Getting in the Spirit

Christmas fun is in full-swing around here even though we're using our cheap, fake tree this year.  I think it looks a little Charlie Brownish.  Spencer thinks it's the most beautiful tree in the world.

One of our neighboring stakes puts on an amazing nativity display every year.  In addition to collecting and displaying hundreds of nativity sets, they have musical performances, rooms decorated with scenes from Christ's life with live actors, and a fun children's room.  Every room is decorated to the rafters.  I can't imagine the number of hours that goes into such a production and it is a wonderful service to our community.  I wish I had taken more pictures just to show you how awesome it is.

Thanksgiving Tradition

Since Thanksgiving day isn't a very relaxing day for us anymore, we decided to continue our tradition of heading to the beach for a couple of days after Thanksgiving.  This was our fourth year staying in Lincoln City Thanksgiving weekend.  We are SO blessed to have a lovely, free beach house to stay in occasionally.  Thank you Darwin and Debbie!

We did a little black Friday shopping at the outlet mall, but spent most of the two days we were there playing games and watching tv.  It was heavenly.  We also went to a lighthouse we hadn't seen before.  It was a neat one, but stopping there was a spontaneous decision and I didn't have my camera. 

On Saturday evening we went down to the beach to see some tide pools, but the tide didn't get low enough for us to see a whole lot.  It turned out to be a gorgeous evening though and we saw the most beautiful sunset.  Pictures really don't do it justice.  I'm so thankful for my beautiful life and the two guys that fill our home with love.

Turkeython

Uberthons hosted their 2nd annual Turkeython on Thanksgiving day.  It was their final race of the season, so Alan and his dad worked REALLY hard to make it a good race.  It paid off with 1,200 runners - one of their biggest races ever!  They had all kinds of fun things going on: a choir performance, warm-ups with a personal trainer, a costume contest, pictures with Santa, great music, an AWESOME announcer named Alicia, a yummy fruit bar, and free massages at the end. 

It's hard for me to help much at the races because someone has to take car of Spencer.  I don't think we'd be able to find a babysitter at 4 am on Saturdays!  But, Spencer and I did go to this race because we were both running in it.  I ran my first race in over a year and Spencer and I both ran the kid's race.  It's always fun to run bigger races - the excitement in the atmosphere is contagious.  I probably overdid it a little with my knee, but it was worth it.  It felt so good to be able to run outside again.  Spencer had to wait around for a long time for his race, but he did great too. 

My handsome boys:

The photographers - sisters Teri and Debbie:

Alan mans the timing computer from inside their trailer now.  It keeps the equipment dry and cuts down on set-up time.  Alicia was a huge help with this race and really was a great announcer.  Too bad she lives in Utah or she'd be hired!

Spencer didn't want to see Santa until he found out that Santa had a treat for all the kids who sat on his lap.  He wasn't very happy about it and didn't say a word to Santa, but he did sit there. :)

The race took up a big chunk of our Thanksgiving, but we did have a nice dinner with Alan's parents, Alicia and Grandma and Grandpa Larsen in the evening.  Afterward, Darwin took a well-deserved nap, Alan posted race pictures, Spencer played on Alicia's ipad, and the girls read and watched a cheesy, Hallmark Christmas movie.  It was a good Thanksgiving.  I have an incredible amount of things to be grateful for but right now, I'm mostly thankful that I'll have a husband again for a couple of months while Uberthons takes a winter break.