Merry Christmas - This Year's Christmas Card

Merry Montage Christmas

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Thanksgiving

This year we went to my parent's in Las Vegas for Thanksgiving. As always, the trip was filled with fun, family, and food! My sister was able to come too and so all of us were there. It was quite the full house! We enjoyed yummy food, ate too much...ate more and enjoyed everyone's company.

Katelyn and her cousin Eliana

 All the Chesnik cousins! We are only missing Hailey (Missy's youngest) in this picture

I want food!

My Grandma McFarlane crocheted hats for all of her grandkids (my group) and her great-grandkids (my kids). Everyone wanted to wear them all the time!

I love this picture of Adam with Chris

On Friday evening, we went to see the lights at Ethel M. Chocolate Factory. They have a cactus garden which during Christmas time is displayed with lights. Of course everyone wore their hats! All the kids had a great time.

Saturday was my birthday. Normally I'm not a morning person, but I decided that for my birthday I wanted to go to the temple in the morning with my mom. It was so relaxing and a perfect way to start my day. And it was early to fit everything else in that day! When we got back, we got everyone ready for Chesnik family pictures. They turned out great for the amount of kids we have. We had the huge group posed and ready, and then Katelyn turns to me and said she didn't feel good. She looked absolutely green. I said sorry and excused the 2 of us and got her some water. I think she was just getting really hot. She felt a little better and took some pictures, although you can still tell she was a little green. At one of the breaks when we were sitting down and smaller groups were doing pictures, Katelyn threw up all over the carpet. So sad that she felt so crummy during picture time. In all we managed and got the pictures done.

Here's everyone! All the kids are getting so grown up.

This is a three generation picture with all the girls.

After picture time, we went to a movie to continue celebrating my birthday. Chris and I took our kids plus my sister's girls to Tangled. I love that show! The kids (5 in all!) were great and we had a good time.

Then of course a birthday could not be complete at my house without homemade ice cream. Mmmmm. Thanks to my family for a great Thanksgiving weekend and birthday party!

Adam's first trip to the ER

Adam's first IV....well this is a picture of his hand wrapped after the IV got taken out. He's got his train blanket and apparently a show on so he's not too concerned about the bandage on his hand.

Adam is officially my first kid to need to go to the ER (knock on wood...don't want to start a trend). As I was packing upstairs to get ready for our family to go to Vegas for Thanksgiving, I heard Adam scream downstairs. The way he screamed, and even worse when I picked him up, I knew something was really wrong. I did my nurse head to toe assessment but couldn't find anything out of place. It seamed when I held him he calmed down. But I really knew something was wrong when my VERY active toddler didn't want to be put down. After a while of not getting better, we asked Chris' dad (a doctor) to come do his assessment. Nothing was really found either other than, yes, Adam was not acting normal. So, then it was a trip to our pediatrician for a night time pediatric check. We were thinking anything from a fall (but there was no evidence of one) to a scorpion sting (which there was also no evidence of one). The doctor couldn't really find anything either...so much for modern medicine! (Can you tell I was getting a little frustrated?) She said if he couldn't sleep that night then to take him to the ER. By this point it was late and so Adam was tired. I thought he would possibly just sleep it off, but he woke after only a few hours of sleep. So then it was off to the ER, with many tears from me worried about my baby, and tears to my mom that I might not be coming for Thanksgiving. As a nurse, I have to say that you would think I would be great with sick kids. I am. Just not my own. By the time we were at the hospital it was appearing that Adam was guarding his stomach when we would pick him up and he didn't like his underarms touched. The ER doc decided it was most likely abdominal so we went for x-rays. They then did blood work and an ultrasound of his abdomen to rule out anything bad. Then a LONG time later it was decided that maybe he was just full of a lot a stool. Great. An ER visit for poo! Adam seemed to be better after an enema so we just left it as that, even though he was still acting not completely normal. We had a follow-up visit with our pediatrician on the Monday after Thanksgiving. He felt it was possibly a cracked collar bone...so off we were to more x-rays. No crack. So we have a mystery that was never solved. A few days after the incident I did notice some bruising on the right side of his shoulder/neck area, so I am convinced it was a fall. In all, after a week Adam was back to normal. Glad he's OK!

"Don't eat the church!"

Today we went to Amy and Scott's ward for the kids Primary Program. The boys all did a great job. At one point during the program, Brock turned around to talk to Adam. Adam for some reason was licking the bench or just had his mouth up to the bench. Brock said to Adam, "Don't eat the church Adam, don't eat the church!" Brock was very concerned and said it several times. I love how little minds work and sometimes the funny things that come out of their mouth!

