Early New Year Eve Party--Comet style

In trying to think of a service project we could do as a family this year, I decided it would be nice to not have everything happen in the weeks leading up to Christmas. So I thought it would be fun to do a party for Jena's Special Olympics team.  They have always been so kind to us and Jena and have included her in many fun extra things beyond just our team practices and tournaments.  So I made a plan and convinced Gary and Jena and some of my dear sweet neighbors and their families to help us out and we hosted:

Early New Year Eve Party for all Comets

and their families

 

It was held at our local LDS Church

on Friday, Dec. 28.

 

It was awesome and I am so thankful to our friends who helped us make it work, but mainly for our Comet athletics and their families.  I am not one to romanticize life with children with special needs.  Although life with Jena is fairly straightforward, for some families it is a constant worry and hardship.  Yes, there are sweet moments that are amazing and we can't imagine our families without them.....but it is not all sweetness and light.  It can be stress and stain.  However the families of the Comets as well as their athletics are terrific.  To interact with them and to watch them interact with each other is a pleasure.  They are working hard to provide their children and their young adult children life with the extras like sports and social interactions.  To party with them is to love them once again.

 

The night started with some seat-mixing games
and then some minute to win it games.
We ended up with about 125 people there including our neighbors who helped.

After the "gathering games" we had four activities including
the dance. Above is the bingo area getting ready to start.
Below is Kaitlyn and Jena posing by our New York backdrop
We had two backdrops and lots of props
where the athletics with their family
or friends could dress up and take pictures--a big hit

Apparently this is the "New York" pose

We also had a small craft---a bird feeder with apple, peanut butter
and bird seed  (an old Cub Scout favorite). 
Three MiaMaids in our ward offered to help as
they needed service hours.  They were great--taking care of the bird feeder activity,
dancing with us, and helping with clean-up and set-up.

 The DANCE

Jena loves to dance and did nothing else for 1 1/2 hours straight.

At the end she posed for a couple of pictures and she did eat cake

and maybe a few chips.  But dancing was her favorite.

Not sure which dance this was

Someone donate this "Comet" cake.  It was gluten free which
many people with Down syndrome deal with.
I didn't get a picture of the whole comet
but it was a fun cake and tasted
great.  It had both vanilla and chocolate cake
on opposite ends.

Rock on Jena

Sweet friends who took care of the food for me.

As we were cleaning up I got Jena to pose with Meggan
one of our neighbor helpers for this 2012 picture.

Last item, two pinatas:
one for siblings and one for the athletics.
No matter how old you are, it is fun to hit
something and make candy fall to the floor.

Gary handled the music for the dance borrowing on our recent experience with Christmas dances and our neighborhood party.  However he had a new twist this time as people shared music from their phones and Ipods.  It was great but I kept saying to Gary make sure the music is appropriate.  It was so fun.  I would definitely plan one next year and some neighbors have indicated they would love to be involved again.  We will see if the Comets and their families feel the same way.

 

It is interesting how as life moves forward for me, experiences from the past (like Cub Scouts and party planning) become skills to be used in other settings to share fun and love for one another.  I am not sure that "planning" is a gift of the Spirit listed in the Doctrine and Covenants but it is my gift of the Spirit.  I love watching something I thought about (with loads of help including divine help) come to pass and to watch people have fun and make friends.  We(and I--depending on the setting) are going to be doing more of that this coming year.  Crisis situations can bring people together---but so can fun and playing games and being together.  Doing that first will help us deal with the trials that come from a better position of strength because we know each other and who we can turn to.  So let the fun and Games begin...............

And our snow

keeps falling around here and much of the rest of the western US including Texas.

On final note about Christmas 2012:

One of my favorite things about Christmas--
Christmas cards, letters, and pictures.

Christmas 2012 has come and gone......

We had a dump of snow on Christmas Eve after having a very mild December so we had our white Christmas. We spent early Christmas Eve at the Hall Family Christmas Eve party from 5-7 which included over 40 people. It is getting too big now with 4 great grandchildren added this year alone. Mom Hall has declared that from now on she will be visiting us at our houses. We will see...she has mentioned this before but has continued the tradition started years ago when her mom said it was time to start doing it at your own houses. She might be right now. Next year those 4 babies
will be toddlers.

More than a room full of Hall relatives

Scott and Chantel with Grandma Hall
holding the newest great grandchild (Not Scott's and Chantel's)
Emily Rose McKinney (daughter of Eric and Brie)
She is just over a month old.

