2020 - Holiday Season Begins

 Our holiday season started off a bit rocky - Tay and I were exposed to a confirmed COVID-19 case the Sunday before Thanksgiving. We found out on Tuesday (about 2 hours after Du had arrived) and so we had to cancel Thanksgiving with G, Papa, Uncle Cullen, Aunt KJ and the Morrison/Popovich crew. There were tears all around but we knew it was for the best and it was a good lesson to be safer leading up to Christmas. Luckily (and shockingly) none of us contacted COVID and came out of quarantine healthy! Du ended up staying through the weekend since he was already exposed and the 5 of us hunkered down, watched lots of movies (Avery and I enjoyed Sister Act and Sister Act 2), played games, and made some Thanksgiving sides and awesome Asian meals (sent by Trinh) to get by. So now it's onto Christmas preparation! 

We got the tree decorated - The kids were a huge a help decorating the house. Tay gave us a scare when he decided to stick an ornament in a light socket and see what happened (again, we were lucky nothing happened!). We listened to our favorite Christmas songs and it felt great to get the house ready and festive!!

We were out of quarantine in time to go to Merry on the Prairie last weekend. It was scaled back some this year but we still had the polar plunge, merry go round, selfie with santa and a visit to Trinket the Elf to see if we were on the nice list. Avery was ON! Tay raised a red flag and had to sing the first verse of Jingle Bells to get on the nice list. Tay sang "Jingle Bells, Jingle, Bells, All the way Home". He combined some songs so Trinket said "RE-MIX" and got him on the nice list. We had a great night and saw lots of pretty lights, we made it home in time for hot chocolate, cookies and the new Disney+ movie. Well Avery and I watched the movie and Hung and Tay played an odd game where they timed themselves to see how long they could leave a chip clip on their ring finger??

Some other December highlights so far:

• Ella and Skin-Skin are back and raising mischief around the house including creating a zipline. They bring the kids little gifts every morning, too :)
• Tay started piano lessons and is off to a great start. He is practicing and really wants to get to Jingle Bells before x-mas.
• Avery is doing awesome with her voice lessons and may be far enough along to join a band in a few months at Bach to Rock!
• There are lots of fun activities at school planned for the holidays.
• Avery discovered the online game Among Us and likes to play with her friend Kendall
• Four random things:
• Taylor asks every night if he can be weird at the dinner table which means putting water in his food and eating it. SUPER ODD. It grosses Avery out and tonight she screamed "Jesus Mary and Joseph" when he did it. LOL
• Bingo got stuck under our bed when he thought there was food and could not get out. We had to pull him!
• Tay now makes a "bed" every night in my room that includes all the throw pillows and a heating pad, no blanket
• We got Avery her first bank account and she just got her own debit card!

We are SO looking forward to X-mas but that means we have to be super careful and quarantine until the family arrives in 2 weeks. To pass the time we are planning to make Gingerbread houses, bake cookies, and get all the gifts ready. We can't wait for the family to arrive.

Avery's Gingerbread House for her Daisy Troop

Decorating and Tay and Hung being weird

Avery and Tay reading the book to get the Elves to Come

Avery building an Elf House

Tay playing with his Lite Brite

Avery running a Archery Class - Report card for Hung

Skin Skin and Ella on the Zipline -Ella slipped LOL

Boy Snuggles!

Merry on the Prairie

Bingo stuck under the bed

Tay's "move" to snuggle with Bingo!