Ranch.

Christmas Day 2010

     Russell wanted to have Christmas morning be just the three of us this year. We woke up at 8:30 and went down to open presents. Kennadee had a blast opening her stocking. She love love loves her Jessie Doll that Santa brought her. He also brought her Toy Story 3 on DVD and some other fun things.

                       

 

      After we did stockings I made breakfast. It wasn't our traditional breakfast casserole or even cinnamon rolls since I have been on my no sugar/no carbs diet so we had sausage and eggs and Kennadee had cereal. It was good though.

   After breakfast we opened our presents. Kennadee got way too spoiled this year even though I tried not to. She even ended up throwing a fit about helping me with something so we made her wait until later in the day to open her big present. Russell got me an MP3 player to use when I go walking. I am really excited about it. I got Russell a computer chair and (Santa) brought him Inception on Blu-ray (Awesome movie) & a yo-yo which he really really wanted and has played with non stop ever since.

                    

  

    After lunch we finally let Kennadee open her big present. It was a new bike. She was so excited! We discovered that the reason she couldn't ride her other bike is that she is way to tall for it. When we put her on this one she was actually able to pedal correctly. Whew! I felt so bad that her old bike was too small.

                      

 

   The rest of the day was spent lounging around doing nothing. It was actually pretty nice. At around 6:30 we decided that we were too lazy to cook so Russell called around and found a Chinese restaurant that was open so we headed out there. When we walked in the place smelled like rotten cabbage and most everything on the menu said it was spicy (I'm allergic) so we decided to see if we could find somewhere else to eat. We looked and looked and decided that if we made it to IHOP before we found anything we would just eat there. So when IHOP came into view we knew that would be our destination. It was pretty crowded but since there were only three of us we got seated pretty quickly. We had an awesome waitress and the food wasn't too bad either. Then we went home and watched Muppet Christmas Carol and then we went to bed. It was a pretty good day.

Christmas Eve 2010

     We got to host Christmas Eve at our house this year. Since Russell had his radiation over Thanksgiving he didn't get to have his Turkey Dinner so we decided to do it for Christmas Eve instead. We had 17 people at our house for dinner. It was crowded but it was fun. I didn't take pictures of the dinner, which I should have because it was beautiful if I do say so myself!!

      After dinner we had our traditional program, Luke 2, Night before Christmas, The Presidency Messages from the Friend, New Era, & Ensign. They were really great, we sang a Christmas song (we should have sang more) and then we opened our traditional gift of Pajamas.
      Diana's kids didn't think they were going to get pajamas so it was a fun surprise for them when Aaron opened a big box addressed to him that was full of individually wrapped presents for them. Kennadee & Hannah got matching Gingerbread nightgowns and they were super excited about that.

                          

                   

     

Sea World Christmas 2010

The Monday before Christmas we took Russell's Mom, Lara, & Adrianna to SeaWorld. They were having their Holiday in the Park so we thought it would be fun to take them since they had never been. They had Polar Express in 4D which is a condensed version of the movie in 3D and then they spray you with water and make your chair vibrate and blow wind on you so it feels like you are in it. Kennadee is a huge fan of Polar Express it is her all time favorite Christmas movie so we thought she would absolutely love it but I made the mistake of saying "we're going to go down" (meaning it was going to feel like we were going down since it was in 3D) When the train goes down the big hill so the entire time she thought that we were actually going to fall down so she was really scared. When we got out of the movie she said "I don't think I will watch Polar Express for the rest of the Christmas Season" And she didn't! I felt so bad. At the end of the day she did say she wanted to go back and try the movie again but it was too late. Maybe next year!
     Lara and I convinced my Mother-in-law to ride on the roller coasters with us she was scared but I think she had fun in the end. Russell and I rode a roller coaster and he lost his contact! Oops!! Which meant that roller coaster ride cost us 187.00 Grr!!
  They had all sorts of fun shows, Shamu, A Christmas Sesame Street play, and our favorite show Azul. We went to all of them. They also had Christmas Lights and lots of fun decorations. Overall we had a pretty good time!!

              

           

                         

            

           

                     

                              

Church Christmas Party

We had our Christmas Party at church the Friday before Christmas. They had desserts (I didn't have a single one) And then we sang Christmas songs and a few people sang solos/duets/group songs for us and all the kids got up and sang for us as well. And after that there was a visit from Santa. It was a pretty fun party.

 Kids singing

 My Sister and her family singing Carol of the Bells

 Kennadee enjoying a ton of treats!

 Kennadee sitting on Santa's lap

 My Mom, Diana, Rhonda, and I on Santa's lap (poor guy! LOL)

 Dad on Santa's Lap

 The Missionaries even joined in the fun!