Just in case, we had the great grandchildren act out the nativity. We have not had a life navitiy since the youngest grandchildren were in elementary school. The two oldest great grandchildren who are 16 and 12 agreed to be a part wtih the many young ones. This was their first time at New Year Eve since they were very young. They have recently moved back to Utah from Tennessee. Hopefully someone got a good picture of them. (I will add it later if I get one form my nephew.) All of our kids made it to grandma's except for Ben who hung out at our house. However Scott and Chantel were leaving to go to her family's house just when Tosha and her boyfriend Roark were showing up so they were all there at the same time. He felt it was way too many people for him.

After cleaning up at Grandma's, everyone head to our house for the post party Eve event. We read a new Christmas Children's book and the kids opened their Christmas Eve present from Mrs. Claus (formerly know as the Christmas Eve pjs. but now a children's Christmas story to add to their home
collections. Jessica and Tosha opened their big gifts from us but took their smaller gifts home to open in the morning. We were planning to have a "Milkshake Bar" but ate too much at Grandma's so skipped that. Soon after they all left, Scott and Chantel arrived to exchange some gifts as well
before they headed off to hang stockings at their house as well. Our Christmas train was short this year as just Gary, Jena and Ben and I were here for the night to hang stockings. Despite having wrapped all but one gift last week, we still didn't get to bed until mid-night.

Ben and Jena opeing their pjs on Christmas Eve

We slept in (which was great) and had a quiet but fun morning with Ben and Jena.

The tree--notice the sunshine in the window

Jena helped Gary wrap up presents.She had fun making up names
to write on the gifts.

Jena with her book about Broadway Musicals.
We were teasing her about her big smile when she opened it
so she covered her mouth.

Here is her smile---uncovered.

More smiles for the Karaoke machine

Jena got a Karaoke machine which we sang with for awhile after a late brunch. Tosha and Roark stopped by briefly and sang with us. Around 1:30 Gary's mom came over and we went over and played a new game with hsi sister Valerie and her husband. Then headed up to Ogden Valley to his other sister, Vonette and had a game playing afternoon. Then we had another visit with Chantel and Scott in the evening and, you guessed it, played games. Unfortunately, Jessica and Elessia both had to work on Christmas day although thankfully, it was a quiet day for Jessica as she mans a crisis line for the State of Utah Division of Family Services--perhaps it was a good day for all children in the state.

And that was a wrap for the celebrating....at least for now.

The calm weeks...

After our two weeks of parties, I was glad to have a couple of weeks of relative calm before Christmas.  I finished shopping, managed to wrap the gifts before the 20th, and get my Christmas cards mailed. 

I also managed to sneak a day down in Salt Lake with my dad as we continued to review the family history materials that he has collected.  I saw pictures that I hadn't seen before.  Reading some letters, we even were able to find online a Church where my great grand father, Daniel Giberson, served as a minister in 1870's.  It is close by where we will be traveling in Minnisoda next summer so I am hoping to stop and see it and also some family graves nearby.

Speaking of family history, my cousin, Dan, brought me several computer files of family history for my mom's side of the family.  It includes a history of my grandfather Robert Owen and lots of other stuff.  My family was part of the Lost Wagon Train along the Oregon Trail.  We are related to Daniel Boone (his older brother was my relative).  I haven't even begun to read everything I got from him.

Christmas with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and..

Alfie (a world famous tenor).  He is famous for doing the song "Bring Him Home" in Les Mesirable (I don't know how to spell it even with spell checker).

It started off as a regular Friday in December---I had a list of things to do and places to go.  My visiting teachers came in the morning and we had our usual fun conversation together.  As part of it, Kaye shared a story from the Christmas program at the Conference Center the night before.  Since I didn't have tickets (despite the fact that the Conference Center holds over 20000 people, they are very hard tickets to get.  You apply online for a lottery to get chosen for tickets.), she decided it was okay to share the story.  We all were teary-eyed just from her telling the story to us.  She said that she just sobbed during it the night before.

About 4:00 that afternoon, I got a call from my neighbor.  She had just gotten four tickets from someone who couldn't use them for that night.  She invited Jena, Gary and I.  We jumped at the chance.  I called Kaye to share my excitement who felt bad that she had shared a part with me.  I wasn't.  I was so excited to see it myself.

Waiting for the concert to start

Jena and Marge, our sweet neighbor

It was a bit of a rainy night but it was so great to be in downtown Salt Lake City with all of the lights at Temple Square and surrounding areas.  The concert was as amazing as Kaye had said and AI am so grateful for the chance to be there and see it for myself.  It was filmed and will be chosen on PBS next Christmas season.  Those who watched the Spoken Word on Sunday were able to see a part of it.  They retold the story of "The Candy man" who dropped candy from his airplane to children in Germany after the war.  The visuals were great and then the actual man who is now 92 years old appeared on stage and spoke a bit about his experience.  If you have a chance to see it, be sure you watch the 2012 Christmas with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

In the middle of all the parties....

