White Christmas...and white New Years...pretty much 2 weeks of white...

WARNING: This post contains a MASSIVE amount of pictures!

We drove to Utah to spend the holidays with Eric's family and had a blast, even though I froze body parts I didn't know I had. I totally went outside to build a giant leaning snowman and we didn't get a picture! I promise I was out in the snow for a solid 15 minutes! We played rockband with the fam for hours in Nate's theater and I found out that I need to work on my breath control although in my defense it IS hard to hold a note when you're laughing so hard! Nate says he might act like me after he's knocked back a few drinks! I promise none of us drink but I DO hear that more than you'd think! We had a Bishop family sledding and soup party where I did NOT go outside but sat by the big window in the warm building happilly watching everyone else freeze to death. That doesn't even LOOK fun! But they said they did so, to each his own. We had a fun gingerbread decorating party on Christmas eve and made a birthday cake for Jesus, cookies for Santa and food for the reindeer. Then we did our annual Christmas Day brunch with the family complete with the traditional ebelskeivers or however you spell it. Delicious. We played the day away and quickly learned that we are not smart enough to play "upwords". The day after Christmas we got to go to the Salt Lake Temple with the whole entire family for the very first time! It was so beautiful and I can see why it took them 40 years to build it. It was a great day and so awesome that our whole family could be there! We had Kensie's 3rd birthday party in the style of Mermaids. We invited all the girlie cousins over to have a scavenger hunt where we ended up underwater in the ocean to decorate mermaid princess crowns. (We decorated the theater to look like underwater with different colored ribbon to look like water and clear balloons to look like bubbles. then we turned on the finding nemo living aquarium on the projector so it felt like we were actually underwater! so fun!) I decorated mermaid cupcakes to look like each girl. Then we took our kids to play at a playplace and then Eric and I headed out for a fun night with some old friends at Creighton and Michelle's wedding reception to decorate their car in a very tasteful manner! and mimi's cafe afterward where we were probably (ok definitely) more obnoxious than is allowed in most public areas. Oh well. Sorry to everyone who might have been within a 5 mile radius at the time! Eric's sister Julie threw and awesome New year's eve Fondue party. So yummy! then we had a fun game tournament from which my TOES are still SORE from standing on them for like 10 minutes! We'll definitely have to repeat that one soon. It was really fun! We got to go visit all the grandparents and it was fun to see the kids spend time with them. Especially Kensie because she would just walk up and kiss and hug them. She wasn't shy at all and I think that really made them happy. We spent many a night watching movies and many a day playing Wii in the theater and countless hours in the playhouse downstairs. It was nice spending time in Dad and Mom's nice big, beautiful house. Culture shock coming back home to our 900 sq. ft. townhouse! We'll need some time to re-adjust but at least it's warmer here!

Our first and might I add sorry attempt at a snowman!

Kensie the snow bunny

Charlie takes after his mama. He doesn't really like the snow.

Eric rollin' a giant snow ball and Bryce trying to make it up the hill in 2 feet of snow.

Gingerbread party

we snitched and I LOVE that cute Haley in the background!

Charlie's version of decorating a gingerbread house

This game was way harder than it looked!

I just think charlie is cute in his ozark hat

Santa brought everyone new shoes!

I love Charlie's chubby bum

Santa also brought laptops and headphones!

I LOVE seeing happy babies!

Sir Bryce got a knight dress up set from mom and dad

P.S. thanks Aunt Becca for the cute monkey jammies!

All decked out for brunch

I'm not entirely sure what is going on in this picture but I think Charlie's face is CLASSIC!

I thought it was funny they all had their laptops

Family Temple day

Visiting Nana. I'm pretty sure she has no idea who we are but we brought candy so she liked us!

Eric's camera happy

Kensie's party. she loves her Rachel friend as she calls her

Cute girlie cousins

I was going to make one big mermaid cake but Kensie threw a diva fit and got individual mini cakes. They didn't turn out how I wanted them but still cute!

A quick lasagna lunch during the party

All the girlies with their mermaid princess crowns on

Kensie got a fancy nancy tutu and pretend point shoes from Nana and Grandpa Bishop
She LOVES them. She even slept in them a couple of nights!

Grandma Great gave the kids COOL glasses. Bryce thinks he's hardcore.

