Tanner's Aaronic Priesthood Ordination

Yesterday Tanner was ordained with the Aaronic priesthood and it was a wonderful day following a wonderful weekend. 

The weekend started with Nanny and Papa arriving Friday night to stay with us. The kids couldn't sleep because they were so excited to see Nanny and Papa. We hadn't seen them in person since Thanksgiving and it was too exciting to sleep through. 

Aunt Laura had already been visiting and staying with Uncle Joseph so she came over to see them too. We hung out until bedtime. 

Then the next morning, Aunt Laura, Aunt Julieta and I went to high fitness. 

Before the class started Aunt Sarah surprised me and showed up at class. I couldn't believe it. She drove all the way from Kansas with her kids by herself so she could be here for Tanner's ordination. It was so wonderful to see her that I started crying right there at the gym. Such a sweet surprise. 

After class, Aunt Sarah brought her kids over and we all hung out at our house together. 
We took them to see our "fixer upper" house so they could all see it. We are almost ready to list it with a realtor, so its really close to being done. Everyone loved the house and then we came back to our house to hang out some more. 

There were lots of snuggles and so much laughter. It did my heart good to see all the cousins together and to have my sisters and parents here. I love watching Nanny and Papa with the grandkids. Those kids are so lucky!

Then yesterday, Sunday, we went to church an hour early so we could meet with the Bishopric and Tanner could get ordained. We were able to zoom in Grandpa Herb and it was so special. 
Dad got to ordain Tanner and it was a beautiful ordination. 

We are so proud of our sweet Tanner boy. He's such a good kid and we love him so much. 

It was a beautiful day and we are feeling so very blessed!

Papa was able to be part of the ordination along with the first counselor in our bishopric, Bro. Sullivan. 
We were so grateful to have Papa there to participate in the ordination. 

But seriously, look at all this family that came to support Tanner on his big day. He is so loved! 

We feel so very blessed! We love this wonderful family of ours. Because Tanner got ordained before our ward met for sacrament, he then got to participate in serving the sacrament for the first time. This was special because everyone got to see him do this. 

Tanner did a great job passing the sacrament and I literally had tears in my eyes. What a special day. 

After church we all hung out and then we had an early dinner together. 

Oh and after having a delicious roast dinner together, Aunt Sarah gave Tanner the sheet cake she had made for him. She's the best. Sheet cake is Tanner's favorite. Aunt Sarah drove 7 hours Friday to Uncle Joseph's house and then also took the time to make Tanner's favorite cake. He's such a loved boy.

Nanny and Papa left after dinner, but Aunt Sarah and her kids stayed the night because they don't have school today. So the cousins all had a sleepover together, including Clark and Danny. They loved it. It was a great way to end the weekend. 
Monday morning we hung out and Sarah and I made a quick run into "Crumbl" to get some cookies. Then the Allreds had to leave to drive home. 

We enjoyed every minute of this wonderful weekend with our family. We are so proud of our sweet Tanner boy and so glad we got to have so much family there for his ordination and to watch him pass the sacrament for the first time. 

 

1st Sunday of 2021

Today we got to go to church in person for the first Sunday of the year. It was so nice. Today also marks Tanner's first day out of primary and Benson's first Sunday as a "sunbeam". The kids didn't get to go to primary still because of covid, but we still had to mark the occasion with some pictures. 

I really can't believe that Benson is a Sunbeam now. I feel like he was born yesterday but here we are with Benson joining the primary organization as a sunbeam. 

And this sweet boy is now in Young Men's and will be ordained with the Aaronic priesthood in a couple weeks. It seems so crazy. My babies are getting so old. 

We had a wonderful day at church and we feel blessed to be able to attend in-person church, even if it's only twice a month. We always look forward to it and it makes our Sunday so special. 

Happy 1st Sunday of the year!

 

Happy New Year - 2021

Happy New Year! 

Never have we been more ready to ring in a new year. I think we can all agree that 2020 was a crazy year and we are more than happy for it to be over. With that thought in mind, we had a funeral for 2020. RIP 2020!

We all wore our funeral attire and said goodbye to 2020 in the best way possible. 

I sure love these cute kiddos.

 

Our funeral had some yummy funeral foods. 

 I made some gravestone sugar cookies. 

and we had a chocolate Bundt cake

Chris and I were more than happy to say goodbye to 2020. I sure love this guy. 

Our party was pretty low key this year. It was just our family and we ate snacks and played games for a couple hours. Then we watched movies until the kids fell asleep. 
Shockingly, Tanner and Bailey almost stayed awake until midnight. They made it until 11:30 pm. Tucker and Benson passed out around 9:30 pm.

 

It was a wonderful night of family time. We played the games we got for Christmas and laughed a lot together. 