I actually made a Quilt (since it is after Christmas I can reveal that now as it was a gift for my mother-in-law).  Chantel was also busying sewing as well as she made a quilt for Scott for Christmas.  I had my quilt machined quilted which was the first time I ever have done a quilt like that.  Chantel tied hers.  This was her first quilt and she did it all by herself.  She and I attended a quilting class that my ward did in November and then we looked details up on YouTube when we had questions.

Here are our quilts:

Grandma Hall's Christmas Quilt

It started with this fabric which actually has "Holly"
on the fabric which is her name.  All the other fabric
was chosen to match this.

Chantel getting ready to put her quilt on the quilting
frames.  It turned out beautiful and Scott was very
thrilled and surprised.

Next quilting project--a quilt for Jena's bed as we are planning to repaint and redo it in January or so.

And the parties kept on coming....

Sunday was our annual Giberson Christmas party.  This year we were able to add Dan and Raylene Gibson, my cousin, who has recently moved to Utah.  This will be our last one with BYU student relatives for awhile as Niles and Rachel Giberson both graduated in December and are back to Texas to begin post college life and to wait for the arrival of their first child, a little boy.  And Katie Giberson is off to her new adventure as a missionary for the LDS Church.  She is going to Portugal.  Katie missed our dinner as she was busy with finals and packing up her college life.

Here we are (minus Gary who was the cameraman):

Me, David and Dawn Dodson, Dad, Dan, Rachel and Niles
Jena, Jenna Dodson, Raylene, Danielle, Karla, Sierra
Chantel and Scott

 On Monday (the 10th), Jena was invited to the annual Girls Christmas party for the older girls on her Special Olympics team.  These older girls are so kind and fun and Jena loved being included with them.  She missed her friend, Kaitlyn who was in Disneyland that day, but had a great time.  Here they are with their craft they made.

Being silly with some of their gifts.  Fun group!!

Then on Saturday of that week, Jena had a party with Special Olympics with a visit from Santa while they were bowling.  True to form, Jena told Santa she wanted chips for Christmas.

And as I mention parties, I realized that I forgot to mention my Ward Relief Society Christmas dinner and program.  It was one of the best I ever attended.  The food was nice and simple--soup and salad and bread.  The program was amazing.  It was written by two of the women in my ward and it was called "Christmas Memories".  Kaye Volk (who is my visiting teacher) and Betty Van Orden (another awesome women) gathered 10 stories from sisters in the ward and then intertwined the stories with songs and narration between them.  They had four narrators and the stories were not identified just shared.  Kaye had written a song called "Christmas Memories" about the power of our memories to feel the Spirit of Christmas.  We all cried.  One of my memories was included.  That was fun as well to hear how they used one of my memories to teach a principle about Christmas.  We have already told them to start writing "Christmas Memories 2" for next year.

The Hall Almost Annual Adult Christmas Party

We spent the first week of December getting the house cleaned and decorated for our annual (almost) Christmas party.  We so love having our friends join us to celebrate the season.  Though it is mostly centered on fun and food (and of course, the white elephant exchange), it is still one of the ways we share things we love with our friends and neighbors at this special season of the year. Historically over the 34 years of our marriage, we first had a party either at Christmas or New Years Eve.  We didn't have a set pattern.  Then when we lived in Hong Kong, our friends the Bradfords, included us in their annual Christmas party (great memories!) each of the first years we were there.  After they left for Malaysia, we took over that party and have been doing a Christmas party since then.  We have missed a couple of years due to sickness but that has been very rare.  I assume that we will do it until we die.  The problem is that we don't keep track of who we invite and what we do from year to year.  I am sure it might get boring for some people.  This year we did take a couple of pictures which we have never down before.

Wives adding a face, buttons and nose behind their backs
with husbands giving directions
(in front--Amy and Newt McNeill

Games playing with Jena looking on in the back

Yes, Andersons--that is the lizard you brought to
our Christmas party in Hong Kong in 1990 (I think).
It has traveled around in HK, Texas, and now in Syracuse.
If you "get" the lizard, you get a guarenteed invitation to
the Christmas party the following year (not sure if that is
a punishment or a reward.)  My kids claimed they haven't
ever seen the lizard so now they can see it.

It was a fun party with crazy games and white elephant exchange rules which Gary makes up and changes every year.  You never know how and what may happen during that game.  We made a Christmas version of Teletrations which was fun.

