Bart & Rachel Wiltbank Family: December 2008

Sunday, December 28, 2008

Jaxten's Birthday 12/26/08

Poor Jaxten. He kind of gets jipped when it comes to his Birthday. I went into labor with him 8 years ago on Christmas day. We drove to Showlow in the middle of a blizzard. That's why his middle name is Snow. We wanted some kind of Christmas, Winter connection. I know, weird but I tell him that it means "Christmas Snow" the most purest of all Snows. We tell him it is to remind him to live a pure life. He didn't come on Christmas but was born at 12:30 a.m. The Nurse's name was "Noel" and the Anaesthesiologist had a big fluffy white beard and smelled like ham. The Nurse's put him in a red stocking and placed a Santa hat on his head. It was a Christmas Story we will tell him every year and share with his children someday. It was our "Special Delivery"

Anyways, when his Birthday comes there is no cupcakes at School, everyone is tired of parties and money has run out. Mom is just plan worn out to plan anything else. He usually ends up with a little money to run and pick out his own presents. He did remember that Grandpa Bill gives money for birthdays so he kept asking Macie and Brayden "How much money did Grandpa give you?" He was excited for that. We were suppose to have his Baptism the Saturday after Christmas and that even got postponed. We will have it on the 3rd of January. I know I should plan more but it's a hard one to get through. He just gets everything in a lump sum. Poor Kid!

We gave him a card with his own money and Granny came through and reminded Grandpa Bill about his Birthday. We made a cake and Aunt Leah and Uncle Sherod came down that evening. It did make it seem like it was a real birthday. He wants to go to the movies and celebrate when he is baptized. He is still little so we can sort of get away with it but not for long!! We are so thankful for our little guy and we are so glad we have him. He still lets us love on him and gives us hugs and kisses. We still need them even if he is a big 8 year old. We hope the hugs and kisses never stop but sitting on our laps to do it is getting a little hard, he is getting so big!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Christmas with the Wiltbank's

Christmas was super this year! We spent the 23rd at Rusty and Amie's house. Every year we celebrate a different countries traditions. We have done this from the time we were little kids in the Bigelow home. We started with Italy and have gone pretty much around the World. If anyone is going some where special we usually host that as the country or place. We have done the States also. This year we did Italy again. I'm sure we have done that a few times. It was delicious. We ate and ate. It was too good!! We had fun choosing gift from a basket. We played lots of silly games. We missed a few family members but were glad that Shaelyn and Brian could make it all the way from South Carolina, they live a couple of hours from where Landon is right now in N.C. It is also my Dad's birthday so it is one big Celebration. I love getting together with my family. It's big, loud and fun! Just one thing is missing, Mom. Things will never be the same without her. We sure do miss her especially this time of the year. She made Christmas special.
Christmas Eve was spent with the Wiltbank's at Kami and Erick's home. They have a nice big home and we can spread out. Kami always is willing to share her home. We enjoyed eating Hawaiian haystacks and Root beer floats. We had fun with our White Elephant exchange. We've found out how to help the kids not have hurt feelings with the gift exchange...give bonafide JUNK! No out of pocket money, true junk from the house. It was fun to see what people were willing to get rid of. We decided to give stuff that wasn't even worthy of a yard sale and no one walks away wanting anything. It was great fun. Grandpa Bill shared a spiritual thought of Christ which set the Christmas mood right.
The kids had a hard time getting in bed. Excitement was to much. We woke to Santa coming. He did a good job and I think everyone was pleased. Macie and Jaxten both got guitars, I think we will now have a Wiltbank band. Brayden was happy with his own T.V. to play new Xbox games on and so are we if you know what I mean! The noise stays in his bedroom.
The greatest and best Christmas gift came at 8:00 am. We got our phone call from our missionary. It is the most wonderful thing a parent can experience, hearing your child's voice. We tried to talk and hold back tears. Landon sounded so good and happy. He said that he is having one of the best Christmas' ever. He said that the members have been so kind. He had to make 3 trips to his car on the Sunday before Christmas, just to load his presents from the members. He said that he now has his 2 year supply of toothpaste and deodorant. We were able to talk to his companion. They both sounded so good. That was the best gift of all!!

