Christmas 2010

Christmas was a wonderful time this year. In November I attended a Relief Society meeting where they gave ideas for keeping Christ the center of Christmas. We added a few of the recommended traditions to our celebrations and it made it a wonderful Christmas.

One of the recommendations was the consideration of gifts that you give. This year, our special gift turned out to be quite a service gift. haha. Brian had the idea to fly his 88 year old grandma out to celebrate Christmas with us for a few weeks. I had never met her and I don't even think my kids new she existed...for whatever reason. We decided that this would be a difficult thing to do, but we were sure we wouldn't regret the memories it would create for our kids.

Grandma Olson flew out on the 16th and we began our time getting to know her. We were surprised at how healthy and independent she was. We needed to help her with her pills and be patient with having the same conversation over and over again, but it wasn't as hard as we were anticipating.

Being hugely pregnant, I wasn't exactly the most exciting hostess and grandma was able to go visit with other family at different times throughout her stay.

This Christmas I was amazed by my kids. Heber had only asked for 1 thing and on Christmas evening he told me how he felt like the luckiest kid. It is amazing how much love you can feel toward your children when they are grateful.
They were also very patient kids with their great grandma visiting. In so many ways they were so much better than I was with it! She would tease them and bug them at all the wrong moments, but they never let it affect their love for her. They would still run to give her a hug goodnight and say, "goodnight grandma!"
Here is a picture of Heber and Brian playing Jenga with grandma Olson. She was always so willing to play with the kids whenever they asked her to. It was very sweet to see how my kids jumped right in to get to know her.
This is a picture of all of us the night before she left. It was difficult to have more responsibilities and unforeseen stresses, but it was very much worth it. I am so grateful that my kids were able to make memories with their great grandma and that my husband could see his grandma again as well. It is truly amazing how wonderful and full Christmas can feel when you try in any small way to forget yourself. It was a wonderful Christmas.