Christmas Day

Merry Christmas from the Randalls! 

Here are the girls sporting their new footie pajamas.  Max actually wanted in on the action. 

Piper opening her first present from Santa.  It was a Doc McStuffins doctor set.  The perfect gift.  Santa must know her well.

Calista opening her present.  Funny how excited she was to get an alarm clock. 

Doesn’t Mark look happy?

Happy girls.

We were able to share our Christmas Day with Bruce and Beverley.  I love this shot.  It shows Grandpa’s fancy wrapping paper (newspaper) and Grandma’s happiness in sharing Christmas Morning with her family. 

The aftermath.  My least favorite part of Christmas morning…the cleanup.

The Randalls and the Joneses all came over in the afternoon for our traditional lasagna meal.  Then it was on to games, then ice skating once the sun went down. 

Watching other people have fun on our rink makes me so happy.  And I’m pretty sure all the cousins had a good time.  Not sure what Piper is doing in this picture.

Marin was skating like a pro after only 20 minutes or so. 

Megyn didn’t want to let go of the walker. 

Markee came out and took a little turn on the ice as well. 

All the cousins were able to have a few laps on the ice.  It took most of the night since we only have so many pairs of skates to go around.  Peter, Josh and Erik spent the most time out there and had a blast.  I think Peter and Erik will try to convince Leslie and Jared to build their own rink next winter. 

Christmas Eve

This year our theme was Germany for Christmas Eve at Jeff’s house.  I love this tradition we do.  We go to Jeff and Alison’s house and have dinner and then have some sort of story/lesson and the kids do an activity.  It’s also a great time to showcase all the musical talent the Randall side has. 

Mark was able to bust out his German fedora and suspenders he bought in Germany last year.  He was lamenting the fact we never found lederhosen, though.  Oh well.  We improvised!

During the ancestry lesson we had on our German roots the ‘kids’ decorated Christmas trees while they waited to see if St. Nick would fill their shoes with candy. 

Calista and her awesome tree…and Tamsyn photo bombing.  We will allow it, though.  She leaves us in a month to go on a mission. 

Piper’s creation. 

And Téa’s tree…and photo bombing by Megyn.  It runs in the family. 

A little guitar playing by Jeff in his lederhosen. 

We had to get a picture of the brothers all dressed up. 

St. Nick actually came and filled the kids’ shoes with candy.   Jeff did a great job on the presentation of a few of our German ancestors.   There is so much good in knowing your history and where you come from.  I think the kids enjoyed the evening and learning just a bit more about who they are and where the Randall line comes from. 

I love this time of year to focus on the Savior and spend so much time with family.  The older I get the more my perspective changes.  It becomes more about the kids and teaching them the stories of Jesus.  It becomes more about the true Spirit of it all and helps us become more selfless.  Merry Christmas!

Piper’s First Dance Recital

Piper chose to start dance classes back in August.  It has been an interesting experience.  Some days she loves it and some days she doesn’t.  When it finally came time for her Christmas recital, Piper was loving it (thankfully).  She got excited when parts of her outfit arrived in the mail.  Here was the finished product of all my hard online shopping…

I get this face quite a bit.

This was just after she danced and came off stage.  She wanted a picture of her starting pose in the dance.  

She did really well.  I’m just happy she got up on stage and danced instead of just standing there looking dazed.  You’d be surprised how often that happens with all the little girls involved in the recital.  Afterwards, Santa was available for all the kids to see and to hear all their wishes for presents. 

Piper loved all the attention and she and I had fun curling hair together.  We did find out that she hates makeup too.  I sure hope she feels the same way in 10 years. 

After watching Piper dance, Calista admitted she wants to dance again.  We’ll see how she feels in four months when registration opens again for classes.  I still have nightmares about the fighting we had to do every Tuesday night for months just to get her to go to dance class.  I’m not sure I can do that again. 

Christmas Decorating

This year it was Téa’s turn to put the tree topper on.  (Next year will be Calista’s turn-the girls make sure I keep track of this.  It’s very important.  Calista will also do the Santa ornament on the advent calendar). 

Sometimes our half-wall does come in handy. 

All the girls pitched in with decorating.  Even Piper made it to the last tree decoration.  She usually gets bored. 

Cute Calista. 

Piper and our swan ornament we got from Germany. 

Somehow Téa stole the camera and caught me decorating the tree. 

It takes us probably two hours to decorate the whole house for Christmas, and I love it!  Nothing too stressful and then clean up after Christmas is super fast. 

Zamboni Not Included

Monday, December 2 was the night we got to fill up the ice rink.  We were so excited. 

