First Snow

I called in sick Sunday afternoon. I needed a day to recuperate and not wrestle with kids. Evelyn and I caught the cold everyone passed around last week. Everett stayed home from school the 17th with a cold, Phillip, Mia, Evelyn, finally me caught it in succession. As I write today, Justin and Josie are bringing up the rear…or starting a new trend. Once a year Blurb has a 50% sale on their photo books, I am behind making and printing 5 blog books. Each book costs about $160-200 per book so waiting for the sale is imperative. I was able to create two books by Monday afternoon! Hooray! The little girls and I slept until after 10 am then they amused themselves making an Elf house out of cardboard boxes and watching TV. I was thrilled to get something important checked off my to-do list while resting at home. 

The rest of the week seemed squashed and off with the missing Monday. I am stressing about the MCO attire, more than 30% of the singers have not passed their attire check yet. I know…hope…it will work out but all the shortages on the girl’s jumper, socks, and kick shorts and the boy’s tie I am seriously concerned about singers showing up half clothed. Next week I will text/call parents if no updates are made. There was no rehearsal originally scheduled for last week but the conductors felt that everyone needed another practice, so we had a rehearsal. Amelia said Professor Bishop had the older choirs sing the same song or an hour! Well, I hope the kinks are worked out so next week Stewart is impressed. I finally heard that I may not photograph the concert, they only want to use the paid photographer at the Utah and AZ concerts. 

The wish of Josie’s heart finally came true! We woke up on Friday to find a note on the white board that read, “Happy first day of December. The Nelfs brought you and Elf on the Shelf.” Josie was beaming from ear to ear all day. She convinced Evelyn to bring the Elf into their bedroom for a little world. Josie said Melody told her if she wished hard enough that Santa would make her dream come true. What magic sprinkled our home early Friday morning. The girls are completely thrilled. 

Friday we woke up to 2.5 inches of snow! Josie was thrilled it started to snow on our drive home from MCO. She got out her stuff and tramped around in the snow for an hour. The roads were terribly slick, Mia made it safely to school however reported the drive was not fun. Fergus got his first taste of snow. He made us all laugh with his crazy antics in the snow. He had a game of flick the cup into the snow going on! It snowed off and on all day! Recess was a riot of snowman making! I helped make an 8 ft snowman with the 5th graders. So fun! Sophia was very, very excited to come play at our home afterschool on Friday. Everyone enjoyed playing in the snow. Phillip took Evelyn and Sophia to the school to make snowmen, Everett and Josie worked on a snow cave. Justin had a hankering for his mom’s toasted ham sandwiches, I was more than happy to let him make dinner. I did not grocery shop last Saturday or on Monday…we were scraping the proverbial barrel for milk, bread, cream cheese, and the fluffy type of grocery. 

The YW were in charge of the ward Christmas party this year. Amelia helped make jell-o cups Saturday morning while I was out grocery shopping. She went back at 4 to decorate tables and help out with the finishing touches around 4 pm. I scrambled to whip up a dessert, had 4 very ripe bananas, so banana sheet cake it was. The boys helped wrap and get the potatoes baking while I took a short nap. The gym was transformed with a large screen print of the nativity (think 13 feet tall) and a darling corner 34th ward set up for Santa visits. We lucked out and borrowed the set, it was so cute. The YW served dinner of ham, potatoes, and salad. The hallways were blocked off so kids had to play in the cultural hall where the Primary had 6 crafts available. A Santa that looked mysteriously like Brother Finch sauntered into the gym with a bucket for candy canes. Brother Lynes bet Sara $2 to sit on Santa’s lap! She happily scored $2 with that easy bet. Oh how we laughed.