Grandma's Cookie Bake!

So when my mom was little my great grandma would do a cookie bake every year around Christmas. My mom would always say those were some of her fondest christmas memories, so when us kids were born my grandma decided that she would continue the tradition. So every year we'd head over to grandmas and start baking cookies!! We would bake and decorate for hours! And grandma didn't ever get mad at us for the crazy mess we would make. I remember my cousin Crystal and I sitting at that table for hours just trying to make the most beautiful cookies. One of the best things we would get to do was grandma would trace our hand onto dough and we would get to decorate a cookie of our own hand. Then after hours of decorating we'd all get ready for bed and head downstairs where we would watch christmas movies all night long. It was so much fun! Even though the family has gotten very large my grandma still does a cookie bake every year! Though very few still sleep over it is such a blast to all get together, hang out and eat cookies! I asked my grandma this year about how many cookies she has to make, and her reply was about 300! WOW! What a lot of work she goes to! But I'm so glad she does, Mae has been able to go the last couple of years and I love that she is getting those same traditions that I cherish from my childhood, and even though she doesn't really get it yet I know she'll love to look back at the pictures and see what great times those traditions are!

Kangaroo Zoo!

Mae's new favorite thing to do is the Kangaroo Zoo! When we pull in and she sees where were at she starts shouting hurray! It is so cute! And the entire time we're there she is so happy and enthusiastic! Its so fun to see her having such a great time!

Snow globe Collection

When I was a little girl I was fascinated with Snow globes so for Christmas one year, I was probably about 5, my grandma got me my very own snow globe. I was so excited by it that it became a tradition. Every year I get a new snow globe to add to the Collection. A few other people have added to the collection as well so I am up to 22 snow globes. Here they are all displayed for Christmas this year!

Yes these are Snow globe salt & pepper shakers!

Here is the entire collectionMy mother likes to endulge my husband in his obsession with the Denver Broncos so he got his own snow globe for Christmas 2 years ago.

Salem Pond

This year instead of Temple Square with the Nelson Family we decided to go to Salem Pond. Wow it was so beautiful! Its this large pond and somehow they have lights floating out on the water! The water is so calm that the lights reflect on the surface. It was so pretty!

Black Friday

My aunt Kim is very enthusiastic about black friday! None of us really had anything specific we needed but its tradition! So thanksgiving night me and Mae headed over to my moms to sleep over because my Dad was going to be home and I didn't want to have to wake Mae up to leave at 4 in the morning. We got up at 4AM and headed out the door at 4:15 to go pick up my aunt and grandma. Out into the madness we headed! We went to Shopko first off and found quite a few good little treasures, and we thought it was pretty crazy there, but Target had them beat! Wow was it crazy!

So the only thing that I thought I would really like to get was at Walgreens, they had some little prelit christmas trees in vases and they were buy one get one free so they were $10 a piece and I thought they would look really cute on my porch! Well we had pretty much already filled the buick boat which is quite an accomplishment but I just wanted these 2 little trees and Walgreens was about to open so we headed over. We walked in the door at 7:10 and the table with the sign for the trees was empty. I was a little disapointed but oh well! One of those things that I didn't really need, but Tasha was on a mission! She was determined to find me some trees! Shes stomping through the store saying shes going to steal them from someones hand or take the decorated ones off the counters! I was just laughing saying it didn't matter but them Kim stopped some on the top shelf and this is where things get pretty funny, Tasha and my Grandma hoisted Kim onto there shoulders and kim starts throwing the boxes down at me. Tashas only requested was that we not hit her with them, what is the first thing I do after she says this? I accidently drop one on her head! At this point I'm laughing so hard that I'm no help at all, and them a very nice gentleman comes by and asks if he can get them down for us. And after looking at them my grandma and aunt Kim both decided that they wanted some to. So we hauled 6 4 ft tall christmas trees out to the already full buick. Quite a sight to see!

Here is Tasha with a 2 trees in here lap, so she is squished against the window.

I'm in the passenger seat looking at my mom over the 2 trees we have wedged inbetween us!

Here is a shot of the backseat, as you can see they have a tree behind them in the window and 2 trees in their laps! Ha ha what a blast!