Christmas break

We had a nice Christmas break, despite me all of us getting sick during some point of the break. We spent the break here in Iowa and it was kind of nice not having to go through the hustle and bustle of traveling during Christmas.

Sitting on Santa's lap this year did not turn out much better than last year. She is still very afraid of him for some reason. We even talked about how nice he was and how he was going to give her treats and she seemed excited until she saw him. May be next year she won't be so scared.

Here is Morgan coming down the stairs on Christmas morning.

This is just one of the presents that she got for Christmas. We'll spare you all the present opening pictures. She got this doll from my mom. She and her doll have three matching dresses and they are all that Morgan wants to wear every day. She got so many great gifts! Thank you grandparents!

We had Monsters (German pancakes) for breakfast. Morgan didn't want to put the doll down to eat.

We shared Christmas dinner with our friends the Allreds, but we don' t have any pictures.

The day after Christmas we went sledding behind our house. There aren't many hills in Iowa but we still managed to have a little bit of fun on the little hills we do have. We spent New Years Eve with our friends the Allred's, Portela's and Hall's at our house. We all went out to eat at a Chinese buffet and then came back to our house to play games until midnight. It was so much fun! One of the games, Balderdash, had us laughing so hard that our eyes were watering. We are so lucky to have such nice friends.

December 29th and 30th we met my sister and her family up in Minneapolis to go to the Temple and the Mall of America. This is my cute nephew Colton who, despite being very sick, was such a smiley kid.

Playing G0 Fish.

Morgan and Makayla playing in a tent in our hotel room.

Morgan at the Mall of America. They had these Barbie's all over the mall and Morgan loved them! I didn't realize it but this Barbie's top is see-through! There were so many cool Barbies.

We also stopped by the Rain forest Cafe to look at the fish. They had this Alligator that came to life and Morgan loved that, as you can see by her reaction.

Mike and Morgan outside the cafe.

We are sad that break went by so quickly and now Mike is back in school. It was so nice to spend time together without worrying about school. Happy New Year! I think that this is going to be another great year!