New Years

New Year's was lots of fun thanks to Jessi and Todd and their crazy partying!  I also kept thinking how great it was compared to last year when we were called back home shortly after our arrival because Susanna had one too many holes in her head and she need a bit of repair work. 

Poor baby!

This year's photos are all fun and no stitches!  Hooray!

Lilli and Sara babysat for one of the couples at the party, so they were up late and go to celebrate a little when they were finished with their watch.

Cousins and Fairies

Over Christmas break, Jessi's girls were dying to make fairy houses and were kind enough to invite Sara, Laney and Zanna to join them.

The girls had lots of fun and still have their fairy houses safely displayed in their bedroom.  They all turned out super cute!

Thank you for the fun day, Jessi!

Sara also got to sleep over one night.  I know she enjoys having time in a house full of girly girls every once in a while instead of all the testosterone we have over here.

The  twins and Daniel are always begging to have Tyson, Lucas and Wilson spend the night and so over the break I gave in.  How can I refuse such sweet boys who love each other so much?

When I came up stairs to check on the boys, I found almost all of them cuddled up together, laying sideways on one twin mattress.   Lucas was in the chair and Drew was behind the chair.  They were so adorable!  I am grateful that we live close to so many cousins and can build such wonderful memories.

Sickness strikes hard at the Algers'... ew GROSS!

Poor Susanna had the worst of it.  She was kind of sick with this horrible rash for about a week and then REALLY sick, the I want mom to hold me constantly day or night kind of sick, with a grotesque looking throat, huge swollen glands and high fever for 8 more days.

I took pictures of her face every morning for several days just so compare if it was getting better or worse.  It was so sad to look at her.

Richard, Nate, Drew Daniel, Laney, Tim and Sara were all pretty sick to for several days each, of course stretching out over about a 3 week period of time. Luckily, I was only sick for a day. I have some awesomely disgusting pictures of Sara's strep throat tonsils, but she does not want them posted.  I love medical photos.  She missed most of the last week of school before break. She was so sad to miss all the fun activities.  Tim and Susanna had to miss out on all the fun extended family Christmas things on Christmas Eve and Day, they were just way to sick.  I am so grateful (knock on wood) that we are over all that yucky stuff now.

Christmas Morning

The kids are so kind to us and have learned to sleep in on Christmas morning. They didn't get up until about 7:30 and patiently waited until around 8 for me to get myself awake and together enough to venture down stairs.

I am not sure why, but Susanna was NOT happy about Christmas.  She was so sad about pictures.

I love these pictures that we take every Christmas morning before we open presents.  It is fun to compare them from year to year.  We always line the kids up youngest to oldest.

Santa covers the coffee table with our stockings and a big pile of movies, games, candy etc in the middle of the table.  He likes to give us all the random gifts that are for the family.

It is funny to me how excited the kids are every year for their new pajamas.  It seems like the joy of new pj's is lasting longer with them than it did with Sam and Josh.  I love it!

My favorite part of Christmas morning is watching the kids open the gifts that they bought for each other.  They each have a secret sibling to buy a gift for.  I am touched every year at their generosity and the pure joy they feel in giving their gifts.  They are all so grateful for what they receive as well.  Truly the spirit of Christmas.

Josh gave Sara a fancy Sansa mp3 player.  She was SUPER happy!

Drew had Josh

Nate had Sam.

Daniel had Tim.

Laney had Nate.

Susanna had Laney.

Sam had Daniel.  He was so sweet planning it out.  He requested blue wrapping paper and blue tissue paper to wrap his gift in.

He wanted it to feel like Daniel like he was fishing through the ocean for his present.

Which was two GIANT sharks.

He loved it! and Sam loved it too.

Tim got a 3DS for his Christmas/Birthday present.  He was elated!

I know this is out of order, but I love how everything looks on Christmas Eve right after Santa puts out all the presents and everything is quiet and tidy.  It feels so magical.

It was another fabulous Christmas. 

 (Only 3 more before Sam's mission.  I can't believe it!)

Caroling

How embarrassing!  I still haven't blogged through Christmas yet.  It has been a really busy January.  

For our family Christmas Eve tradition, we meet with the rest of the Ely gang at the Glendale Care Center and go caroling.  As you can see the singing did not wait for the Care Center.  We had a full on show for us in the car.  The kids, lead by Sam and Victor, sang every song that came on the radio with full choreography.  It was hilarious.  To be honest, they had some pretty good moves and for making it up on the spot, they did a really good job of synchronizing. 

Like I said they were a riot.

Gram and Papa have lots of Christmasy hats and aprons for us all to wear as we spread Christmas cheer.

I didn't get any pictures of us caroling, but what we do is follow one of the workers around the halls of the whole center while singing to, smiling at and hugging all the sweet people that live there.  It has become one of my favorite traditions.  It is great to see them singing with us with "their eyes all aglow".  One older gentleman pulled out his harmonica and began playing along with our singing.  He was right on key and joined in perfectly.  I was amazed at how good he was.

It just feels right to start Christmas Eve by loving lots of sweet grandmas and grandpas.  It melts your heart and prepares you for celebrating the gift of the Savior's life.