December 2016
Dear Family,
Few months rival in activities as
December does! From the first weekend
holiday decorating to the last weekend take down, it was BUSY and full of
fun. Various service projects were
sprinkled in throughout the month with opportunities to share the love of the
Savior.
Early in the month we hosted the
Syracuse Arts Guild’s Christmas brunch as usual, even though Curt has not been
involved in the group for several years, the older women and their husbands
still want to meet at our place. They
are all such good humble people and it gives us the push to set up Christmas.
We attended the Larry H. Miller
FREE sing-a-long at the Vivint Center (old Delta Center) where we sang our
hearts out with a million other people to a live orchestra. The Miller family passes out song books, a
donut and a few free tickets to events throughout the year. This year’s songs seemed more spiritual and
Mrs. Miller thanked everyone for coming out to “Family Night”. Having the Windhorsts and most of the DeGraws
make it a fun event. Beckham and McCoy
are a little too young to enjoy the evening.
Maybe next year. The night was a
success when the camera’s spotlighted Isaac with Eliza’s large chicken puppet
she had brought (why???) on his hand, and the rest of the kids singing with
their Santa hats on. Its been a goal to
get on the score screen for the last four years and we finally did it!!!
Our only Christmas concert was
Jane’s singing class at the Syracuse Community Center. There is nothing better than preschoolers
putting on a program. Jane has
impeccable rhythm!
Grandma Flora hosted a Christmas
brunch on the 17th. It was so
GOOD to see many of the cousins and their families. We ate delicious food, sang songs, heard a
story and got to hug each one. Thank you
Flora for that inspired get-to-gether.
Curt and I celebrated our 36th
wedding anniversary. Since ‘It’s a
Wonderful Life’ is Curt’s favorite all-time movie, which must be watched
several times in December, we attended the production at CentrePoint Legacy Theater
and went out to dinner. It was very good
but hard to stay awake that late. That
is weird to say that. Too bad we didn’t
think about going to HawaiiJ
On Andrew’s birthday (35 yr.
old!!!!), December 22, our entire family, 24 of us went to stay at Bear
Lake. Andrew, Abby and Marie were in
charge of activities. We started off
with an Amazing Race Challenge. The race
for first place was on! Cars were
divided up and each group given a starting envelope with clues of where to
go. When we got to where we guessed the
clue sent us, and if we were right, we got to open the next envelop giving us
instructions on what to do at that spot – all activities had to be documented
by pictures or video. For the next few
hours we were either at a playground sliding backwards, face first, and then
both, giving an ‘under-dog’ to each player and hanging from monkey bars for 60
seconds. Other locations had us playing
hacky sack, or going to a clothing store and singing Rudolph the Red Nosed
Reindeer. At the bookstore we had to
research how many chapters the book “Alice in Wonderland” had, name one of the
books written by the President Elect of the United States, and find the meaning
of everyone’s name on the team. It was
tricky to find 10 strangers who would be willing to text happy birthday to
Andrew’s cell number but we got it done!
We finally arrived in Bear Lake
just before the snow fell. There was
room for everyone and Amy, April and Alex had planned great and easy
meals. Scones, soup, lasagna, and
Hawaiian Haystacks were favorites. We
rented snow mobiles one day, went sledding, played a million games, had
devotionals, used the guest lodge for an all-out Nerf gun war, made cardstock
Christmas stockings for Santa to fill, the adults played a hilarious true
‘White Elephant’ game instead of bought gifts this year and some of us braved
the out-door hot tub for Truth/Dare. Willow
and Andrew bought and wrapped 30 small presents for the kids to play Right/Left
games. The youngest ones were SO
distressed to see the present they were originally handed being passed around
and around. They were a bit confused. It was hilarious. Needless to say we all had a good time with
plenty to keep us busy. We drove home
late Christmas morning after church through two white-knuckle snow storms and
felt grateful to have made it home safely.
Monday morning we gathered once
again for a new family picture in the snow out on Antelope Island. Clark was our patient photographer. We have high hopes this picture will last
several years. April & Dan are
leaving this week for California and the military and there is a good possibility
that Alex and Miranda will continue schooling in Missouri this Spring. We had to grab the opportunity before it was
lost.
On Thursday David, Megumi and the
kids came to play. I invited Isaac,
Megan and Lydia to liven up the house while they were here. We drove to a park in Brigham City to go
sledding then on to the steamy Crystal Hot Springs in Honeyville. We stayed until we were past the prune
stage. Lillian had an intense craving
for some In-And-Out burgers and fries, so we took a detour to Riverdale on the
way home. The next morning we slept in,
packed lunches and headed up to the Hardware Ranch for a ride through the wild
elk herd. We arrived barely ahead of the
huge crowd that showed up with the same idea.
It was a beautiful day and I thoroughly enjoyed the company and the
day. I delivered Amy’s kids home happy
yet tired. Thank you Meg & Dave!
Friday night was a going-a-way
party for April. Willow and Miranda came
back to Syracuse for a wild night.
Facials, cooking, and laughing were the choice of activities. I am so very grateful they enjoy each other’s
company.
Saturday…..New Year’s Eve…..Curt
and I got into bed at 7:00….fell asleep around 8:30 and didn’t wake up until
6:00 the next morning. The only one
awake at 12:00 am was Dan. He ate his
shrimp ring and a bottle of Martinelli’s by himself. Oh to be young again! (NOT!) It was a grand time with grand memories to
store away.
Love to you all,
Aunt Susan & Uncle Curt
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