Presley can tie her shoes!

I don't have a picture but Presley has been trying to tie her shoes for school but she wanted to learn how to do it all by herself.  We sat to try and she kept getting stuck on the the loops.  I've explained it to her many, many times but when I turned on a YouTube video she picked it up immediately.  Kids these days...all they need is YouTube.  She was so excited.  She had me send everyone the video.  Drew made her tie his shoes and it was much easier with his shoe strings.  

New Living Room Furniture

After 16 years in our home, I was ready for a change in the living room.  I asked Preston for new living room furniture and to paint as my Christmas.  

I had wanted a long console table for the wall by Zack's room and we found the perfect one we both loved and bought it about a week before Christmas.  

While at that store Preston fell in love with this unique lamp and so I went back the next day with Ty and we bought it for him.  

Shawna moved to Chandler and we offered her our old living room set and so we took it down on the 27th.  Since we had the trailer we stopped at the furniture store we had spent hours at a couple of years ago looking for furniture and was able to buy a new leather power reclining couch and 2 swivel recliners and get those home before a snowstorm came through.  We knew we had a short amount of time and we found ones we liked in stock and the whole process didn't even take 45 minutes!

The next afternoon we found enough paint in our garage from previous paint jobs to be able to paint the green walls we wanted to.  

We have since moved some wall decorations and repurposed them but we are waiting on a couple of canvas pictures to arrive so I'll have to update later.

We have plans to put a shelf under the canvases and add some color.  We will see how it goes.  

While in the valley we spent several hours visiting Garrett's family and getting to meet Rikae's new son, Abram.  He's already 7 months and little Cruz was so excited to have new friends to play with.  I thought he was trying to play with Presley but he's like her and likes to play with the older kids so he was trying to get Drew to play with him.  :)

The boys took turns riding on Emmett's little dirt bike and then Garrett fired up his motorcycle for Preston to take a spin but before Preston did he gave Presley a quick ride and she loved it.  

Some of our repurposing work

Aydon mission life so far

He's loving all the HUGE slices of pizza!  :)

His favorite Ice Cream stop in Poughkeepsie on the first snowfall

Elder Raesbeck in Union City, New Jersey (4th companion)

Union City, New Jersey

MTC Companion Elder McAleavy (1st companion)

Elder Cardiff showing Aydon and his companion sleeping on way to the Tempel

Aydon Mexico City Temple Grounds

Arriving to New York

MTC District

District 4C

Elder Cardiff & Aydon & their companions the day they left for New Jersey

President & Sister Rolfe, his Mission President.

Sept Zone Conference 

Fall leaves

Poughkeepsie, New York

Zone Conference October

Aydon & Elder Bishop (3rd companion-2nd trainer)

Elder Swain and their roommates golfing on his last Pday (2nd companion-1st trainer)

Elder Bishop & Aydon at their ward trunk or treat (spiderman & a mobster)

Elder Swain & their roommates hiking Wappinger Falls, NY

 

Christmas 2022

The kids asked if we were going to Disney for Christmas again but since we just came off a Disney cruise that was decorated for Christmas I said that was our Disney Christmas this year.  I did miss not having to buy presents this year though.  

Winslow passes around a couple of these Santa decorations and we received it from Ara Leonards family.  It was a good day to received it...poor Presley had been sick and it was a nice pick me up for her.  You can see how red her little cheeks are...just like Santa's.    

We haven't been able to do the Santa train for years...there's always a conflicting activity going on.  Since Ty was working I decided to take Presley and Zack wanted to go but I said no and then Drew ended up coming and now I feel terrible because Zack's not in the picture.  Preston was due home anytime and I tried calling and letting him know where we were but he missed my message so was already home by the time he saw it and he wasn't in it either.  

Fisbee brought a gingerbread village for us to do one weekend.  The house was falling apart when we opened it so we just used hot glue to put them together.  Zack decided to make a graham cracker house instead.  

Fisbee was up to his ol shenanigans again this year.  Here's my favorite.  

We hosted the Christmas Eve party and John wanted Navajo Tacos so we changed it up this year.  I made the beans and then helped mom flip frybread.  This was the best frybread too!  

I was so happy because Preston had a smokin trip home and made it right when everyone arrived so he was home for the party.  

Granny started out with a stocking game.  She had 12 things to do with Christmas in a stocking and you couldn't look or pull it out and had to guess as many of the 12 items were.  I think Preston or John won this game.  

Mom made a money game that was so fun for the kids!  They rolled ping pong balls into different sized boxes and tubes.  The center toilet paper tube was $20, the cake mix boxes were $5 and the the larger boxes on the end were $1.  We let Presley & John Luke rolld 6 balls but the older kids only did 4 balls each.  After everyone had a turn they got to try again until they were out of money.  Luke ended up winning $45!  Presley won $14 I believe.  

Granny let them be banker and count out money.  

Mom put a lot of effort into prepping all these canvases.  She had traced Christmas shapes on them so the kids could quickly do a craft.  

Then we played the paper plate game.  Presley won the coveted Snickers yard and started crying when Ty won the Giant SpiderMan coloring book...luckily for both of them they were wiling to trade to get something they both wanted.  

Granny made them matching Pete the Cat hats and gave them books.

Good to see Jace & Jalen.

We were trying to hang out until Aydon called us but he called right as mom & dad (the last ones to leave) were backing out.  Since we knew Preston would go right back to work we had planned on opening presents and we decided to do it while Aydon was able to call us.  It was so nice to "still have him there" as were doing Christmas.  

Dad made it long enough to see what Santa brought...Presley got a bunch of squish balls like she asked for and a PlayDoh Ice Cream machine.  She loved both of them so much.  She got a new Bluey toy and a Luisa with a donkey toy that Tucker chewed up both pieces before she even got to play with it.  She got a stretchy spiderman and a spiderman cup.  

The boys all got new cups and bullets to go with the new guns they got from Christmas.

Drew got a Connect4 shots game.  You have to bounce the ball on the table and make it in.  We had lots of fun playing that Christmas.

Aydon made Jambalaya for him and his companion for Christmas.  His companion was sick on Christmas, poor guy.  Aydon's companion's parents sent him a lifesaver book (that used to be one of my favorite gifts as a little girl) and a little Lego set that Aydon had already put together when we talked on Monday.  

Our family Christmas photo while we talked with Aydon.  

Presley doing her heart hands

Aydon showing his gift exchange present...his own LSU Joe Burreaux jersey.  Him & Ty can be twins now!  

Chirstmas on the Sabbath was so nice!  I loved it.  We waited until Preston was home the next night to have our Christmas dinner and since his parents were in the valley with Garrett they were able to have dinner with us.  I cooked a different ham than our normal Black Forest Ham but it was just as tasty.  Vickey had Drew help her grill some ribs.  We ate well.  

 I'm so thankful that even though I broke down for a second while saying the prayer before Christmas Eve dinner, we were able to have a nice Christmas and he was able to be apart of it too.