Thankmus, Christgiving, or whatever

On the Beesley side, were all saddened by the thought that we wouldn't have Christmas together. James and Jes would be on their Honeymoon, Andrew and Joy are going to Joy's family, and Eric and I couldn't find a way to make it to the wedding in Utah, then head on to California for the Christmas, and make it back to Nebraska in time for Eric to be back to work. In trying to figure out how to not fade into a depression in the lost traditions, my Mom had a truly inspired idea. We decided to do Christmas at Thanksgiving (James came up with "Thankmus" but Ethan is convinced it should be "Christgiving" to keep Christ involved, which makes sense). It was a hard idea to wrap my head around at first, but after embracing it, it was a lot of fun to take care of half of Christmas ahead of time.
There were somethings I missed, like reading Luke 2, opening pajamas the night before, eating Christmas tree sweat roll for breakfast, and opening stockings, but something that made missing those things worth it: spending the time with my family. I can make the sweet roll, we can read the scriptures here, but I will truly miss our families on Christmas.

Enough of dwelling on the sad, here is our fun celebration: Livi LOVED unwrapping

Ebby in his totally awesome sunglasses (he takes after his Daddy in crazy sensitive eyes)

Livi kept running over to play with toys when it wasn't her turn to tear into a present.

Then she ran over to put on her new hat and ran back to the toys.

Ella and Livi helped James, who was working as the present sorter, to hand out the gifts.

Ella got a cornucopia of pink. She got a pink apron, which she wears every time we bake, a pink tutu that she wears at least once a day, and a pink Barbie camper that Livi tries to "play" with whenever she can, but that Ella is very proprietorial over.

There were lots of "favorite" gifts for Ethan but when we left Thankmus and were getting ready for bed that night Ethan almost started crying when we realized we had left the Power Ranger transformer thingy at my parents house. I had to run over in my pj's and get it for him (luckily the Stotts and my parents live only a little over a mile apart).

I'm still missing some key pictures, so if anyone (Mom) has a copy of the group shot from that night, if you could send me a copy I would appreciate it!