Santa comes to church

Last Saturday, in between the birthday party all the dance recital activities, we managed to find a few minutes to stop by the ward's Christmas breakfast where Santa was going to be visiting.  Abby really wanted to see Santa this year, so I was so glad to have found the time for her to see him.  Abby did great and went right up and sat on his lap,  Lexi, however woudn't go within 20 feet of the guy.  Abby told Santa she wanted a fairy Barbie that sings...Hmmm not sure where he's gonna find that :)

Abby's dance recital

Last Saturday was another one of Abby's dance recitals.  Her class danced to "Run, run, Rudolph".  It was so cute, she did a good job!  All these pictures are actually from the dress rehearsal that morning because I've discovered that trying to get a good picture when it's dark during the actual recital is next to impossible.

Firefighter of the year!

Yesterday Cam came home from work and said that he was told he needed to be back to work for a luncheon.  The chief had specifically told him he need to be there.  So, I invited myself along, because Cam suspected he would be receiving an award at the luncheon.

He was given "Firefighter of the Year"!  I'm so proud.  It's been a challenging few months since his partner Mike had the stroke, so it's really great that he got some awesome recognition for the work he does.

I wasn't able to get any decent pictures...

Decorating cookies

Abby had a friend over the other day, and I made each of the girls a big cookie that they could decorate.

Monahan Christmas party

Last Sunday, we had a Christmas get-together with all of Cam's family.  We usually try to find a day before Christmas to celebrate all together, rather than trying to find time on Christmas/Christmas Eve.

All the little kids

Opening presents from Grandma and Grandpa

Colton and Grandma opening a present

Little climber

Lexi (and Abby has also) found that they can climb into Colton's Exer-saucer, and play.

I had to add this one, because Abby's face is HILARIOUS

What's going on

These last few weeks have been crazy busy. So here is an update of what we've been up to:

• Lexi got a nasty cold
• Colton has some teeth coming in, but the discomfort and "teething symptoms" that I ignored for nearly a week turned out to be an ear infection.  I'm still feeling a little guilty about that one :)
• Lexi's cold has been passed around to almost the entire family
• Started the Christmas and Lexi's birthday shopping
• I've been called back into the Primary to teach.  I'm excited to be productive again at church.
• Santa drove by on the firetruck (the city does that every year) and I finally was able to grab the girls and run out the door to see them drive by this year (I've been too slow all the previous years), but unfortunately the siren and loud horn scared the crud out of the girls and woke Colton up from his nap.
• I'm still in PT, but think I'm nearing the end of that.  Although, I'm still not certain how much distance running will be in my future.
• Cam's been working hard, and even made a few appearances on the local news over the last month or two.  A couple of months ago, while at work, Cam's partner had a stroke (he's only 32 years old) and was in a coma for a couple of weeks.  He's awake now, and making progress on his recovery.  Cam's been spending as much time as he can visiting his friend at the hospital and the whole fire department is trying to raise money for him and his wife (who is pregnant with their first baby).  It's really awesome to see how these guys come together to take care of each other. 
• My dad is a little over half way done with his cancer/chemo treatment.  He had a PET scan recently, and that came back clean, so hopefully after he finishes his treatment, it will be adios to all things cancer related.
• Lexi is just talk, talk, talking.  She says tons and tons, but she is really hard to understand, even for me and Cam.  But she is amazing me everyday with all the words she is picking up.
• Colton now rolls both ways.  But still doesn't enjoy being on his tummy.  So if he accidentally rolls onto his tummy, he usually is in hysterics pretty quickly.
• Abby is so, so, so excited for Christmas, and asking tons of questions about Santa and stuff.