Christmas Start-up Kits

Monday, Dec. 3rd, Jena and I headed out to deliver our Christmas Start-up Kits.  (Gary had to help at the bowling alley with another Special Olympic bowling team.)

 I made one for each of the kids.  I should have taken pictures of what was inside so I could remember for another year.  They included candy, an old Christmas movie DVD, a candle, a nativity or Christmas picture and other little things to get into the Christmas spirit.  I made each of them Christmas pillowcases.


From top left:  Ben's, Jena's
From bottom left  Jessica's, Scott's and Tosha's

Jena's Christmas pillow in the middle of her bed

We were able to see each of the kids to deliver the packages.  Actually we saw and talked to everyone except for Tosha.  We were meeting at a gym to fit into my schedule and hers, but I got lost so she was already in class. We watched her exercise in her Zamba class, but had to leave the package with her boyfriend, Roark.

Scott's drop off:

A wreath that Chantel made for their door

Close-up of their beautiful Christmas tree

Another new item Chantel made for their mantle



Checking out their bag

Next was Tosha's but no pictures.  I didn't think she wanted us taking pictures of her doing Zamba although she is awesome at it.

Then to Jessica's: 

Elessia and Jessica
and their Christmas tree

Jessica and Jena with Zeva the new puppy ( a beagle)

Jessica lives in Magna, Utah, which is about 45 minutes south of Syracuse.  From there we headed up to Sunset to Ben's house.

Ben's apartment

And don't worry about Jena.  Her package was sitting on her bed when she got home from school. 

It was so fun to see everyone and deliver a surprise for the holiday.  I think I will do something every year like this although it might be very different from year to year.  Even making the pillowcases was fun (Thanks to my friend Robynn Thiot for the idea.  She made Christmas pillowcases one year when her kids were visiting.  I thought it was a cute idea) .  I think next year I will make some for our bed.

I love these people!!!!!  Marry Christmas to them, every one!!

What did one snowman say to the other.............

"Do you smell carrots?"

And thus we launch into the weekly review as November has gone and December2012  has begun---in fast fashion with two holiday activities completed and more in the weeks ahead. 

Not that you can tell by the decor of my house---we are still in Thanksgiving mode at our house.  I always choose to wait a little bit after Thanksgiving before making the change to Christmas decorations.  This year with over a week until December started, it looks like I might be the only one in the whole neighborhood with pumpkins still on their porch and a cornucopia on the table.  It is okay----I am thankful and I love the autumn colors.  The good news (for Jena who can't wait for the Christmas trees and other such things) is that we are having a party here on Friday so I am sure we will get the right season in place around the house.

I wrote the above piece on Dec. 2, but unfortunately haven't taken a moment to finish it and send it off.  Now it is Dec. 23--two days before Christmas and I haven't written about any of the fun things which we have been doing this holiday season.  So this will be a series of posts to catch up until today.  Here it goes.

Back to the weekend of Nov. 30 and Dec. 1st----

Our ward had our Ward Christmas party on Nov. 30th.  It was the perfect way to start the season.  I am sad that I didn't take a picture but we had a nativity in which all of the people were members of the same family--the Ruberts with their seven children from 12 down to 1 1/2 years old.  The costumes were amazing and all in tan and browns--very calm and elegant as well as the backdrop of the stable.  The littlest child was a lamb complete with a tail and long ears.  Early in the program he broke away from the shepherds and began wandering around the stage and up and down the stairs between the stage and the floor.  It was so darling.  Jesus talked often about those lambs--how we must love them and search for the ones that were lost.  That thought stayed with me through out that nativity.  We then had "back by popular demand" a Christmas dance like the year before.  Fun time....

Jena and our friend, Meggan

Saturday night we headed to Layton High School and saw the "Voice Male" Christmas concert.  This has become a yearly tradition and Jena won't left us forget about buying tickets each Christmas.  We took our friend, Meggan Sparrow, and also Gary's mom, his sister Vonette and her husband Gary and their two youngest daughters, Nikki and Krystal.  They do a combination of fun holiday songs and also traditional Christmas carols.  We laughed and cried--another fun night.

With the ward party and the Voicemail concert over, we were ready for the holiday.  We even started taking down Thanksgiving decorations and carrying up the Christmas things!! 