Megan's parent program - Ocean unit

Again, I am amazed at all the things the kids are learning in Club. Megan now knows the difference between a vertebrate and invertebrate, she knows about sharks and whales and fish, and tidal waves and how they are formed, and sea stars and so much more about our ocean. To add to that, she can name all the oceans in the world, and point them out on a map. A lot of what they learn is put to song to make it easier to remember. I think this is why Megan loves it so much. I even learned something new from Megan that she had learned. Did you know that sea stars (commonly referred to as star fish, but they are not a fish) take their stomach out to eat? Then if they don't like something that they've eaten they just leave their stomach there and they grow a new one. Nice. Kind of wish I could do that sometimes.

Club has a small loft. Megan is showing me her shark puppet.

Megan smiling during the classroom portion of the parent program.

This is the small playroom that is decorated like a submarine for this unit.

Dancing in Disneyland! (cont...)

So to keep the tradition alive...Saturday had a clothes color assignment too. It was "grey day." To start off the day we got ready to dance! We were so thankful that our time slot to dance was first thing in the morning (well, late morning, but the first show). It made it easy to just get ready in the morning to dance, and then we had the rest of the day to enjoy in the Park. The girls all danced really well. Good job, Katelyn!

Waiting with the group to enter the Park with their Disney escort.

Megan is too young to dance at Disneyland, so she started climbing letters while we waited to drop off Katelyn.

I love this picture of Katelyn and her sassy dance moves. She's the cute one on the right of the picture. Swing those hips, Katelyn!

 The rest of the day was spent enjoying the Park again. Here's the "grey day" collage.

This was a pretty adventurous day for Megan and me. To preface this story, I have to say that I don't do the rides that have a big drop. I don't really like them. As I drop and am in the free-fall state, I kind of hold my breath and stop breathing. Not a good idea, but I'd have to say, better than throwing up! I learned this as a teenager and have avoided those kind of rides ever since. I don't mind going on fast roller coasters, and I don't mind going upside down. It's just that free fall that gets me. So, now the story. One of Megan's favorite rides is the Jumping Jellyfish in California Adventure. It's an easy drop. Just enough to have your stomach do a little jump but not enough to get scared. For some reason, I mentioned to her that the Tower of Terror was like the Jumping Jellyfish, just bigger and faster. Well, then she wanted to go on that ride. We tried to convince her that she would not like the ride and that it would be too fast. I think Chris and I were hoping that she'd be too short to ride the ride, but as it turns out, she's not. There was no good reason to not let her go on the ride, so we said we could try it. So, of course Megan wanted me to go on the ride with her. I told Chris he had to come too to help me! In the end, for me the ride wasn't too bad. Not my idea of fun, but I'm still breathing! Megan on the other hand said she never wants to ride the Tower of Terror ever again. She held on to Chris pretty tight and screamed her way down. I think she'll be sticking with Jumping Jellyfish from here on out.

Dancing in Disneyland!

Katelyn is finally old enough to dance in Disneyland! I know, your thinking, "but weren't you just in Disneyland in August." Yup. Thanks to Jeanne's School of Dance and Katelyn and 2 amazing sister-in-laws who teach dance, we got to do Disneyland a second time this year. The dancers were scheduled to dance on Saturday morning, so we got to the Happiest Place on Earth Thursday night so we could have one whole day in the park. If you know my family, you know we dress in the same color. So much easier to find your group in the crowd! So, Friday was "red day." Then I had the happy surprise to find out that my family had decided to celebrate my birthday. When we met at the fireplace at the Grand Californian, I was given a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse style adventure to collect my presents throughout the day. It was so much fun!

Here's our best family picture as we wait to enter the park. (Megan really was excited to be there even though she's not smiling in this picture, and Adam just wanted out of his stroller already!)

Here's a picture of all the birthday treats and presents I got throughout the day. Thank you Kaley and Amy for your crazy, fun, creative brain! It made me feel special all day!

I just love seeing the kids in Disneyland! Here's a collage of our fabulous "red day."

One of the presents I got was to have 3 hours with just Chris in the park and the rest of the family would watch my kids. We chose to leave just after dinner and enjoy a date! Chris chose to take me to Captain E-O because I had never (to my recollection) seen it before. It was definitely interesting! We then went on some rides. What a difference it is to stand in line without kids!