Nativity 2014

Harrison Nativity

December 23, 2014

All the cousins/ grandkids did a great job again.

Always fun to watch them do this each year.

 

A couple of the angels before the show

Afton- 6 years old

I love 6 year old smiles  especially when 3 teeth still need to grow in.

Lilly- 6 years old

Lizzie was Mary this year

Checking on her baby

Mary and Joseph.  Lizzie is actually holding the baby with care here.
  It was quite amusing to see her put him in the crib.



And action......All the grandkids doing an awesome job!

Cast picture :)

Lilly getting ready to play Jolly Old Saint Nicholas

Piano Guys

Last May I decided to splurge a little of my first paycheck and bought some tickets to The Piano Guys Christmas Concert.  It was Saturday December 20th.  It was an absolutely amazing concert.  Their music is beautiful, inspiring and it  really was a fun entertaining concert.  I am so glad we could all go as a family.  The kids seemed to like it too.  A little too late in the evening for Afton and Lilly though as they both fell asleep about 3/4 of the way through :)

Our seats were super high up (sometimes the sacrifice pricewise when you are a family of six.) 
 Thank goodness for the Jumbo Screen so we could have a great view. 
Plus for this type of concert most of it is the sound anyways.

I promise she really did enjoy the concert. 
She is so funny when cameras come out for pictures



3 of the four kids



Me and my Afton who currently has 3 missing teeth :)

Ran a little late into the evening for this 6 year old :)

Kinda a date night. 
We just had kids on each side of us :)

 

Temple Square

Last Thursday we decided to head down to Temple Square to go check out the festivities there. 

• We walked through City Creek and saw the fountains  that are set to Christmas music .  They even had fire with the water which was pretty awesome.
•  Saw the candy display windows at Macy's. 
• As we were walking around Temple Square we were invited into the old Tabernacle to watch the Christmas Program on big screen videos.  It was going on live at the Conference Center across the street.  It was the Mormon Tabernacle Choir with Sesame Street Muppets and Santino Fontana (voice of Hans on Frozen).  It was pretty awesome. 
• After that we walked around Temple Square again looking at the lights.
•  Then we went back to our car and had some hot chocolate we had packed in an insulated thermos. 

 

Love how this picture captures the meaning of Christmas

Zoo lights

On December 9th we decided to go see Zoo lights up at Hogle Zoo.  I had heard there were discount coupons at Wendy's to justify the cost of going for our family of 6.  We stopped at the Wendy's on Foothill only to discover the coupons were only good for Thursdays (this day was a Tuesday).  We sat in the car for a minute trying to decide if we still wanted to go.  We decided to still go and just use the discount on our zoo membership, only to discover once we got there our membership had expired :( 

 

We were a little worried how the rest of our night would go......

 

 Despite being more money than we originally planned, it was a great night out as a family.  We had lots of fun and the kids though it was great.  That might also be due to the fact we let each of them have a hot chocolate too :)

 

Christmas Devotional

On December 7th Ethan and I were able to go downtown for the First Presidency Christmas Devotional. One of Jim's patients had given him two tickets.   I really enjoyed some one on one time with Ethan.  He is such a great kid.  I also really enjoyed listening to the speakers.  This is such an amazing time of year to reflect on the Savior and be reminded of the true meaning of Christmas.

Ethan and I in front of the Conference Center

View of the Conference Center

Trimming the Tree

Technically we put up our tree the last part of November but

we will just post it now when I have finally found a little time put it on the blog.

Lucky is especially excited when we get the Christmas stuff out
 because he knows his elf costume is there :)

Lizzie carefully placing some ornaments

Afton trying to get to a higher branch

Cute little Afton

Twins sending some Christmas joy

 

As a final touch I found a plastic rat on top of our tree a few days later. 
 Lizzie must have felt it was still missing something.

 

Christmas Card 2014

A few Harrison moments from 2014……

January- Started the year with a family hike around Antelope Island on January 1, 2014.

January- Afton lost her first tooth.  She will lose five more before the end of the year.  Lilly keeps wondering when her turn is to lose her first tooth.
April- Spent a week as a family exploring the Redwoods, Oregon Coast, and Seattle.  It will go down as  one of our ALL TIME FAVORITE family vacations.
April- Ethan turned 12 (in Seattle) and was ordained a deacon in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints about a week after his birthday.
April- Ethan officially became taller than his 5’6” mom.   By December 2014 our 12 year old son is  5’9”!!!!  He is trying his best to catch up to Jim.
May- Jim has a new office and opened up his first Physical Therapy clinic.  We would like to introduce Mountain View Physical Therapy. Now accepting new patients.  Call now!!!! 801-996-3626.  
May- After a 12 year break, Alisha returned to the land of the paid working world.  She gets to work in the office of Lizzie, Afton and Lilly’s school.  She loves it and appreciates this opportunity.   Even better that it is during school hours, summers off, only 17 hours a week and Alisha can see the girls the days she is at work.
June- Sept.  New races for the Harrison family.  Alisha can now check Ragnar off her to do list (June) the kids did their first 5K (Color Run/ August) and Jim, Alisha, Ethan and Lizzie did the Dirty Dash (Sept.)
August- Big moment in the Harrison household as Afton and Lilly started 1^st grade.  That means ALL of our kids are in school ALL day.   Definitely a bittersweet milestone.
November-  All 4 kids did a week without any electronics (TV, Wii, computer, Kindle).  We were very proud of how well they all got along, how creative they got and how quickly the week went by.

Thinking of you this holiday season.  Hope you have a Merry Christmas and a very happy New Year!

Love, Jim, Alisha

Ethan (12), Lizzie (10)
Afton (6) and Lilly (6)
Harrison