Christmas

Christmas has come and gone but, toys are still strung all through out the house, the tree is still up, the wreath is still on the door, and there are still Christmas goodies on the kitchen counter.  I guess since the sense of Christmas is still lingering it's ok to catch up on our Christmas going ons. 

The Christmas Card

I had a lot of fun with this year's Christmas card. 

First I hunted down red Converse, which was painful until I learned we have several Converse stores in Vegas, who knew? 

Then came the photo shoot.  This was really fun!  Ronnie selected the music and I snapped shots as the kids let loose and had a ball. 

A little work on Photoshop and then the assembling began.

Front of Card

Inside of Card

Gingerbread Houses

Fun was had by all this year as we assembled our houses. I think we are still finding candy that rolled off the table and found it's way to every corner of the house. Mom made a cute little cozy cottage with a red and green roof.  Cody decorated his love shack, complete with a candy cane heart archway.  Lacey, Sadie, and Lana get the award for most candy used and they added a very cool chimney to their house.  Kyle worked all by himself on his ginger train, he did a great job, there is even cargo in the train car.  Lana carried on the tradition of the Rudolph nose and introduced her cousin Mason to the fun.

 

 

 

Christmas Day

Here's just a few photos of Christmas:

    From Cute..........................................................To just Wrong!

The cousins at Christmas

. . . HE HIMSELF, . . . !

The Grinch carved the roast beast!

Snow Day

Yesterday it started to snow in Las Vegas around noon.  It kept snowing until way after the sun went down. Here's a video documenting the snow, hey it's a novelty here, just bear with me. 

                                 

A Snowy Day from Shawna Lutes on Vimeo.

 

And here are some pictures of what the kids did with all this snow. 

They got all bundled up.

The neighbor girls recruited them to build a snowman.

I guess Kyle was there for the heavy lifting.

Lana was pretty good at rolling the snow balls around.

The girls were hard at work and I wondered where Kyle ran off to.

Ah ha...look no further I found him on top of the camper making snowballs to throw.

He wasn't the only one throwing snowballs!  Lana's friend from down the street came over to join the fun.

The neighbor girls finished the snowman.  Didn't they do a great job?

All this snow means only one thing to the school aged kids...will we have a snow day tomorrow??  Yes indeed they did.  Here is what we did with our snow day.

We journeyed to the mall with letters to Santa in hand.

Lana wasn't feeling her best so no smiles today.

We found the Santa Mailbox at Macy's

Dropped our letters in.

Then had some lunch.

Lana's first Hot Dog on a Stick.  She's now hooked.

Oh the wonders a snowy day brings.

A Christmas Tradition

Each year we add ornaments to our tree, but one ornament is special.  As a family we think of something significant that happened in the past year and try to find an ornament to represent it.  I love this tradition for many reasons, it's a time when we can remember what happened through the year and it's fun to see what each person thinks was most significant.  It's one of my few original traditions, where I haven't copied what one of our families did.  It's a time when we all go shopping together which hardly happens this time of year. One day when we are old and gray, I can see Ronnie and I reminiscing on our life together as we put up our Christmas tree.

Here is our collection so far:

2000

Our first year together, this represents our marriage.   We were actually married in my parent's home, but I couldn't find an exact replica of their home so I thought this would do.

 

 

 

 

2001

After getting married in Las Vegas we moved to Colorado.  A few miles north of us there were pastures full of buffaloes.  Also the University of Colorado's mascot is the Buffalo.

 

 

 

 

2002

We were able to move back to Las Vegas.  I think the dice are self explanatory. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2003

Ronnie and I went to Monterey Bay, CA when we were dating.  Years later we were able to go back and visit this awesome place with Kyle and me being 7 months pregnant.  It was such a treat because it was only 65 in Monterey and 110 in Vegas.  (Lana got her own baby's first Christmas ornament so we choose this one for this year)

 

 

2004

Besides kids this is probably the most significant thing to happen to us yet.  The purchase of our first home.  We were so lucky to have received a call from a dear friend telling us that the other side of her duplex was for sale.  I can truly say that great friends make the best neighbors. 

 

 

 

2005

Yet another Monterey Bay ornament.  We could probably have one of these for every year because it is our favorite place to escape the Las Vegas heat.  This year was significant because Kyle was the first person in our family to go scuba diving. 

 

 

 

 

2006

The year of the pickle.  I don't know what nutritional value a pickle has, probably none, but Lana lived off of pickles this whole year.  It effected our whole family, trust me on this. 

 

 

 

 

 

2007

We started our first garden in Las Vegas.  We did the square foot gardening method and had a lot of fun caring for it.  We had a a very prolific eggplant bush that produced eggplants the size of your head!

 

 

 

 

2008

This year we ventured to southern CA for our family vacation.  We hit the highlights with the kids and were able to see the baby pandas at the San Diego Zoo. 

 

 

 

 

 

I can't even begin to guess what next year will bring, but looking back on the years I feel truly blessed.

Las Vegas Marathon

                                      

This past Sunday was fast Sunday for me.  Usually fasting is not a hard thing to do, but this Sunday was hard.  Ronnie's company sponsored a mile at the Las Vegas Marathon this Sunday.  Everyone was encouraged to go help out by passing cups of water and Gatorade off to the runners.  I try to keep the Sabbath day holy and so on and I don't think that going down to the Strip makes it easy for one to do this.  But I went because we were volunteering, doing good works.  We woke up at 5:45am and got everyone dressed in some sort of red (we were asked to wear red for some reason).  We helped fill 4 tables full of water and Gatorade cups.  Then the runners started passing by.  Everyone was excited to cheer on the brave people running and try to hand off some cups.  The kids had a blast.              

Las Vegas Marathon from Shawna Lutes on Vimeo.

 

We saw all kinds of runners...

                                Santa Runners                                                                     Elvis Runners

                        Turtle Elvis Runners                                                             Bride and Groom Runners

                          More Elvis Runners                                                            Funky Jive Man Runner

We were set up on mile 25 so when the runners passed us they only had 1.2 miles left.  Which is why you see some of the runners walking.  Some were running half marathons and some started at mile 7 after getting married.  It was apparent some runners were running with a purpose and some were running for fun.  No matter though the only thing on my mind as I looked at the runners was...well let me see if you can guess:

                                                  

                                                                          You can see it here...

                                 

                                                                                      And here...

                                

                                                                I tried to block it out here....

                                                    

                                                    But I moved and it came back into focus...

                                    

                      You think I'm taking a picture of my husband don't you....you'd be wrong

                                  

                                                                                 See it now...

                                 

          Yes, that darn IN-N-OUT sign is quite a force to be reckoned with on fast Sunday.

 

                             

We had to leave before everyone was finished so we could make it to church.  This is the sea of cups that had accumulated so far, I can't imagine how many more there were when it was all over and done with.  Who knew marathons were so messy?