A Week of Christmas Parties

Last week was a week full of Christmas parties. We had a Christmas party every night. They all started Tuesday the 13th with my work party. Instead of going to Las Vegas this year, my company just stayed in town and had dinner and a white elephant party. It was different than past years but I thought it was still a lot of fun. We had dinner at Bloomington Country Club. The white elephant gifts were really good. Russell and I chose second and got a good gift of a popcorn tub and theater sized candy. I wanted to keep it but of course Hans stole it from us and then Jeff stole it from Hans making it no longer able to be traded. Then we got a $10 gift card to Wal-Mart which also got stolen from us. Finally we got the gag gift of the party... A Gas Powered Razor! It was the gift Jeff brought and he had duct taped a funnel to some tubing and then to a razor and included a can of refried beans. It was so funny we had to keep it. Everyone was laughing so hard. Russell and I had a great time.

The next day, Wednesday, was Russell's work Christmas party. This party was held at the St. George Leisure Services building. It was catered by Texas Roadhouse (SO GOOD!!!). They also had a white elephant exchange at the end of the party and we came home with a cozy Christmas blanket. Also at the party Eric Dodge sang, which I wasn't too excited about but it turned out to not be so bad. There were a few songs he had people do line dances to.

He even got all of the ER doctors up there dancing in front of us. It was so funny to watch but they were all good sports about it. This party was fun as well.


Thursday was the Dixie Ambulance Christmas party but we decided not to go to this. Instead we went to Tyler's jazz band concert. Tyler did really well in the concert. Afterward, we all went out for ice cream shakes at Arctic Circle. I love the Christmas flavors of the shakes. Russell got Egg Nog and I got Candy Cane. Yum!


Friday was another Christmas party. This one was with my family. We started this Christmas party tradition last year and it was fun to do it again this year. This year the theme was Ugly Christmas Sweaters. Chad was the official winner with the ugliest sweater:

While at this party we played Christmas pictionary and I made a few videos on Jib Jab with our heads. The videos were so funny. The best was seeing my dad's head dancing around to Feliz Navidad. I wish I could figure out how to download the videos to a disc so I watch them on something other than the Internet. Also if I can figure it out I will post them on the blog. They are great. After the games and eating soup, we started the white elephant exchange. With so many people, it turned to noise quite fast but we are all used to it because that is what our family does. For one of our gifts, we gave the Gas Powered Razor I got at my work party except we added Dynamite Hot Chili to it as well. When that gift was opened, I could not contain myself and just started busting up. It was so funny. Chad ended up with that great gift...Perfect!

Finally Saturday was our final Christmas party of the week. This one was our annual Morwood party with my extended family. We hold this at Santa Clara Elementary. This year was really fun because we did a few Minute to Win It games:

First my dad, and uncles Don Lynn, Chad and Rick had to hold a string with a pom pom on the end in their mouth and wipe it up and have it stick to their nose. First they lathered up their nose with Vaseline so that the pom pom would stick. The whole thing was so funny I am glad I got it on video. Finally right before the buzzer, my dad and Don Lynn got the pom pom to stick. The next stunt was to get an Oreo cookie from the top of your head to your mouth without touching it. My 93 year old grandma, cousin Shawna, and uncle Dennis tried this stunt out. Grandma was the funniest to watch because she kept trying to whip her cookie off her head and catch it in her mouth but it never worked. Dennis almost got it a few times before the cookie fell on the floor. No one was able to complete this challenge in time but the whole room was laughing so hard.

After the Minute to Win It, all of the kids participated in acting out the Nativity while my aunt Sally read the story. Emily was a beautiful angel. She was excited to be up on stage with all of her new found cousins and friends.

Finally, the main event of the evening was a visit from SANTA! Emily was not too sure about Santa. She knew she needed to go up and talk to him to get her present but she wanted me to go with her for moral support. When she got up there she did not want to sit on his lap but she would stand next to him to get her present and that was it. She was much happier to walk away from him instead of toward him. She told Santa she wanted a jump rope and a mermaid for Christmas. When she opened her present however, it was not either one! She was kind of mad until she realized it was a Strawberry Shortcake and then it was an okay gift.

Colby was asleep when his name was called but I still made him sit on Santa's lap for a picture:

I am kind of glad he didn't wake up right when I placed him on Santa's lap because he probably wound have freaked out and been traumatized for life! Any way when he did wake up, we had him open his present and he was so excited for his cars.
Santa even got Uncle Yoddy up on his lap even though Clint thought he was way too old.

And that concluded our week of Christmas parties. There are only 5 more days until Christmas. I can't believe how fast it has come. Merry Christmas everyone!