Family

All of my siblings are in Utah for Christmas (Danny from Hawaii, Nathan on his way to Phoenix, Benjamin from Pennsylvania, and Sherri from California), and we've tried to spend as much time with everyone as possible. Twelve adults and fifteen grandkids. We've been busy the last few days. For Christmas, Grandma sewed all the grandsons a tool apron/belt (and gave them tools) and all the granddaughters adorable aprons (and gave them mixing bowl and spoons). Gendertyping aside, everyone looked adorable. Thanks for all the time and effort, Mom! We've been sledding together (no pics, bummer), bowling, out-to-eat, visited the blacklight mini-golf and bounce house fun house called Kangaroo Zoo, in-to-eat (great meals, Mom!), gathered for a whole-family photo shoot (kids were troopers!), and exchanged fun Christmas gifts. It's all been wonderful!

Christmas bliss.

Christmas hasn't been this much fun since I was young. The magic was back. Santa ate the snack that was left for him and his reindeer nibbled on the carrots -- leaving a few crumbs in the yard as they pulled the sleigh away. Kate was pleased that Santa brought her presents even though she tore the legs off our Santa door hangar. In fact, he brought her exactly what she asked for -- The Jungle Book. James was thrilled with his light saber and airplane addition to his GeoTrax train. Robert preferred to sleep in, but caught up on a bit of the action later in the morning.

The children were nestled all snug in their beds . . .

. . . but Santa was up half the night.

"I'll see what I can do."

Feliz Navidad

James and Kate performed wonderfully in their preschool program a couple of weeks ago. They loved being on stage and talking into the microphone. The kids, costumes, songs, and dancing were adorable! I wish our pictures had turned out better, but you can certainly get the idea of how cute everything was. The best part was to see how much fun the preparation and performance was for the kids.

Advance

Many of you know Ben used to do some work with Pres. Clinton during college. He'd fly off to cool (Israel, Macedonia, Italy, Bangladesh) and not-so-cool (Detroit in the winter, Albany, Park City - which is cool, but not when you live 20 minutes away) cities to help "advance" logistics for any given scheduled event (speech, art preservation campaign, meetings with a head of state, refugee camp visit).

Well, his "Advance" involvement has not ended. Every once in a while, the Clinton people tap into their Western resources and Ben helps out here and there, usually in Utah. Back in October, Senator Clinton came to SLC for a fundraising event for Obama and Ben led the Advance Team. More accurately, Ben was the Advance Team. Normally there are a number of people involved -- someone for the press, someone for the location, someone for the motorcade, someone for the hotel arrangement, etc. Staffing is lean on the campaign trail, so for this event Ben was The Man and spent the day traveling with Hillary and briefing her prior to her several stops. By all accounts (including a shout-out in a personal letter from Senator Clinton to Mayor Becker), he did a great job. Hopefully, with Hillary's new and exciting position, he will find himself in one of those "cool" cities once again.

Deck the Halls

We've been enjoying a very fun (and busy!) Christmas season. Our activities so far have included: reading and learning about the Christmas story, decorating the tree, frosting cookies, "helping" shovel the driveway after the first snow storm of the season, visiting the Festival of Trees, watching an adorable preschool Christmas program with singing and dancing (post to come, stay tuned), listening to lots of Christmas children's books, visiting Zoo Lights at the Hogle Zoo, going to a live nativity, and watching a couple of the classic Christmas movies like Rudolph and Frosty. And there are still more than 10 days until Christmas. Kate is hoping Santa will bring her The Jungle Book DVD and James wants more track for his train.

Good morning, Kate.