Weekly Wrap-up

Last week was a busy one as it was my turn to teach Joy School. Joy School weeks are always so hectic but so worth it to get to spend time with my sweet little Nicky and the other cute kids. The theme this month has been Sharing and Service! How fun! On Monday we went around the corner to a home for elderly women and shared our Christmas program with them. The kids put on a presentation of the Nativity (Nick was a shepherd & Kade was even a wiseman!) and then they sang a few songs they had learned. They then gave out hugs and cards to all the "grandmas". The kids were especially excited because they got to see our bishop's mom. Nick was a little shy with all the grandmas but Kade was not at all & gave away plenty of hugs! Skylar's kindergarten class also went to sing for them later in the week.
Later that night we went to the Provo library to see the Utah County Bell Ringers. They only played a couple of songs and then let all of the kids in the audience take a turn. This turned out to be crazy since there were a hundred kids who went up, ours included. But the kids had a fun time ringing their bells!
Thursday was St. Lucia's day. I almost forgot which would've broken my daughter's heart. St. Lucia's Day is a Swedish tradition that celebrates the beginning of the twelve days of Christmas. The custom goes that the oldest daughter in the family wears a crown of candles and a white dress and ushers in the light of Christmas by serving her family sweet rolls. This is basically the only tradition that we do that honors our heritage, isn't that kind of sad? We definitely need to pick up a few more. Skylar really loves the whole thing and loves to serve the whole family sweet rolls and we all love to eat them!
On Thursday night we had our Family Joy School Party. The kids put on the same program for all of the families and we had treats that they had made themselves-well, mostly. The kids really belted out the songs. It was so cute!

Friday night Ben and I left the kids at the Tongs and snuck out to eat at Red Lobster. I say sneak because Nick loves "Red Losber" and would've been upset had he known we didn't take him. But we really needed a night out alone! We tried to get in a movie but there was no chance of that after getting stuck in traffic for an hour!
Speaking of traffic, on Saturday after we went sledding we headed up to SLC to Temple Square. We forgot to check the Jazz schedule and unfortunately hit SLC at the same time as the fans. There was also something going on at the Conference center so we were lucky enough to hit that traffic too! It was crazy!! Once we finally found a parking spot in some ghetto alley we finally made it to the lights! Our friends, the Hanamaikais, met us there- they were smart and parked at the Gateway so arrived much sooner. It was so pretty at Temple Square. It seems like the Christmas spirit really hits once you go there. Afterwards we all went out to Crown Burger, which has become our Temple Square tradition. We had such a great time!