socks on a rooster: Trips, Graduations, Christmas and more...

December 15-19 we flew to Boise, Idaho for Hannah's college graduation. The girls are becoming quite the frequent fliers and they do amazing. Allie wasn't asleep for all of the flight there or back but when she was awake she kept pretty entertained by everything and she wasn't a problem at all. We were so thankful the girls did so well.

Mom and Dad, Granny and Pap Paw Taylor all flew out for the graduation as well, so there was quite the crew there. It was a really enjoyable graduation. Since Hannah graduated in December it was a "Winter" theme and they played some Christmas music while people were being seated which Madison loved. She was so fascinated by the "live" music, i.e. drums, horns, etc. Allie slept through a very small portion of the beginning and a tad of the end of graduation but was up for pretty much the entire thing and I must say BOTH of the girls did amazing! I was SO worried but they did great, we were pretty proud of them:) After graduation Mom and Dad treated everyone to some amazing BBQ at Goodwoods in Boise. If you ever have the chance, GO! It was great, then again, we love BBQ so it's always a good thing:)

While we were in Boise we celebrated Madison and Brandon's birthday with presents and some delicious ice cream cake from Cold Stone and we also did our Christmas together a little early. I think everyone was just glad to be together but we all ended up with some pretty neat gifts too:)

When we returned to Colorado we had a couple of days to regroup (and by that I mean unpack, do laundry, cram some house selling/buying in and then pack it all up again.) Then on the 22nd we went to Riverton to be with Brandon's family for Christmas. We were nervous about the roads, as usual this time of year but it ended up being fine. Brandon's sister, Jessica was also there from Washington for Christmas so it was really nice to spend some time with her. Christmas Eve Day, Jessica, Brandon and Rocky went snowmobiling and had a blast. One of these days we are all going to be able to go again (including me) and I can't wait. The girls just need to be a little bit older before I'm comfortable with that. Maybe next winter, we'll see. Then that evening we had some steak and shrimp and spent some time at Brandon's Aunt's house with a bunch of the family. Christmas Day we woke up to gifts from Santa! This was the fist year Madison really understood that Santa was coming and that he was going to bring her presents. We even showed her Santa on Google the night before so she could see he was traveling around the world, on his way to her:) She liked that. Madison got an Easel and an Inch Worm from Santa and Allie ended up with a lot of much needed clothes:) We all had a really good time watching Madison-mainly, open presents. After we had our Christmas that morning we went to Hudson to Brandon's grandparents' house and joined the other 45+people that were there, for more gift exchanges and food. We spent the majority of the day in Hudson then went home to veg. I had been really sick with the flu for pretty much the entire trip and was absolutely miserable at this point. I was at my worst Christmas night. Fun, I know, but I guess it could have been worse... I think that's what I'm supposed to say right? But really it sucked, I was sick on Christmas, who wants that?? I'm getting better now though. I can actually sleep without taking Nyquil, hooray!

Well, that just about sums up our traveling over the month of December. It was a lot of work and stressful at times but so much fun too. Now, we are home and in the middle of trying to get everything taken care of for the sell of the condo and for the buying of our house in Billings. We are really excited! It's going to be amazing. I can hardly stand it. We're scheduled to close on the condo on the 27th of January and then on the house in Billings on either the 31st of January or the 3rd of February, it just depends on how quickly the lenders can get it all together. As soon as we close we're going to have the floors redone, and get some new appliances in the house before the movers show up, it's going to be awesome... like I said, I'm REALLY excited!! You know I will use my new camera and take lots and lots of pics of the new house. This really has been a pretty good month after what we thought was going to be pretty awful. God is good and we have learned that he has a way of making us lean on him. It's been a pretty amazing learning experience for the both of us. I think God just needed us to realize it's in his hands, not ours:) We seem to forget that quite often and it's nice to be reminded every now and then. It's amazing the things that he can make happen that we can't even come close to doing. Well, until next time, possibly next year??

OH, and I've pretty much given up on the challenge. It's a lot harder than I thought it would be but I tried and I will continue to do so once things settle down a little:)