Talent Show

On Feb 14th there is a Primary Activity day and they are doing a talent show. We've been discussing what Ali might do. Here are some of the things she's suggested:

Gymnastics
rolling her R's (like when you speak Spanish)
"filling the room full of thick, thick fog" and then being able to "look through it"
doing a dance while Mom and Dad play the piano
acting out "Thoroughly Modern Millie"
telling jokes
rolling her eyes (I think she means crossing them but...)
reading a poem
painting a picture

We're still not sure which of these she'll do (if any) but I didn't want to forget all of her ideas.

Christmas 2008

We had a very fun and exciting Christmas. This year it was Grandma and Grandpa King's turn to put up with us. We were a little sad that none of my (Sarah) siblings could come with their families but we had a great time! Grandma and Grandpa do a great job making things magical. It took us twice as long to get to their house as usual due to the snow but it didn't dampen anyone's Christmas spirit. We took turns picking Christmas carols and then everyone sang them. I was surprised and impressed at how many carols Ali knew all of the words to. I guess it pays off to start listening to Christmas music in October. Andy was a gem too- sleeping the whole time.

As soon as we arrived, Grandma had everything ready to decorate cookies for Santa. Ali decided that Santa would "probably be freezing" by the time he got to our house so instead of serving him the traditional glass of milk, she decided to serve hot chocolate. She wrote him a note explaining how to make the hot chocolate. It was so cute! We didn't help her with format or spelling. Here is a picture of the note.
Carrying on the King family tradition of new PJ's on Christmas Eve. Here is a picture of Ali with some of her loot. Santa brought her "Congo drums" (aka Bongo drums), Over The Hedge DVD, a CD case for her room and lots of candy. Andy slept through all of the gift opening. He woke up around 10:00 or so and then we started opening his gifts. Here he is with his haul. Santa brought Andy some rattles, new binkis and new bibs. Ali was really cute as she helped open Andy's gifts. She was excited for him to open her gift first. She gave him a rattle and a little brother bib. She even helped him put it on. I love this picture. The look in Ali's eyes says it all.

This moment of bliss didn't last very long, though. A few minutes later, Andy pulled his feeding tube out and we had to rush to the emergency room to get it put back in. As we were looking over our Christmas pictures/videos, we discovered that John inadvertently got Andy pulling the tube out on video. You can see how he manages to get one hand under it and then a few seconds later has it gripped with the other hand and is pulling. You can tell it's hurting him so he moves his hands toward his mouth for comfort which just makes him pull harder. Sad! Here it is (it's not gory, don't worry):



After our brief detour at the ER, we came back, had a beautiful Christmas dinner and eventually got around to opening Andy's presents again. This time it was much more successful. Andy was pretty sore and tired after all of that. He did get in some good playing time with his new toys before he conked out. The good news is that his Christmases will only get better from here, right?

Ali also got an Easy-Bake oven and was so excited when we were finally able to find the right kind of light bulb for her to bake. She made us a "double decker" yellow cake with chocolate frosting and sprinkles. She was so proud!

Here are a few other random pics from Christmas:

John got the extended version of Lord of the Rings on DVD. (John- I will remove this picture from our blog for the small price of a 30 min. back massage. The ball is in your court. Hee Hee Hee) He also got a huge book of BYU football facts and memorabilia. Ali trying on Gma's new snowmobile garb. Ali being silly.

December In Review

December was kind of a crazy month for the Love family. Here are some of the goings on:

Grandma and Grandpa Love came for a visit so they could be here with us during Andrew's second open heart surgery. This was the first time they were able to hold him. Ali was thrilled to have them back! Andrew's second open heart surgery went great! He was in ICU for only three days and was home after six. And then it snowed! Ali was so happy to be able to play in the snow. This is how much snow we had on Sunday, Dec. 14th. They cancelled church and school on Monday because of it. And then it snowed some more: (This is after the third time shoveling. The first two times we totally cleared the walkway. The third time we gave up and just did a small path.) School ended up being canceled for a whole week and no church for two. Luckily we have great neighbors and Ali played with Meredith everyday. Ali and I decided to try making some melted chocolate lollipops. It was fun and we learned some tricks for next year. We forgot to take pictures of the finished products but here are some of us having fun with the leftover chocolate. Chocolate lipstick...mmmmm! We had a great December. I'll add the Christmas pictures at a later date.