December

Our December this year felt emptier than usual...it is more difficult to go about holiday celebrations when you a missing the child you thought would be a part of them. But we still did our best to go about many of our normal fun Christmastime activities, plus some that haven't been traditional for us.

One of the first things we ended up doing was seeing the lights on Temple Square.

Right at the start of the month we also went to our ward's Christmas party. This included a dinner and program put on by the various organizations within the ward. The Primary dressed up as people and animals from the nativity and sang a couple songs. The Elder's Quorum put on a kazoo piece that Austin ended up participating in too.

After everything else, Santa came to visit, so Austin hurried over to wait in line for his turn to speak with this important guest.

The following week, Austin played Silent Night at his piano recital with Nate accompanying him. He played his piece better at home many times, but he didn't do too badly at the recital.

Later that week we went to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas Concert because our good friends Heather and Royce invited us. We always try to get tickets for this, but have never been successful, so it was our first time going. We enjoyed it, and really appreciated the invite to go!

We also got to see our good friend Lori and her kids that weekend. We met up at Burger Stop for dinner and then took a hay ride around Layton Commons Park to see the lights there. We topped the occasion off with some hot chocolate.

The weekend before Christmas we went to and performed in the annual Peaden Family Christmas Program that my grandma holds each year. We were grateful that it only lasted an hour and didn't drag on seemingly endlessly as it sometimes does.

Nate's sister-in-law is Mexican and she invited us to join in their Christmas tradition called Las Posada this year. So, the Friday before Christmas we drove down to Utah Valley to have dinner and walk between a couple places representing "inns" with the children all dressed up in nativity themed costumes. We sang about needing a place to stay while the "innkeepers" sang back that there was no room. We ended with going inside the room we had started at and then acting out the nativity. Afterward, there were a couple pinatas to batter and smash. It was a fun way to celebrate Christmas a bit differently than we normally do.