Happy Thanksgiving Week

It has been a fun and busy week filled with the normal "suspects" (that would be housecleaning, too much food and game playing) and some other highlights.  We will start with Monday and move forward:

Monday:  I headed to Salt Lake and spent the day with my dad starting on some family history and genealogy projects.  It was awesome and I hope to make it a monthly tradition.  All Gibersons are certainly invited to join with us.  I will let you know the dates.  :)

Monday evening Jena and I went with some friends to see the "Wizard Of Oz" which was being presented by a high school in Ogden (Gary had to help with another Special Olympics Bowling league at the bowling alley).  It was good and Jena and Kaitlyn really enjoyed it.  I was amazed by the dog that played Toto.  He was darling.

Tuesday:  My run around and doing projects day which I can't disclose on the blog since it isn't Christmas yet.  I am actually doing a project or two for Christmas.  It has been a long time since I have really done that.

Wednesday:  The "pick up pies and get ready for Thanksgiving Day"--The weather has been beautiful so we spent some time getting our yard ready for winter.  In many ways it is the best we have done for a long time (I think that we have mentioned that yard work and me have a love-hate relationship---I love it when I want to do it but it can be a burden when I don't.)

However the big news for Wednesday was that Jena had her first day of work at her job at the Syracuse bowling alley.  They approached us in the summer to see if we were interested in a job for her.  Some of the teenager staff had talked to the management and suggested it as Jena would often help them put away balls and clean up when she was there with Gary.  We said we were but she wasn't 16 yet.  She went through the process of application and interview and started Wednesday.  To start with she will work one day a week for 2 hours.  Gary or I will stay in the building to coach her if needed but the staff and management know her so well that it went great the first day.  Here she is heading in for her first day of work.

Heading in to work...
One of her jobs is cleaning and putting
away the bowling shoes....



Again, my apologies to Jessica (Lagoon), Scott (Painter's helper), Ben (Lagoon)
and Tosha (Jamba Juice)--if I had been blogging back then
and photos had been so available I would have totally
posted about your first jobs and taken pictures.

Thursday:   "Happy Thanksgiving"

I headed to Journey House in the morning to serve Thanksgiving Dinner to clients and their families of Davis Behavioral Health. 

We had a later dinner to accommodate our kids and even then Tosha and her boyfriend, Roark, only made it for a brief stop around 9 as she worked until 8 at Cracker Barrel.  Otherwise we had everyone else for dinner at 5 and also Gary's sister Vonette, her husband, Gary, and three of their children.

I saw lots of face book posts of beautiful tables of dishes and food.  Here is what I took a picture of:

After dinner was cleaned up, it was time for the real order of business:  Game playing.  Here we are playing Telestrations.  Jessica took a "cool" panoramic picture of all of us playing but I don't know how to get it from my text messages to my computer.

Brother bonding time away from the
crazy game players.  Scott did play for awhile
but it is not always his "cup of tea".

Roark and Tosha

No group shots but as a mom it is just fun to have all of your children in your house at the same time even if it is just for a brief moment.  I love all of these "peoples"  and so glad to have them in my life.

Friday: After a busy couple of days, I fell right to sleep on Thursday night only to wake up at three in the morning and couldn't get back to sleep.  I did laundry, worked on genealogy stuff, and emergency prep. stuff until about 8:30 a.m..  Then after breakfast, I headed back to bed for a couple of hours.  That doesn't happen to me very often.  It made Friday somewhat wasted day but I was grateful that I got so much stuff ready for emergency prep. because I am giving a presentation next week in Ward Counsel and my PowerPoint is mostly prepared. Nice!

We helped a neighbor move in the afternoon and then finally Gary and I watched a bit of football and took naps--another holiday classic.  We played games with Mom Hall that night after a taco dinner at Taco Time where we got a 10% discount and treats because they knew Jena.

Saturday:  Special Olympics bowling for Jena and Gary.  I worked on some computer projects for Church and for an activity we are doing for Special Olympics.  Then I headed over to the bowling alley for our Saturday post-bowling.  My new bowling shoes had arrived so I needed to try them out.  I am now official with my own locker at the bowling alley (at three dollars a season--Gary said it was worth the cost.)

Still wearing my other shoe when I took this picture...so corny I know.

Gary and Jena headed over to help with Christmas lights at Grandma's house while I ran a few errands.   After an unexpected trip to the ER to check on our brother-in-law who had to make a visit there (turned out to only be a urine infection but they were worried about other things.), Gary and I headed down to BYU with our dear friends, Hal and Jolynn Beckstrand to attend a BYU basketball game.  It was a very fun game which BYU won.  It was great to catch up with them.  It always makes me wonder why we don't get together more often.  They have been friends for over 30 years.  And of course, no pictures.  I am going to make it a goal to get pictures of these sweet friends(and all of the rest of you) which have been such a blessing in our lives throughout the years and will continue to be in the eternities.

And that is a wrap for the week!!! Hope yours was great as well.