December was just lovely. It flew by really fast but it wasn’t chaotic and out of control with to much going on. It was perfect.
We made treats, did puzzles, listened to music, looked at lights, drank hot chocolate, did toys for tots and the giving tree, wrapped presents, watched Christmas movies, went to Christmas parties, celebrated with family and friends. It was an awesome month.
Allison had another wrestling match. It was an away meet so we didn’t go but someone recorded it for us. Spoiler alert-she wins! I finally figured out how to combine her videos so we can watch all her matches for a meet in one video.
Ryan and I went on a brief overnight date to downtown Kansas City. He gets a free weekend night as a perk through his Hilton credit card so we usually use it in December. We went with our friends Dani and RJ. We booked a few reservations at some of the Christmas pop up places they have for appetizers, dinner, and dessert and had a nice relaxing night with lots of visiting.
Christmas was on a Wednesday this year. The kids finished school the Friday before and Ryan and I had our last day of work on Monday. Then we had the next week off to celebrate Christmas, New Years and enjoy being lazy, and getting things done around the house that we wanted to. Ryan built some shelves for all the decorations in our storage room. I haven’t taken down all the Christmas decorations yet so I will wait to take a picture when its all packed away and finished. He installed a new security system around our house. I was in my purging our house of things that we don’t need anymore and customizing/organizing a few areas. I did Ryan and my closet, the pantry, and the storage room- which like I said is now just waiting on the Christmas decorations. We played games with the kids and hung out. There is a touch of a sad note for me this year because it will be the last Christmas before our kids start leaving the house and we start tip toeing into a new era in our lives. That is another reason I really wanted to soak everything in as much as possible.
I am just putting a little ‘good job’ note in here for me. On December 12, 2024 I got all the way caught up on my blog. I have been several months behind at any given point for the last year or two. Woohoo!
For part of our church Christmas party this year the youth were asked to do some kind of performance. One of the leaders came up with a shadow nativity. They basically act out the life of Christ to a song called Halleluiah behind a screen with a bright light so you can just see their shadows. It is about a 5 minute long song, so it is short but very sweet and touching. Emilee was willing to do it since no one could actually see her and there were no speaking parts. She was actually put in charge of turning the lights on and off when they needed it and thought that was perfect. Allison is living at the school gym for wrestling right now so she didn’t have time. Matthew said, “No thanks.” The leader in charge texted me and asked if I thought Matthew would be able to participate. I told her he would love to and let Matthew know that he was voluntold to do it. They went to the first practice and when they came home I anticipated a little push back from Matthew for making him do it. Instead I got a play by play of the rehearsal as he speed acted/sang through the song and all his parts. The reason the leader had asked for him specifically is because she wanted him to play the adult Jesus because he is older and able to be more mature and reverent than other boys that were participating. Matthew ate that up and was all in. It reminded me of the time I signed him up for a summer play of The Greatest Showman. He was not happy and protested the whole way to the first practice. Then I didn’t hear much protesting after that and he said it was going pretty well. When we went to the performance he was literally swinging from the ceiling on rope ribbons while he sang his little heart out. He definitely has a drama side to him, he just doesn’t let it out very often. It was cute to see him be excited about it. Campbell caught wind of it and said she was coming to watch and she told Ramey and he came to watch. Matt did a great job and Emilee nailed the lights.
I recorded it…I must have been holding my phone upside down though because it is sideways and I can’t get it to straighten. Add it to my list of mom fails. 🤦♀️ Just turn your head to the side while you watch it.
Shorty after we had Matthew and were living in Wichita, Ryan surprised me with a piano for my birthday. This is the awesome piano I have had for the last 18 years. It has been a great piano and I have spent hundreds and hundreds of hours playing it. We moved it to four different houses with us and every time the movers told us it was the heaviest piano they had ever moved.
Many good memories playing songs on this piano.❤
When we were building our new house, I decided that at some point I wanted to get a baby grand piano and planned for a spot for it in our living room. Nay Sayers-like my husband (and specific friends he asked because he knew they would agree with him) said it wouldn’t fit or it would look weird. I ignored them because I knew they were wrong and it would look beautiful. I didn’t know for sure when I would get one but it was on the list. I went and looked at pianos a few times and met a nice guy named Blair at one of the piano stores that kept an eye out for what I was looking for and would send me some options every now and then. A few weeks ago he sent me one that really caught my eye so Ryan and I went over to look at it. It was lovely and I liked it but I didn’t get it. I did however, see another one while I was there that I really liked and I ended up getting it instead. We bought it and a few days later it was delivered and was my early Christmas present. AND I LOVE IT!! It fits perfectly and doesn’t look weird at all. It is so pretty and all my kids and Ryan have said they will start playing again or want to learn at least one song. Will they?? …probably not. But it is so pretty they wish they could play it. 😂🎶 I can play it! And I love to play it! John Cazier helped me break it in and my sister and mom over Thanksgiving too. I’m excited to play it for years like I did my last one.
