The tale of 4 Christmases

The "upside" to Leena having divorced parents (as well as Jeff), is all the christmases that come with it! We will have had 4 this year! First christmas was packing up my 2 babies, filling up the mazda to the brim with coats, hats, gloves, snow shoes, beanies, and 6 days worth of clothes and toilitries. And making the what used to be 8 hour drive, to Idaho. jerome, specifically. Leena did FABULOUS! She was such a sweetheart through it all. We had to stop obviously for gas and lunch, and she just watched movies and slept the whole way. Just asked ONE time how long we'd been travelling for, such a good girl! We met up with Jeff's cousins Lauren and her sister, Meagan in Boise. Then, for some reason, I forgot how FAR we were from our actual destination. In short, it was about, well a little less than 2 hours from Boise. Anyway, we left a little late because the passes were advising snow, and we needed chains for our car, and after 30 stores of calling around, no one, literally, on this side, had any. (I'll go into that story later) I think we left at 9:30, and got into Jerome (with meeting up with the cousins for an hour or so) around 10:30. Landon slept the whole time, almost. which, we forgot would come to haunt us. He was wide awake until about 2am. So, needless to say, it was a long trek, and we were tired. We stayed at Jeff's mom house. We hung out with Jeffs sister, Christy, and her cute little family (she has 5 kids, oldest is 12, youngest is 3) for a while, and laid low. Til Christmas eve. On Christmas eve, everyone got together for church, and then met at grandma and grandpa Daniels house. Which, was nice to see all the names with the face I've yet to match. We had a good time, and good dinner with family. The kids got an abundance of things. Some, are still in Idaho. We then went home and went to bed. The next day was Christmas! Forecasters had said it was going to snow, and I was upset that I was going to miss the white christmas in Seattle. Would've been my frist there! But! It snowed a bunch in Jerome, making it a white christmas anyway. We woke Leena up to her first white christmas. She was so excited, had breakfast and waited for Jeffs sister to come over with all the kids to have christmas with them. We had a good time and Leena enjoys all her presents Jeff and I got her. We have a good share of stuff now! (which were 3 things cause everyone just loves buying for her) We then bid then packed up the cars again, and drove teh long drive out to Gooding, where Aunt Phyllis lives. We then had Christmas dinner and opened up many presents, while Leena played her brains out with her new cousins, Elisha and Jonah. (They're 5 and 6) While we were at Aunt Phyll's house, I got a call from my parents..with my little brother cody on the line!!! I was so mad that I was going to miss my little brothers one call home on christmas while they're on their mission. but, my mom got the # to call them back at, and 3 way called me in! Thanks mommy!! He's doing great, and seems happy. He's done alot of good out there, and i'm sure touched many people in many ways. Cody had a huge heart, he always has. I'm sure he's blessed people. Cody knows he's in the right place, doing what he's supposed to. I'm so proud of him!! Mom did the same with Seth, 3 way called me in. His spanish is amazing! He rambleed off a few things to me, and I was like "I have NO idea what you said, but it sounds pretty darn authentic!" he said he hates the bostonian accents, you can't understand what they're saying. He also said, the lady next door, April, (who you can't even tell is a woman if it wasn't for her name) is a hoot. If she ever needs help with anything, she hits up those missionaries next door! He says, that she introduces them as her husbands, hahaha. Hee loves the people he runs into, and teaches. He is a minority in Boston. He also said it's alot of Dominicans, Venezuelans, and Uruguay cultures. which means it's pretty darn diverse out there. He has been snowed in for 3 days, and he and his new companion, were pretty bored of playing the same games over and over. Seth is a good guy, he's learning so much, I'm proud of him as well. Both of my missionary brother are proud uncles. Seth said he told some of the ward memeber that "I had my first nephew!", they do come forma family of alot of girls! I put Leena and Jeff on for both brothers, I can't wait til they're home! The next day, the 26th, was go home day. The night prior, as Jeff was tucking Leena in, she was saying her prayers, and started to cry. He tucked her in anyway, no questions asked to her. So, when he came out and told me she'd started to cry, I was a little alarmed. Leena can be an emotionally sensitive girl, so I wanted to know what was wrong, so I could console her properly. I go in there and ask why she was in tears, she looked at me and said "I don't wanna go home momma..." awww. This was the girl that didn't want to go at first, and we really had to tell her how much fun she was going to have, to get her to go. It was sad to see her cry, but glad at the same time taht she'd had that much fun, and learned to really like all of her new cousins, so fast. I told her we'd come back, and she'd see them again. That seemed to console her a little, but not fully. She was just so upset about leaving, I told her to take deep breaths and to close her eyes and she'd fall asleep. Within 5 minutes, she was out. We left at 8:40. It wasn't a bad drive really, til we hit WA. Of course, we'd been hit by 2 storms, the biggest since 1953, with 75mph winds and 15" of snow in places (IE my parents house!) We hit the pass, and it was dumping snow, and the speed limit was docked from 70mph, to 35. Crap. We lost momentum and had to pull over and put our cables on. We had them on for all of 2 miles, crawling at 20mph. Because our car is labeled a "sports car", it can't go regular speed with chains on. Anyway, after the sheer hell through Snoqualmie Pass, we FINALLY made it to my parents house, which had 14+ inches of snow!! I've NEVER seen it that much at their house! That was 8 more inches than what we had in Idaho! We dropped off Leena, and jetted to seattle (only after getting stuck in my parents driveway of course, cause of snow) and caught teh ferry, and after a long day, got home at 11pm. We got stuck outside of our house, adn said screw it. Took what we needed, adn walked the 7 houses home, with baby in hand. We woke up to a new dent in the car. Which, we don't know how it got there, but we think a snow plow maybe because when we left the car, they plowed around it. We have one more christmas left. My older sister and my 5 year old niece, Maleah, will be flying in on Tuesday, so excited! I haven't seen those 2 in about 3 years. I've missed them! So, we're having another christmas with them!