Wednesday December 26 (add pictures)

We slept in a little this morning before getting up and getting things packed up.

The boys shoveled more snow because it snowed more overnight.

It sure was beautiful.

Got packed up and spent some time with Gramps.

He is a great story teller and the kids love listening to him.

We also cleaned up the house for Gramps because we were like a tornado there!!!!

I told him that we most likely left stuff there, because we had stuff sprawled out everywhere!!!!!

We are glad we got to spend Christmas with Gramps. 

It made for a very special day.

Anyway, we got driving towards Utah.

Stopped to see Grandma, and wipe the snow from her gravestone.

Then of course we had to see the buffalos.

We had a nice drive through the canyon.

We got to Em's house with about an hour before we needed to head to the family party.

So we got unpacked and chilled out before we headed out to the church for our family party.

We started the night with eating pizza and salad.

Then we made some gingerbread houses with the kiddos.

That was fun.

Cassi lost her phone at some point, and before she could find it, Madi built a gingerbread house around it!!!!

No one would tell Cassi where the phone was.

After gingerbread houses, we all sat down and did a fun gift exchange, then we called Cassi's phone :)

She walked up to it and smashed the house to get the phone.

It was pretty funny!

Then we went on with the gift exchange and had a fun time doing that.

Emmy had some gifts to give all the little kiddos too, so they all opened those, which was fun.

Em has been working many many hours to make some amazing quilts for my parents!

And when I say amazing, that doesn't even cover it!

My Dad's quilt was a bow tie quilt pattern filled with fabrics that remind us of our childhood.

Books he read to us, animals we had growing up, computer and library related fabrics because that was his field of work.

It was amazing!

She also included a fabric swatch from each of the Emmy blankets she has made for us siblings, both in Mom's and Dad's quilts.

Then for Mom's quilt, Em made the most amazing giant quilt block of the 508 house, Grandma Beardall's house.

That block alone took 20 hours to make!!!!!

Then it included bees stitched in the quilting.

Just amazing!

She put so much thought and time....and then more time into these quilts!

She has a gift for sure!

And she is just the sweetest to share it with us the way she does!

After all that and clean up, we headed back to Em's.

We got here about 10.

So now they are all in bed, hoping to get some good sleep, and then we head home tomorrow.

It has been a whirlwind of excitement these last few days.

Oh, update on Shane, they will be releasing him soon.

He will need to take time to recover, but no surgery needed.

Prayers work!!!!