One of the best things about our Christmas trip in Denver (and our reason for braving the winter roads) was Arwen getting baptized.  It was so great to be there and have so many family members be able to attend to support Arwen and her big day.

Here's my pretty, 8 year old girl on her big day.  Aaron performed the baptism and the confirmation.  My dad conducted and got the font ready.  Aunt Heidi filled in as last minute piano player, and did beautifully.

I gave a talk on baptism and Grandma Carrot gave the talk on the Holy Ghost.  Uncle Micheal played the guitar while my brother Scott, sang a solo.  (Scott also sang one more song for Ar.)  Aunt Bethany and Noah gave prayers.  And we had lots of cousins there to whisper about how pretty Arwen was...and enjoy all the candy we had for a treat afterward.

Goofy looking family, but what a special day we had.  Aaron and I are so proud of the sweet little girl we have.  She tries so hard to make right choices and is such an example to all of us.  And thank you to everyone that came to support Arwen.  We love you all!

Snow

Joshua wasn't a big fan of sledding in the freezing cold.  He went down once I think.  The cold was just too much for him.

Here's the big race.

"Not my problem!" yells Arwen as she leaves Noah's wreckage behind her.

Shoshone Falls on the way home.  Getting here we had crazy crosswinds blowing snow over the road through Wyoming and 30mph speed limits most of the way.  

Arwen braved the cold with me to go out and see the falls while the others hung out in the warm motel.  It was well south of freezing.

We had fun looking at all the frozen waterfalls.

Livin' on the edge.

After another long drive we arrived at home sweet home.  Lulu celebrated by sneaking out of her room and falling asleep on the top step.

Family Visits

Uncle Michael decided he wanted to grow a beard and justified it with a Christmas best beard contest.

This is the best I could come up with.  I shaved it off before Uncle Mike came up because I didn't want to wear it to the Hudson family dinner.

Football in Uncle Matthew's backyard.  Look at that arm on Arwen.  During the official game there were only a few injuries and a little bit of blood.

One of the twins, can't remember their names but I know they both have Anna in them so here's one of the little Anna's. 

This could be the other or the same one, but you get the point, they were cute and there are two of them.

Lulu loved them here she is kissing one of there tiny little feet.  Ah, Annabelle and Luciana.

Here are the great grand kids with Grandma Suzanne.  We had a nice visit over there and the kids had fun playing with a bunch of toys Great Grandma kept over in the corner and eating all her tootsie rolls.

To Denver for Christmas

getting caught up

We drove to Colorado for Christmas in the snow.  It added a few hours to our 2 day drive but it was beautiful.  Beautiful and maddening.  I was driving in the one snow free land looking at all this scenery that I'd love to stop and take a picture of but there was no way to pull over without getting stuck.

Free day at Denver Art Museum had some catches...like that it was not free.  So we poked around the grounds and...

...found Lulu's twin that was nice enough to give her a ride.

The kids really wanted this massive armoire to bring home for a bunk bed.  That's be fun, and easy to put a lock on.  (The kids have been seeking into my bead again lately)

You might recognize the artwork from a celestial seasonings box.  Noah, Arwen, and I took a tour of the factory while Joshua, Larkin, and Sarah sampled all the herbal teas.  They let us hang out in the mint room for a while and it was intense, they separate it from the rest of the herbs as the mint would contaminate everything.  They were processing lemon grass the day we went and it smelled awesome.

After the Art Museum we tried the Denver Mint which gives free tours, we'll unless you have a camera bag.  Oh well we had as much fun as we could and a freezing day in Denver.

Joshua loves video games...or any games for that matter.  He'll sit on the computer for hours and play chess against it :)  He really likes to play angry birds on my iPod.  Mostly, he likes to watch me play.  The other day he was watching me and I squashed all the pigs with the angry birds and the pigs snorted.  So I snorted.  Josh looked at me with awe and astonishment on his face and said, "I didn't know you spoke pig!"  I just get cooler by the minute!