While I can recognize the year was really hard. It was so hard for so many people. We were very blessed that Chris had a job that allowed him to work from home. We never lost our income and for that I'm so grateful. We enjoyed months of church at home by ourselves before we started having virtual church. We loved getting to learn from our kids and hearing their sweet testimonies. 
We were able to visit family all the way in Oregon for almost a month because Chris could work remotely from Oregon as easily as Arkansas. 
We homeschooled for the first time. We have learned a lot and have grown together. We also get to study "Come, Follow Me" every school day together and its been so nice. I love getting to hear my kids explain the scriptures and the gospel. 

While we've all been suffering from anxiety, isolation and frustration, we've also grown closer to each other. We've learned to rely on each other and on our Heavenly Father and Savior. 
While life is beginning to open up and resume, many aspects of life haven't gone back to normal. 
We have hopes for 2021, but they are much more reasonable than they would have previously been. 
We are excited for something hopefully new and different in 2021!

Happy NEW YEAR!

 

Our First Christmas at Home

For the first time ever, we spent Christmas alone. It was strange and quiet but nice. 
We spent Christmas eve having fun and doing some of our favorite Christmas eve traditions. 
I had to get my traditional pj pictures. I know it wont be too much longer until my kids are too big for this but I love it too much to stop right now. 

This one is my favorite! Benson's little face is so sweet in this one. 

We also decorated Christmas cookies. I had baked them the night before so we were all ready. 
The kids love decorating cookies and worked really hard on them. Even Benson worked hard. Okay, maybe he worked hard on eating the icing. But he enjoyed himself. 

Tucker took it the most serious and worked so hard to make his little cookies. It was pretty cute to watch. He did a great job too!

  

 

Dad even helped a little here and there. 

I sure love this girl of mine. 

After cookies we relaxed for a bit. We watched a movie and then we decided to smash our gingerbread houses. This is a favorite Christmas Eve tradition. 

Tucker decided at the last minute not to smash his house. 

The rest of the kids didn't hesitate. 

They smashed their houses gleefully and enjoyed eating them. 

Then the Drake cousins came over for Christmas Eve dinner. 

We had a delicious dinner of tamales and burritos. 

The kids played with their cousins and had so much fun. 

Before they left, we sprinkled reindeer food all over the yard. The reindeer would have to be blind to miss our yard. There was so much glitter and oatmeal in our yard. 

After the cousins left, we had a special delivery from the pajama elves. The kids ripped open the package and dug in. 

After they got their Christmas pajamas on, they gathered around and we read the pajama elves book together. This was Benson's first time to really understand or even listen to the story. He loved it. 

Then we said good-bye to our elves. Benson gave his elf a big hug. He loved getting to touch the elf finally. It was a very tempting month for him. 

Bailey was sad to say by to "Sparkle" but excited to get to hug her. 

Tuck and Tanner each hugged their elves bye too and then we got ready for bed. 

The kids were finally asleep around 9 pm. Their excitement is so fun and we all couldn't wait for Christmas morning. Chris and I made it to bed by 10 pm, which is pretty early. 

Unfortunately, their excitement didn't allow them to sleep very much. They were up at 2:30 am and then again at 5:45 am. So our Christmas day started very early. 

The kids love sorting through their stockings. We could hear their giggling from our bedroom and it was so sweet to wake up to, even if it was a little early. 

Benson loved the scooter that Santa brought him.

After the kids finished with their stockings, they searched for the Christmas pickle. Whoever finds the pickle, gets to open the first present. 

This year Tucker was lucky to find it and he was so thrilled! We spent the next hour opening presents and it was so fun to watch everyone's reactions. 

We gave the kids one big group gift and they loved it. We gave them a new game, an airfort and a disco light ball.

Tanner got legos, a transformer and this new bow. 

This year our sibling gift was special because the kids used their own money to pay for their gifts for each other. We gave each kid $10 as well, but they each decided to spent $10 of their own money on their sibling. It was so sweet and special. I loved watching them pick out their gifts for each other and then getting to watch the reactions as they opened their gifts. 

Benson had Tanner this year and he gave him some Star Wars legos. 

Bailey had Benson. She got him a fishing pole, some hot wheels and a mini skateboard. Benson was so cute and gave her a big hug after he opened his gift. 

Tucker had Bailey. He got her a polly pocket and "Jojo" doll. 

And Tanner and Tucker. Tanner got him some "Minecraft" legos. Tucker loved it. It was so cute. 

Tucker also loved getting a new kindle. 

The kids declared it "THE BEST CHRISTMAS EVER" so I guess it was a success. It felt weird not to be with family for Christmas. Nanny and Papa were going to come here this year, but with COVID cases so high here, they didn't feel comfortable. We totally understand. COVID is the worst. We were sad not to have family and to not get together. But we made the best of it. We had a quiet Christmas day. We did a facetime call with Nanny and Papa and opened their presents together. 

Then later we did the same with Mimi and Grandpa. 

That evening we had our Christmas dinner. This was our first time making Christmas dinner alone. It was a lot of work. But it was delicious and we all enjoyed it. 

So cheers to our first Christmas alone. It was a great, quiet day and we had so much fun!

Merry Christmas!