Christmas Jig

Here is our family dance for your enjoyment. Cross-eyed Joe is our adopted son.

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1406741031

pictures (yes, again...)

Jason is so cute with Adelyn, I just had to post some recent pictures. These ones are of them posing with her new adorable hat and gloves (not for Memphis weather, but for Christmas in Idaho).This is a picture from our "sleepover" this past weekend. Ever since we've been married, Jason and I love to have "sleepovers" where we take our mattress off of our bed, put it on the floor of the living room, watch a movie, and spend the night. This was the first time we invited Addie to join us. It was even better with the lights of the Christmas tree!

Addie loves to help Dad study!

Her new outfit (thanks, Korin!) and playtime in the saucer-thingamajig. I have the best family!

(If you haven't read our blog lately, make sure you read the last post by Jason, it's pretty wacky...)

A Smoky Fillmore Christmas

Christmas is almost here, and what a merry one it will be! I haven't seen ANY of my side of the family for about 4 months (which isn't too long, but it'll be great to see them all). I also have been waiting for this kind of a break for awhile, optometry school is pretty busy and it'll be great to get away from it for a little while, without having homework in the back of my mind.

I Love Lamp.

Even more than Lamp I love my family, it's always great when we're all together--we always have tons of fun together! Like every year we're together for a holiday we'll watch a couple flics, play some board games, all the brothers will quote lines from Will Ferrell and laugh till we can't anymore, and reminisce about when we were younger. The wives will have 'craft' time, and the brothers will hit up a little Halo 3 no doubt. But this Christmas will be a little different from the rest. I can sum it up in three words: Football, Food, and Babies. Let me explain.

1) Football: This will be the first time on Christmas that the brother's get together and have a little brawl fest with a ball (it's about time!). Hopefully this becomes a tradition.

(Don't worry Brea, we'll play with flags!)

2) Food: Gem's been going to Culinary Art school, so we'll have delicious food 24 hours a day! (Thanks for the hook-up in advance, Gem.)

3) Babies: It will be Adelyn and Chaela's first Christmas--and it will definitely be a big change from past years, and lots of fun. (I'm excited for Addie to finally meet her Uncle Jake!)

I love this holiday, and being close to family. I would like to give a Hollah and wish everyone a Merry Christmas and safe journey's to where'ere you may go. Watch for bears this time of year, they are the #1 threat to America.

Beloved Christmas Traditions

First, I would like to start off by saying that I was greatly mistaken in my last Santa post. It turns out that I either fabricated the notion that we didn't "do Santa" at my house because my parents liked to receive the credit, or that I grossly misunderstood a joke they made when I asked them why. Either way, I have never known my parents to be selfish in any way and I definitely did NOT mean to imply they were. I stand corrected. Sorry, Mom and Dad. It turns out that they decided to opt-out on Santa for two very different reasons, which bring me to the subject of this post--fun Christmas traditions.

As said previously, I never cared that we didn't believe in Santa. I don't feel that I have missed out on the fun or spirit of Christmas. In fact, at our house we had a very different Christmas tradition, one which I intend to carry on with a portion of our gifts. Santa was not a part of our house because my parents (a) didn't want to lie to their children and (b) they liked us to guess what was in each gift. Instead of writing gifts were from them, my parents would write that it was from some person loosely associated with the gift inside, thus enabling us to guess what it was. For example, one year my brother received a tie and the present was from the inventor of the guillotine. Random, I know. It's a very fun game, one in which we could hardly ever guess what the presents were because they would make the associations so bizarre that it was nearly impossible.

Another favorite Christmas tradition at my house is the annual Christmas Eve nativity puppet show. My mom made hand puppets (I wonder how old they are now) of the main characters in the story of Christ's birth (Mary & Joseph, wise men, shepherds, the angel, etc) and we would act out the birth of Christ along with a children's song called The Nativity Song. (If you haven't heard it, check it out here, it's a great song and not well known.) Me and my brothers and sisters would all crowd behind the couch or a blanket, fight over who got to be the star and angel (because that person was the one who got to shout out "Hosanna!" in a loud and crazy voice) and do our play. Now that we've all grown up and my parents have grandchildren, it makes it even more fun because there are many more bodies to squeeze behind the couch--even Jason has joined in the Hutchinson Christmas Puppet Show! I can't wait to get my own puppets!

Our advent calendar was always one of our favorite things to do around Christmastime. It was a felt Christmas tree that hung on the wall, with little hooks on it. Every day leading up to Christmas we would take turns hanging up an ornament on the tree. I remember running to see it every morning, and it was so exciting when it was my turn! Each year we had to rotate who got to hang up the angel on the top of the tree on Christmas Eve because, for some reason, that was the best one. It made our anticipation of the big day grow and grow!

On Christmas Eve we have a little family program. My dad usually reads us a new children's Christmas story from a picture book, we do the puppet show, and then we read the story of the birth of Christ from the Bible. We also were allowed to open one present. I love Christmas Eve because it's wonderful to be with family and remember the birth of our Savior. I love this time of year!

Hi again! I'm 5 months old!

Hello everybody, it's me again, Addie. Guess what? I'm now 5 months old! When I woke up Monday morning and my mom told me how old I was, I could hardly believe it. It wasn't until she took me to the doctor that afternoon and the doctor said it, that I really believed my mom. Parents make up stuff sometimes, so you can't always believe everything they say. For example, my mom told me last week that rice cereal was good. Well, I certainly didn't think so! I kept spitting it out and she hasn't given it to me since. Good thing, too.

Well, it's been a fun month of growing. Now I can stick my whole foot in my mouth. It tastes a lot better than rice cereal.

Oh, here is a random picture. My mom asked me to put it on here to show off her fireplace. She certainly has a long way to go as far as decorating skills! At least we have a cat, though. (Oh wait, it's not a real cat. See? That's another thing my parents tricked me with.)

My pacifier is my favorite toy. I always prefer it to anything else. I'm extremely good at getting it in my mouth now all by myself.

To commemorate being 5 months old I was given some Christmas socks. They're cute, don't you think?

I'm still small, though. The doctor told my mom that I'm between the 5th and 10th percentile for weight, height, and head circumference. I hope I spelled that right, that's a big word for a 5 month old. I only weigh 12.3 pounds and am 24 inches long. Tall and skinny like my dad. But it's ok, I'm still a happy girl!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas (even though it's still 60 degrees in Memphis...)

We finally put up our Christmas tree last night. It's wonderful to have a festive living room!

When Jason and I were dating and talking about getting married, I kid you not, one of our biggest disagreements was whether or not to do Santa. The Hutchinsons never did Santa while growing up. I always thought it was because my parents didn't want to lie to us, but over Thanksgiving I got their whole story. It was mostly because they did all the work for Christmas and they wanted the credit! They said lying to their kids also played a part. Well, because of that, Santa is not a big deal to me. We were still very excited on Christmas Eve, still had fun opening our presents bright and early, and we still enjoyed the Santa stories...it's just that, well, he isn't real. But to Jason, Santa is MAGICAL. I guess I just don't understand. I gave in and we've decided that we'll do Santa, so I'll see how this goes. What are your thoughts? Did any of you not do Santa either, or was my family crazy?

This is a picture of me and my Dad on my first Christmas Eve. I hope to capture a similar picture of Jason and Addie!