This was such a fun week! We’re just soaking up Christmas time and all the magical and fun moments that come with it! We did A LOT of fun things this week, so prepare yourself for a longer blog.
Monday, was WebAIM’s holiday luncheon. We went to Crumb Brother’s and ate in their special back room for catered events. Each team member got to bring one guest. Mark and I had so much fun talking with my colleagues and their spouses. Also, the food was delicious!
We decided, for the twelve days leading up to Christmas to do “Twelve Dates of Christmas.” We planned one fun date each day. Most of them are just simple activities to do at home, but it’s been a lot of fun! Monday evening we watched a nativity video together.
Tuesday after work and walking Flynn, I met with my primary presidency over Zoom to finalize teacher spots for 2022. Then I immediately hopped onto a Zoom meeting for work. That evening, we made paw print ornaments using a kit my sister, Marisa, gave us! It took a few tries, but turned out really cute!
Wednesday, Mark was the one who had extra meetings! He and his professor were supposed to drive to Salt Lake City for a meeting but due to the snow and ice the meeting was moved onto Zoom (thank goodness for Zoom!!). That evening, Mark and I walked around downtown Logan to look at gingerbread houses that were on display. Our favorites were the elves’ library and Calvin & Hobbes making snowman on the quad. Mark also really liked the farmhouse and barn one!!
Thursday morning, I graded my last couple of final exams and submitted final grades! Luckily, most of my students took the exam early so I was able to grade them as they trickled in instead of grading them all after the due date. I also finished up my contract hours for English Connect on Thursday morning! For the next couple weeks I’ll just have WebAIM work which is going to be lovely!!
Thursday morning, we also watched the special Christmas message from President Nelson! We were able to watch it together when it came out at 8:00 before Mark left for school. That evening, our date was reading our favorite Christmas Children’s books by the Christmas tree. We had to shuffle our dates around a bit because our car was in the shop for emission testing and to repair a windshield wiper that broke because of ice on the windshield. The mechanic fixed it so quickly and it was ready the next morning!
Friday, Mark had his FINAL final!!!! This is his last semester taking classes, so he won’t be on the student side of finals week again! He studied a lot and felt it went well!! It’s crazy to think he’s done with classes. Now, he gets to really focus on his dissertation and start applying for jobs. We really hope we can find a good job, close to family!
Friday evening was a lot of fun! I made a nice dinner-stuffed pasta shells and green salad. For our date, we went to Zootah lights. We got there when it started at 4:30 and had the zoo to ourselves until it was time to go home. I wore lots and lots of layers!
When we got home from the zoo, we did our Christmas Break Book tradition. Earlier, we had each picked a book to order from Amazon. On Friday, we wrapped and hid each other’s books. We were too tired to spend much time searching this year, so we gave each other hints to make it go faster haha! I think it would have taken a long time without hints! Mark hid mine in our flour bucket and I hid Mark’s behind our DVD’s. It really is wonderful sitting by the tree reading together after we find our books. So peaceful. One of my favorite Christmas feelings. I got A Christmas Carol! I wanted to read the original book after seeing the play and movie last week. It was really fun to see all the details the play and movie implemented from the book. I got a beautiful, silk-covered version with illustrations. I read the whole thing that night!! Mark requested The Hobbit! He listened to it on audible earlier this year and really wanted to own a copy. We found a nice, illustrated version for him too!!
After Christmas Break Books, we put on our matching Christmas pajamas (thanks to my cousin who gave Flynn these pajamas last Christmas and my aunt who gave us these pajama pants last January) and got set up to sleep under the Christmas tree! We pulled our mattress out to the living room and ate brownies and peppermint ice cream in bed while watching The Santa Clause. It was such a fun evening and falling asleep under our Christmas tree was the perfect way to end it.
Saturday morning, (after a quick exercise session and putting away our bed) we made gingerbread reindeer pancakes. They were delicious and adorable! Mark cut the bacon to look like antlers and I baked the pancakes.
We spent the rest of Saturday relaxing and that evening we watched Christmas with the Kranks with my brother’s family. My sister in law loves that movie so it’s a lot of fun to watch it with them!!
It was such a great week and we’re very excited for next week and all the Christmas moments ahead!!
Our Story: The Bell Family 