Visiting with Grandma Great

Kensie's new BFF Great Aunt Joy

All I have to do is photoshop in Dad's head and we'd have 4 generations of cute Bishop Boys

Even Grandpa Bishop had to smile at Kensie's sassy charms

Giving loves to grandma Bishop without being prompted

Fun Times!

S. O. T. Dub-yah

Eric got to come to the show last night and I think he enjoyed himself. He told me he cried several times, so I'll take that as a good sign. I felt like last night was one of our better shows and they fixed my costume so it's a lot more secure and comfortable so I can just focus on performing rather than keeping my clothes on! (my wrap fell off on stage on opening night!) So we took this picture of me and Eric on the mountains that I painted.

This is my friend Jolie who plays Mary in my cast. She's pretty much THE coolest girl ever. She's super talented and super gorgeous. I just LOVE her!Oh, and her hair doesn't always look like that! This was after ACT II so she had to be aged. Luckily she took off her wrinkles before this pic. She shudders every time she looks in the mirror after aging herself! hahaha

We're kindred spirits. 'Nuf said.

Christmas! (and oh yeah, thanksgiving too...)

That's pretty much how I've felt all this year. I'm ALL about Christmas this year. Thanksgiving, not so much. Normally I would make myself wait until after Thanksgiving for the Christmas music and decor but I couldn't wait this year! Maybe because the show is so focused on Christ's birth and we've been doing it since October? I don't know. But I love it and nobody else is in my house 24/7 to judge me so I'm enjoying every minute of our fun Christmas Decorations! Anyway, so some elves in our ward found out we didn't have a Tree this year and they brought one over Sunday Night after the kids were asleep. We told them that Santa's elves dropped it off in the night and they were SO excited to see it! We decorated it for family home evening last night and we also made gingerBear cookies decorated like our family. We watched Polar Express together and had a Christmas sing-along! I felt like I had to get all of our fun family time in last night because I've got a show every night this week and also 2 shows on Saturday so I'm trying hard not to be a total slacker mom. It's really draining but also very fulfilling so I feel like it's worth the sacrifice for another week but I'm very much looking forward to having my family back! So here's the pics from Thanksgiving and then some of our Christmas family home evening last night.

Our festive thanksgiving decor

The Thankful Box
Everyone wrote something they were thankful for and put it in the box

Our cute place Settings
Cortney made the cute little Pilgrim Hats!

Best Thanksgiving EVER!
Eric has been waiting his whole life to have a reason to have a Chick- fil- A platter
I absolutely despise Turkey so we got a platter with assorted sauces for our Thanksgiving Dinner!

This is our beautiful live Christmas Tree! We couldn't have picked a better tree for ourselves and it smells delicious!

I decided to hang all of my glass ornaments since half of them have already been shattered this year.
I LOVE how it turned out!

Kensie liked helping roll out the dough

This is Mommy and Daddy GingerBear.
The kids also wanted to make the grandparents. So we also have a Grandpa and Nana Bear in the favorite colors and a Grandpa and Grandma Bear. Note the scar on Grandpa Holden Bear's knee from his bear Knee Surgery! his dough leg fell off and we had to piece it back together so it was fitting for him! haha
Also I tried to make Brown for our hair but mostly it looks like baby poop yellow?...i don't know

Kensie Bear

I just love his fat little hand holding that paint brush!

Bryce's Master piece

Probably the cutest Boy EVER!

Good thing it's edible paint!

Funny Story: While we were eating our creations, Bryce said he wanted Grandpa Bishop and Kensie wanted Grandma Holden. So then they started playing with them and making them talk to each other. The conversation between the bears turned to dancing. Grandma Holden GingerBear started dancing and twirling. Grandpa Bishop Bear then said " NO, NO let me show you how to do it Grandma" Then shaking his little Bear tail, "I like to move it move it!" Then the 2 bears danced happily long into the night.

BLAH-g!

I have been SO busy with Savior of the World stuff and pre-school, people getting sick, watching other people's kids, and all of the other fun mom stuff I get to do, blog's taken a back seat. you're over it. i guess I say that a lot...you're over that too! ha...anyway Eric is coming to the show on Wed, at which point I will get some pictures in costume and maybe even one with me AND Eric! we'll see. on a random side note, who has tried the dark chocolate covered altoids?? Best. thing. ever.