Martin Christmas Dinner

My sister-in-laws and I decided that this year we all wanted to spend Christmas at our own houses with just our families. We end up traveling a lot or having family over on Christmas that it was a nice idea to have one that was just our small families. Don't get me wrong I enjoy getting together with family but now that we have kids that are getting older I want them to have some traditions of our own.

Sister love

So we decided that we would have a Martin family Christmas dinner on the 18th. It was so nice to see everyone and we had a great time. As soon as we showed up Paul and I didn't see much of Natalie or Katelyn. They just love to play with their cousins that they take off and I have to go find them to make sure they aren't getting into too much trouble. We do a movie exchange for the grown-ups and some how Paul got the movie "Big Trouble in Little China" again for the second year in a row. I swear Paul loves some of the dumbest movies. He was so excited because last year he got the DVD and this year he got the Blue-ray. We really don't have the same taste in movies. I think next year the Martins have decided to do a movie exchange and you bring a movie that you hate. It will be funny to see how many men bring chic flicks and the women bring the B rated movies the men like. I am so glad we had this dinner the week before Christmas because it totally put me in the holiday mood. I am looking forward to Christmas and with Natalie now on Christmas break we can start do some of the fun things. Baking cookies, drive around to see the lights and go to the mall to see santa and that is just the start.

Party at Amos and Michelle's house

Thanksgiving

I know it is way over due but I just had to post something about Thanksgiving because I got to see a really cute little nugget and I have a travel story that I will probably never forget.

The girls and I went down to Las Vegas to visit my cousin Emily and her family. My husband got stuck back home because of work so that meant I was traveling 7 months pregnant and with two kids but I thought I could handle it. Emily had her little boy in August and I hadn't seen him yet so I was so excited to see and hold him. He is such a cute and easy baby. It was so cute to see how Sadie loves her little brother. My girls of course loved playing with Sadie and wanted to hold and kiss Brody. I think they are going to do great with our new little one. I only have a few pictures because I just kept forgetting to take pictures....I guess that is what happens when you are having so much fun!! I was so glad to be able to come down and spend Thanksgiving with Emily and Travis.

No matter how much we cleaned....it always looked like this....the girls were so helpful. So now on with the travel story. We got to Las Vegas just fine which was good because it put my uneasy feelings of traveling by myself with two kids to rest. Then on the way home the flight out of Las Vegas was an hour and a half late so we missed our connecting flight in Salt Lake but they had one more later that night that we would make so it wasn't that bad yet. The girls were really bored of airports by the time we got to Salt Lake that I was glad our connecting flight was a little early.We got on the plane and flew all the way to the Tri-Cities when the captain came on the speaker and said the weather was bad enough that they couldn't land and they were taking us back to Salt Lake. I handled that really well and started crying on the plane. (dang hormones) By the time we got back to Salt Lake it was midnight and the girls were crying and tired when I had to wake them up to get them off the plane. So the airline gave us a voucher for a cheap hotel and a phone number to call to get another flight. I called the number and they told me that the next available flight was in 3 days!!! By this time I am not crying anymore I am just mad. The only thing I could think of was to get a flight to Spokane and have Paul drive the 2 1/2 hours to pick us up. The earliest flight was the following evening so I booked it and now needed to get me and the kids to the hotel. The only good thing about this night was that because Paul is a Gold member with this airline our hotel was upgraded to the Marriott. The girls and I finally got into bed at 2 am. Oh one small bit of info...the airline thought it would be easier if we didn't get our bags and they just transferred them to our next flight. So no bags or change of clothes or even our tooth brushes. The next morning we got up, bought some tooth brushes and toothpaste in the lobby of the hotel and needed to check out at noon. Then back to the airport to wait 8hrs until our flight left. There is not that much to do in an airport and then on top of it I had to entertain to kids. That was the longest 8 hrs of my life. When we finally bordered the plane they could only keep two runways open due to the weather so we taxi'ed the runway for 2 hrs. Thank goodness my kids fell asleep but it was still long for me and Paul was just pulling up to the airport in Spokane when I called him and said we were just taking off in Salt Lake.

This was the best smile I could get out of them. We were just about to board the plane to go home.

Overall I will never travel without Paul again. We were so happy to be home and I had to try really hard not to cry when I saw Paul in the airport. I will never forget this disaster.