I just realized.

It's a good thing there are holidays, or I would never take pictures, and never have reason to blog.

Christmas 2011

We had a really fun Christmas this year. Spencer was home, and we decided to go cut down our tree from a farm in Alpine. They only had Blue spruce trees, at least that's all we saw. Have you ever tried to cut down/carry/put in a stand/decorate/water/undecorate/get rid of a Blue Spruce? I'm not sure how long it will take for the rash we all got from the prickly needles to go away, but even Spencer says it's the best tree we ever had. It was huge, and really beautiful!

We made gingerbread houses on Family Night right after Thanksgiving. Tara and Spencer each had a friend join us, and that was it. A pretty small group this year, but fun all the same. Tara later invited the Single's Ward to make houses, and that was a bit more rambunctious. No pictures, though.

Tara and Joe

Spencer and Sarah

Jeny's house and some lady holding it up.

I love all the pensive looks.

Christmas eve was spent here with the kids and the Galloway family. We did our usual cold cuts and french onion soup, and the Galloway's added some Cinnamon Rolls and Wassail. Yummy! We did not have our usual program. I guess Tara and Spencer have decided that only traditions that make Jeny work hard are worth keeping. Instead we sang Christmas carols with Mark, Joe and David playing guitars. That was really pretty fun, especially when we got to "Blue Christmas" and everyone's Elvis came out. We watched Spencer's Christmas program compilation, read the Christmas story and watched the Bishop's Wife. Good times! Of course, I got no pictures. Bummer.

Christmas Morning

This is the only picture I got of people on Christmas morning. I had to wake them all up - again. Maybe my grandkids will be excited enough to get up before me. Sigh.

The End of 2011

New Years Day Right after our New Years celebrations.

Church starts at 9am now, so we decided to break up the houses right after the new year began, at about 1:30am.

Spencer's favorite is to drop the real gingerbread house. He's been doing this since he was about 3.

The mess - cleaned up by all these great smashers. I didn't have to do a thing!

From left to right, Kelsey (Grierson) Long, Joe Galloway, Tara, Sarah Ogden and Spencer.

New York City

Mark had a client meeting this past Saturday in the Bronx, so we decided to go together and spend a quick weekend in New York. We stayed at a little (very little) hotel right off Herald Square, which is right by Macys, and this is the north side of the Macy's building.
The first night we went with Mark's co-worker and just walked around a bit. We went to Times Square and around the Rockefeller building. They had already decorated for Christmas, and I didn't even hear anyone complaining about it being too early. I loved it!
The thing inside this scaffold is the Christmas tree that stands outside the Rockefeller building. I asked the security guard at the tree for a little piece of the tree, and she broke off two decent sized branches for me! She was super friendly and chatted a lot.

We had to go into the Toys R Us store at Times Square. It was pretty amazing! They have a Wonkaland that looks a lot like the one in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and there is a Ferris Wheel inside the store. Here you can see the Mr. and Mrs. Potatoe Head car.

We also walked by Radio City and it was just pretty.

On Saturday, while Mark was working, I went Christmas shopping. I went into the Macy's, and they still have wooden escalators. So cool! Then I called Mark's niece, Karene, and she took me to all the right places for my shopping. Christmas shopping is done. Wahoo!!!

That night Karene took us all ove the place, and my favorite was this park that is made on a retired elevated subway line. There are parts of the park that you can still see the old tracks. And the views were great.

On Sunday we just did sight seeing. We went to Brooklyn and had lunch in a real italian restaurant, then we walked back to Manhatten across the Brooklyn bridge.

We took the Staton Island ferry to . . . you guessed it. Staton Island. It passed right by the Statue of Liberty and not too far from Ellis Island. Next time in NY, I will get to that island!

That night we walked around again, visiting Grand Central Station. What a huge building!

On Monday we went to the Christmas show at Radio City, featuring the Rockettes. This is the lobby of Radio City.

After the show, we went to the 911 Memorial Park. This was probably the best part of the trip. All I will say about it is, I really love this great guy I married!

These pictures show the waterfall pools and the Freedom Tower under construction.

The oldest surviving church in Manhatten is St. Pauls, right next to the World Trade Center site. It's really a miracle that the church wasn't seriously damaged.

Then we walked down 5th avenue, into Schwartz toy store and Tiffany's.
Here we are by some of the decorations along our way.
And of course, there is the food. Ah, the heartburn! But it was worth it!

Carving pumpkins without Mark :(

But we still had fun! Here's what we got.

See if you can figure out who did which. Here's a hint. Joe made one, and he likes Jack.

Fall Fun

Collecting beautiful leaves - in the dark.

Tara doing her trademark faerie pose.

Tara and Joe on the cool log.

All of us on the cool log.

My favorite boys!

The results of our labors. I like it!

Hey! Lookee what I found!

Can you believe that was two years?

Elder Grierson finally returned home yesterday.