I have been so excited to decorate for Christmas this year! I wanted to put everything up early but since I was hosting Thanksgiving I thought I should keep my Thanksgiving stuff up at least until then. I did put my outside lights up and my tree without decorations on it early. It has been two years since we have had our decorations up. I forgot what some of them were! Two years ago we had just moved into our rental and only had room for a few things. Last year we moved in to our new house two days before Christmas so I put our tree up and that was about it. This year is was a little like Christmas opening up all the boxes to remember what I had. It was very fun to get it all up. The kids and Ryan were excited too. It feels nice and Christmassy around here now. We were in our last house for 7 years so I had a spot for everything. I have a few things that don’t work anymore or some areas that I don’t have the right decoration but I will tweak it a little each year and eventually it will all pull together. My goal this year was to get a bigger tree. We went from 7 1/2 feet to 12 feet. It is big! I love a beautiful tree but don’t love the setting up. I might get a little tired of setting it up every year, but I think it fills the space pretty good. I also got the garland for the stairs. Allison had a really cute idea to put ribbon on the kitchen cupboard doors with a bow so it looks like presents. I thought it turned out pretty cute! Ryan and I attempted to do the lights ourselves this year. He even crawled up on the roof for our tall front porch. The smaller eve next to it had a 30 foot drop off the one side so we decided it wasn’t worth the risk of our lives and ability to move all our limbs. I ordered a grinch and stuck him in the yard to make it look like he was stealing our lights, then we didn’t have to put them on that eve. Next year we need to get some bigger lights I think…and see about finding someone else to install them.
It has been a few years since my entire family has been together. Last Christmas we decided that we would all get together for Thanksgiving. We were debating on having it at Sherri’s house or ours. After a little discussion, Sherri said that she would, “rather host a holiday that wasn’t about food because its not really her thing and it might not live up to everyone’s expectations.” It would have been just fine at Sherri’s but that tipped the scale to have it at our house. So the plan was set for 5 families, 6 couples, 11 adults (we will count Matthew as an adult now), 12 kids, and one baby, for a grand total of 24 people to gather together for a Thanksgiving Holiday Family Reunion. Matthew moved to the workout room, the girls moved to the basement living room and that left a room for each married couple. A few kids slept with their parents in their rooms but most of the kids slept in the basement living room and had a big sleep over together each night.
The Cazier’s arrived Sunday before Thanksgiving. My parents and the French’s arrived on Monday evening, and my brother and his family came Wednesday evening. Ryan and I had to work Monday and Tuesday so my family entertained themselves during the day. They played lots of games and ping pong. DeAnna organized a baptism temple trip for everyone that wanted to go on Tuesday. That was a good experience for the cousins that got to go together.
The rest of the week we spent hanging out and having fun together. We did our traditional white elephant party. The kids had one and then the adults had one. They were both lots of fun. DeAnna and Emilee ended up with matching white elephants. Allison was the amazing entertainer of all the cousins. She organized several group games and contests. She prepared the giant living room sleep over each night. One of her biggest hits was a dance party in our basement. She strung lights along the walls in our cave (that is our unfinished area under the garage. Someday it will be an epic entertaining room.) and then made each person an invitation and person ticket. Once the doors opened they had to get a secret password from Grandpa Jones and then they could give the password to get into the dance and dance their hearts out. It was a pretty cool party.
Thanksgiving morning several us were getting ready for our Thanksgiving feast. Sherri recruited Allison and Tyler to help her make an obstacle course for anyone that wanted to do it. They did it relay style so when one person finished an obstacle the next person would go until a team one. When they were all obstacled out anyone that wanted to run in the family Turkey Trot ran a mile route that Sherri had mapped out through out neighborhood. The Cazier boys finished in a pretty impressive time. Tyler, Nathan and Michael can have a nice track or cross country career in their future if they want to! It was a VERY cold day so I was impressed with any of them that went outside to participate in the outdoor activities.
Everyone had lots of Thanksgiving food. It was a delicious feast. After we ate a lot of us took our post meal nap and then woke up and ate pie for dessert. It was a fun day. The whole week was fun. We went to a few movies, put puzzles together, played lots of games, visited and enjoyed each others company. My mom helped me put up my Christmas tree too. We were up until about 1am on Friday morning. Everyone was leaving the next day so we were playing until we were exhausted. We all went to bed healthy but between then and morning almost half of us came down with a stomach bug. We were so close to a sick free get together. It was brief but violent and by the time it was done a little more than half of us had it. A little bit of a sour note to end on but I had a great week and I am glad we could all get together. I think everyone else thought so too.
We were lucky to get two of these gems in the White Elephant party.
Of course we updated our family picture since we were all together. It has been maybe 5 or 6 years since we have done that. We are blessed with a great family. I wish we were all closer and could see each other more often but I am grateful for the times we get to get together.
My dad does a good job at taking lots of pictures when we get together. He was the official photographer for Thanksgiving. Aubry and KJ participated in the kid white elephant but there pictures were accidentally videos so I couldn’t get them to upload. Aubry got a cheeseburger mug and KJ got a toothbrush ornament.
