our christmas vacation so far

I think this is going to be a long post so bear with me.

We have been in Utah for the last week or so and have been having the best time. Our trip started out eventful. I hate when a trip does. I had checked our seats the night before to make sure nothing had changed and we still had three seats together on our long 4 hour flight west. We did. When we got to the airport, we no longer did. Our gate agent was less then helpful and seriously couldn't have cared less that we were separated on our flight. His big help to us was to ask passengers to switch with us once we got on the plane. Thanks gate agent, I'm pretty sure I couldn't have come up with that on our own. Since Quinn has quite a few followers on Twitter, I told him to tweet about it once we got through security. I have heard  stories of people with substantial followings getting good results when they tweet about problems they have with a company. I kid you not, 5 minutes after he tweeted we had a customer service agent with Delta asking for our confirmation number to help us out. We made our short flight to our connection city and by the time we landed our problem had been solved. 3 seats together. Many other passengers were not so lucky. There were a lot of angry passengers at the gate.  Who knew Twitter would save our trip?

We arrived safe and sound and spent the next day close to home so the kids could recuperate from a day without naps. Next up, I was able to help my mom and Dana host a bridal shower for Jiao, my cousin's fiancee. See here for more details. It was so much fun.

Cameron, Ashley and baby Liam flew in next and now everyone in the family was together. We all got to go see A Christmas Carol and really get in the Christmas spirit.

The adult tree

 The kid tree

Christmas adorableness

My cousin Mackenzie was nice enough to host 45 Arnett's at her house for a Christmas Eve celebration.

 The kids table.

 Stacey, Sydnee and Ashley

 Baby Ty's first Christmas Eve

 Mark, Mallory and Sydnee

 Beckham and Mark

 Nativity fun

 Asher was a wiseman with an offering of potato chips that he munched on during the Nativity.

Beckham visited with Santa. Asher saw Santa's three times this year and I still haven't managed to get a picture of them together.

After the party we returned home to open our Christmas Eve present, jammies of course. 

Here is my dad with all three of his grandsons born this year and interestingly enough all three of them bear part of his name. 

Larry Dee Arnett

babies left to right: Liam Dee Arnett

                            Ty Larry Arnett

                                             Beckham Arnett DelHoyo

Christmas morning the adults were up even before the kids to shower and dress so we could make it to church on time. We had to wake the kids up around 7 am so they could have time to see all the goodies that Santa had brought them, then it was off to church. Our whole family was able to attend church together.

A pre-church candy cane.

Beckham loved what Santa brought him

 Everyone

 All the grandkids

Our family photo

 Asher modeling Mallory's shoes.

 Christmas Beckham

 Asher loving the Dora book from Mark and Mal Pal.

 All of Jaxson's BYU football dreams came true.

 Is it Christmas without crying?

 Stacey's new car dreams came true too!

Later that day we had a delicious prime rib dinner and stuffed ourselves until we couldn't move. 

The day after Christmas we were able to attend Jantzen and Jiao's wedding. I always love a wedding and can't help but cry. And who doesn't love a love story that brings two people together from other sides of the world. 

mini Christmas

We had a mini-Christmas last night. We opened all of our gifts from the DelHoyo side of the family. I wanted to give the kids a few days to enjoy the gifts before we left for Utah.

 Beckham's first Christmas gift.

 What was inside. He loves it (if he can ever get it away from Asher)

 Asher couldn't wait to tear into them.

 Modeling the contents.

 I can't even begin to tell you how excited he was for these. He went to bed kicking and screaming for the trucks. This morning we heard him outside our bedroom door playing with them. It was 6:30 am.

A few morning shots of the kids. 

Quinn and I got these from his parents. They were requested for Quinn. At first, I thought he was crazy, but they are delightful. I haven't taken them off yet. Every one needs a pair. 

We also received a beautiful antique looking photo of the SLC temple from the Lances. It is just gorgeous and I can't wait to find a place for it in our home.

Thank you to Grandma and Grandpa DelHoyo and the Lances for all of the wonderful gifts!

the sickness

Quinn is sick. Really Sick. I've never seen him like this before. He has pretty much been like the picture below for the last 4 days.

He is running a pretty high temperature pretty much constantly. He has a horrible cough and terrible body aches. I've asked him several time if he wanted to go to the doctor. Each time he would say he was fine. I finally convinced him to go to Urgent Care this morning. I'm so glad I did. The Dr. said he had an infection in his ear/throat and eye. She said he was a day or two away from full blown pneumonia.  She gave him some heavy duty antibiotics and told him to stay hydrated. He is going to stay home from work again tomorrow and hopefully 24 hours after antibiotics he will finally be feeling better!

train ride to santa

Even though Quinn is down and out sick, he rallied and we headed out to Durham last night for a train ride to Santa.

 Quinn and Asher enjoyed  corn dogs and I had a delicious funnel cake. Beckham enjoyed his corn puffs!

 Asher is showing off his loot. I'm a sucker, what can I say? He made out with a toy train and a rudolph light stick.

 Getting ready for the train.

  Family photo. The train took off and then you stop half way where Santa Clause and Mrs. Clause are there. They go around and say hi to everyone and hand out coloring books. Asher was a little shy with Santa but loved it nonetheless. Then on the train ride back Rudolph made an appearance dashing through the woods. All the kids loved it.

Asher and I ended the night with a trip to the ER. He and I were playing around and he fell on our brick hearth. Luckily, the Dr. decided that permabond would work fine instead of a couple of stitches. We watched a lot of Yo Gabba Gabba and got lots of stickers while we waited. Asher was brave and this morning it doesn't even look that bad.