Springerville Ward Christmas Party

Well my new Church calling is Activities Chairman and it came shortly before Christmas. Needless to say I was very busy planning and buying. We did "Christmas Morning". It was a lot of fun. We served breakfast for dinner. It was YUMMY! I didn't realize how many people are like us and eat breakfast for dinner. We wore our jammy's and slippers. We had a nice program with the Show Choir singing. Macie and Kylee Wilkins sang 'Silent Night' for the closing song. They sounded beautiful. The Bishop asked if the girl's would sing for our Christmas Sacrament meeting. They did and it really added to the Christmas spirit.
Bart and Steph helped me with the decorating. It looked really cute. We did goody bags for the kids and had Santa come. It was great! Springerville ward is such a good ward, they really helped me out a lot. I asked Wendy and Troy Burk if they would help with the cooking. I didn't even have to worry about a thing. They all did such a wonderful job.

To start off the Christmas season, Stephenie Haycock, Valerie Price and I made tamale. We made over 400 of those little suckers! I guess we figured that wasn't enough of the mass cooking projects so we decided to do Chocolates too. We made so many dozens we couldn't even count. It was a lot of fun visiting, eating and listing to Christmas music. Our daughters joined in, whether they wanted to or not. They all were equally embarrassed by their mothers when we started to show them how to disco dance and do the 'Hustle'. That was after about 8 hours of working with tamales and we were completely exhausted and out of our minds!

This isn't Lucy's Chocolate factory!

Monday, December 1, 2008

Our little Tradition

Ever since we shared our first Christmas together, it seems like Bart and I started these little traditions. Kind of quirky but they have come to mean a lot to us and our kids. We started our first Christmas with putting all the Christmas lights on the floor, usually the end of November and we would dance to Christmas music. All of our kids loved doing this especially when they were toddlers. It seemed to get a little bigger each year and now has evolved into my family coming over and being made to dance...willingly, RIGHT? This year they came over on Thanksgiving night and we made popcorn balls and danced with sticky little hands.
The first year we had Landon, I thought I would make homemade ornaments for each year. I made a little family of bears. The next year the heads were broken off. Well Macie came along and her first ornament was a baby wrapped up in a pink blanket. I made it out of salt dough. I was going to put little black beads in for the eyes. I made holes and never got around to putting the beads in so we pull out this "eyeless" baby every year. I told Macie that maybe this was the year I would put the eyes in. She said "No you can't do that, I want to show my kids and have them ask me why the baby doesn't have eyes, and I'll tell them it never did." Can you believe that? The following year I cut these cute little wooden ornaments out and painstakingly painted for a week on these dumb...or I mean wonderful hand made creations. So much for homemade, the year after that I went and bought them at the store. Every year when we take them out or put them away, it involves some kind of super gluing so when I buy the ornaments I also purchase super glue. I usually keep the broken ones out, to fix, before storing. They get fixed in July. The kids have ended up with more than one for each year cuz it's so hard to pick just one when there are so many cute ones to choose from. I also have bought expensive Hallmark ones but they cost so much it limits the presents under the tree. So I usually buy them for "Special times", like once in their life time. Jaxten just can't seem to get why everyone else has more than him. He ends up in tears.
We have so many of these little treasures that they now have their very own tree. Yes, we have 2 trees in our small house. One to look pretty and the family ornament one. I do enjoy looking at all the different ornaments. They usually have a theme each year.
I thought it would be such a neat thing for the kids to take with them for their own Christmases. They probably will marry someone that will say "You're not putting those ugly ornaments on my tree!" Just my luck! I know Macie will want hers. She asked me "Mom, you'll still buy us ornaments after we don't live at home, won't you?" I said "No dear, I won't buy them, they will be hand made." NOT!