Allison decided to do wrestling again this year. In October she went to the middle school after school and helped there for a few weeks. It helped her get a little extra conditioning in too. Then in November her high school season started. It is a lot of hard work. I think she will do good at it though if she wants to. She made varsity. Campbell is on varsity too and helps us get Allison to and from practices a lot which is awesome. It is fun to watch her wrestle, even though she tries to get us not to come most of the time. We still attend and love watching her. She won one of her three matches at her first meet.
Starting in June and continuing with one person in our family each month until September we have a birthday to celebrate. Emilee wraps up our families birthdays each year in November. This year was her 12th birthday. It was on a Sunday which is not the greatest day to have a birthday. She thought of ways to celebrate all week to get the most out of it. She had friends come play, got an early birthday present, had a family over on Sunday for dinner. We made individual pizza’s on the grill and had a double stacked cookie cake to blow out her candles. She got some Palm Pals and parts to her Harry Potter Lego castle for her gifts. It took us a while but when we were all home on a week night we went to K-Macho’s for another birthday dinner. We love having Emilee in our family and it was fun to celebrate her!
This year our Halloween ended up looking a little different than it has for the last 10 years. The McDonalds kids and ours all made individual plans with their friends so we didn’t get together like we usually do. We still made pizza and home made root beer for people to eat as they came and went to get ready or stop in on the way to their party. Our houses in our new neighborhood are spread out pretty far so we didn’t have any trick or treaters.
Matthew dress up as Dr Duffensmirch from Phineas and Ferb. Campbell was Harry the platypus. They went to a party with a group of their friends from school. They actually went trick or treating for a little bit too.
Allison and her friends assembled matching outfits and were gangster minions together. They went trick or treating in Grandpa Terry’s neighborhood and then spent the night at our house.
Emilee was a witch this year. She went trick or treating with Reese and a few other girls. They picked a neighborhood that is known for handing out full size candy bars and they were not disappointed. They found a few haunted houses people were doing as they trick or treated too.
Ryan rediscovered his Joe Dirt costume from almost two decades ago and proudly wore it to work. He gave himself a goatee to go with the costume.
The night of Halloween Ryan and I shuttled the girls around were they needed to go and then enjoyed a quite night at home. We did go to a Halloween party with Dani and RJ Halloween weekend. RJ is a pilot so he provided Ryan with an outfit to borrow and Dani and I got First Officer costumes to go with them. I think we were a hit. Ryan LOVED being a pilot too.
As I mentioned in a previous post, this was Matt’s last season with his competitive team. They started playing tournaments on the weekends right after Labor Day in September. He has been on this team since 4th grade. There have been lots of changes over the years but at the end of this season there were three boys, plus Matt, that were on the team when he started. Coach Jimmy was the head coach and there were several others that were awesome coaches. Coach Kent, Coach Uhl, Coach Robby. Ryan helped coach most of those years too. If he wasn’t actively coaching he filled in and was helping in some way. He had a hard time just sitting in the stands and watching. There were some tricky times but overall it was a great experience and I am really glad that Matthew was able to be a part of this team and make good friends. The boys and their families on the team were all good kids, good people. That makes a big difference when you are spending the whole weekend together for months at a time during Spring, Summer and Fall baseball. We traveled a few times and had good times and memories from that as well. We went to Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Gulf Shores. I have posted many pictures from his baseball over the years and that was another blessing from being on this team. There were several parents that great photography skills and they took so many pictures and shared them with everyone. I wouldn’t have very good pictures if it wasn’t for them. Matt had his arm back in top form for this last season. He had the highest batting average on the team most of the time. He hit triples and doubles pretty often and was robbed of a home run or two by inches several times. He had good plays at short stop. Watching the boys play and read each other from playing with each other for years was a lot of fun. I will miss it next Summer when it is time for baseball season to start. We all will.
At the end of the season we had one more get together at a restaurant to say good bye to everyone and give appreciation to the coaches and recognition to the boys for their hard work. It was a fun night. One of the parents made each of the boys a poster of them in their uniform for their rooms. There was a slide show of all the boys, and lots of pictures on the tables to look at while we visited and ate dinner. I am sure we will run into them and keep in touch over the years but it is an end of an era for sure. I have really come to love baseball and appreciate it. I love a quite baseball field in the morning with the sound of the team warming up and the sun shining on the grass.
Here are some pictures from the season.
Coach Jimmy and the original kids he started with. Matt, Aiden, Jake, and CamWe had lots of meals together between games.Lots of gorgeous sunrises and sunsets.Campbell had a tournament at the same place we were and came over when she was done.This is the day Matthew wore the wrong uniform. He called and told me he didn’t look like the other kids.This is the core group that we spent our weekends with.
Here are some cool action shots, thanks to our photography parents.
Turning a double play.
Running the bases, trying to catch Ramey.
Catching the pop fly.
Getting the out.
Making it look good. 🙂
This is getting on the field in position first.
Getting runs in. His speed was top notch this season too.
Beating the runner.
Crushing it.
And…stealing bases.
For one of the games we were so far ahead of the other team, the coach let everyone pick the position they wanted to try for a few innings. Matt went with pitching.