It took 4 hours to fill it up.

The next morning we woke up to this…

Perfect timing, right?  The water didn’t start freezing until the next night, though.   

By Friday the rink was solid ice.  Our first night of ice skating was December 6 and man did we have fun!

What a good-looking family.  Well, minus the photographer. 

Calista.

Piper. 

Téa.

Me…just before my double axel.

As long as the ice is frozen enough we skate every night.  Some nights it’s just me and Mark, which is pretty fun.  Our family has spent more time outside in the last month than we did the last two winters combined.  I highly recommend everyone make their own rink.  Totally worth it.  And if you don’t live where it’s cold enough, just come borrow ours. 

Turkey Trot 2013

My last 5k of the year happened to be my best ever.  Not only did I get my best time ever but I convinced Meghan to run the race with me (and she hated every second of it).  And I’m super mad I didn’t even take any pictures.  So, pretty much this post is just to brag a little…about me. 

My official race time was 25:58 (down from 27:17 from the Freedom Run).  I was 10th place in my age group and 134th place overall out of 744 people.  This old lady is like cheese…I keep getting better with age. 

Building A Rink 101

After the last few years of enjoying our friend’s ice rink Mark decided it was time to build our own this winter so we could skate whenever we wanted.  I was more than willing to let him, and so were the girls. He humored us all by letting us help him.  It was slow going at first but having all three girls help ended up being beneficial.  We were able to finish construction in just an afternoon.

Construction began November 2 since we knew Mark would be going to China the end of November and we wanted to make sure it was all put together before the weather turned. 

First item of business: cut 2x4’s to make braces.  The girls really had fun with this, marking the wood where Mark needed to cut with the saw. 

I’m finding out more and more how much Téa is like me.  Poor kid has to do everything perfectly.  No cutting corners.  How has Mark put up with me all these years?

Do you like Mark’s work station?  Still can’t believe that used to be our old dining room table.  We could barely fit 4 placemats on that thing.  It does make a good workshop table now, though. 

Every kid got a chance to try out the drill.  Téa was the only one who could push hard enough to drill through the wood. 

Being the oldest child has its perks.  Téa got to be the helper around the big tools. 

About three hours later I went upstairs to get a better view of our handiwork.  Finished dimensions are 36’x22’.  (*since we’ve skated on the rink now we’ve decided that it’s much too small and will be as big as the yard will allow next year). 

The rest of the afternoon was spent putting the finishing touches on: flood lights, wire, white Christmas lights and a step. 

For the month we had the rink built until the time we could actually fill it with water, this was what the girls did almost every night.  Apparently playing tag in it was just awesome.  I will admit that I would turn on the lights at night just so I could stare at the rink.  It was just so pretty.  (I just noticed that this picture was taken on the night of the full moon and looks like it’s one of the flood lights on the right)

Whenever friends would come over they had to play in it, too.

We waiting patiently (and sometimes not so patiently) for the weather to get cold enough to freeze the rink.  It finally came December 2.  That post to come soon…

Oktoberfest 10K 2013

I finally got to do another 10K race.  I missed last year’s Oktoberfest race because I was in Germany.  I got a personal record time of 55:59, shaving off five minutes from two years ago.  Not too shabby for this thirty-something lady.  I ran it again with Jared and Leslie.  They, of course, beat me…again.  I blame my hip for slowing me down. 

Leslie and Jared both medaled.  Leslie won first place in her age group and Jared got second.  

Me…I got fourth place in my age group.  Missed it by that much.  Marissa, the other girl in the picture up above, came in second in our age group which knocked me out of the top three.  I still blame Leslie and Jared for bringing her.  If she didn’t come I would have medaled.  I’m not bitter or anything…

Fall Break 2013

Since last year for Fall Break we ditched the kids to head to Germany, we decided to do something with them this year.  We headed to Mesquite to stay only a few days but pretty much the entire time was spent by the pool.

One day we had lunch outside and found out that Jeep really, really likes Salt n’ Vinegar potato chips. 

Here’s Jeep shaking for some chips from Calista. 

Téa was nicer and didn’t make Jeep do any tricks for chips.   

Then Jeep was on to Piper for food. 

By the time she made the rounds I think Jeep was practically foaming at the mouth from all that saltiness. 

The first morning we were there I woke up and found Calista doing this…

Reading!  I’ve never caught Calista reading a big chapter book just for fun.  Just another reason to thank JK Rowling for her writing skills.  She’s a genius. 

PS. I’m wondering why I never take pictures of the kids with my parents.  I will have to remedy this.