To answer a few questions about our family pictures: We were outside, it was not a back drop. It had snowed the day before and the trees were perfect. It was about 35 degrees out so of course us Alaskans didn't need coats. The snow was about up to my knees and Olivia needed to be carried. We took a red bench from my room and packed it around to the different places we shot pictures. It took us about 45 minutes to get our shots. For those of you familiar with the area, we were at the Eagle River North Fork state recreation area on the way to the Nature Center.
We saw lots of animal tracks and heard a moose bellowing in the not too far off distance, but no wildlife encounters.
But this weekend we had the most holiday-rific time of all! It started Saturday morning with the boys Christmas piano recital and Olivia's primary Christmas party, both at 10 AM. Luckily we just had to drop Olivia off to her teachers at church and we both made the recital. It was Ethan's first performance. He was thrilled to play on his teacher's cherry red baby grand piano because "It sounds cooler than the smaller black one downstairs."
Olivia had a visit from Santa at her party. "But," she told me. "It wasn't the real Santa. He only comes out on Christmas and its not Christmas yet." Olivia asked for, "The doll withe the llama." Luckily, as one of Santa's helpers, I know that this means the American Girl Doll "Chrissa" and her pet llama.
After the party/recital we went up to Palmer for their annual Colony Christmas celebration. Just like Perry, UT celebrates the 4th of July in a grand way, Palmer uses Christmas as the back drop for their towns celebration. We decided to check out the Nativity display set up at the LDS church house. The building was also hosting performers and our friends little girls were participating in a couple of numbers that their little dance group put on so we decided to go and support them and see what kind of Nativities were set up.
The Church gym in Palmer at the Nativity Display. This is just a taste of the set up that was all over the building for us to enjoy.We spent over 2 hours taking in all of the Nativities, playing the "I spy" game set up for the kids to look for objects all over the building, and then moved on to see more of Palmer. We saw the ice sculpture garden, and many lights and carolers, but missed the gingerbread house displays, the night time parade, and only glimpsed in on the Orchestra Concert playing holiday music.
Ice sculpture Gardenn at Palmer's Colony Christmas FestivalAnd the party was fantastic!! A HUGE amount of work was put into a very nice evening.
The end of weekend was wrapped up with a Messiah Sing A Long at the church last night. The amount of "amateur" was incredible and the quality was top notch. A small orchestra and an army of pianists accompanied the soloists and the congregational choir. It was a lot of fun and a awesome way to worship our Savior this time of year.
Yes, the Moncurs are feeling the Christmas spirit!
Posts
