Christmas Party

After a delicious dinner the Primary performed "The Nativity" which included scripture verses and songs.

It was fun to sneak a peek at the mama's and papa's watching their little lambs and angels on stage.

This was my vantage spot as I was perched next to the piano to ward off unsuspecting little fingers trying to give their own rendition of "Away in a Manager" during the performance. The cutest/funniest antic this year was one little sheep, whom must have had an itch on her back, as she laid down on her back and then started moving back and forth, as in scratching it. This little lamb must have liked what she saw on the ceiling and her appointed spot on stage because when the sheepherder came to gather his sheep, she would not budge. The herder discovered how hard it is to gather all the sheep, not just the ninety and nine. I am so grateful that we reenact the Nativity; if we had to choose only one portion of the evening, I would choose the Nativity, always. Why else gather? This is the reason we celebrate. This helps children feel the Spirit and hopefully begin to understand the humble beginnings of the Savior. This helps us to better understand the magnitude of Mary and Joseph's humility and commitment to the Lord. To Mindy, who organized the Nativity, Lisa who led the music and Amanda who accompanied the group, "Thank you!"

Following dinner and

the Nativity we made the gingerbread/graham cracker houses. I had said it was a "D. D. Activity." It would either be "delightful" or "disastrous." The time had come to find out.

Here are two of the "Senior Choir" boys. They are awesome! These two guys also decorated one of the gingerbread men, can you see it? I missed Daniel and Kevin. They were wandering around somewhere at this point.

The "N" family, we are in Sunday School class together, making their creations. One is building a tall structure.

Our dear friends twins with their Grandpa. Did they ever have fun! (In this photo, you can see our gumdrop tree centerpieces, one gingerbread man left on the tree as an ornament, the ribbon on the jars and the marshmallow garland on the red tables. On the white table cloths we had gumdrop garlands running the length of the tables. Thanks Amy and Tricia!)

Ohhhh, here is Christopher, another one of our favorite younger ones. He loved decorating with the mini marshmallows. Check out his mom's blog of the evening here.

Ahhh...this little cherub was ready to go home and go to bed. She is the daughter of one of the members of the Activities Committee. Her daddy does all the shopping for our committee; I often question what we will do when he graduates from dental school this spring. I appreciate his service so much.

Mr. Dale, one of our all time favorites, all decked out in his holiday red!

Brother Storm has great decorating skills. Thanks, Brian, for recreating your finger licking decorating techniques. He even has a chimney!

My bestie, husband, best spouse supporter and right hand, ever, Mr. R; Miss Claire, a darling young woman and my Stake Choir buddy with whom I had so much fun; and dear friend Paula with their creations.

Finally, someone really using their frosting. Wonderful Miss Amanda with little Brie (Brie is Christopher's little sister. I had been holding Brie and handed her over to Amanda where she very happily spent the evening.)

Had I sat down to make a house I think I would have slathered the frosting on the house and decorated the entire tray with frosting as snow and added a candy cobbled walkway.

At the end folks walked around and checked out each others building/decorating success.

Overall I think it was a "delightful" evening and thanks to all church members who helped out in any way to make it possible and our s-u-p-e-r- committee for everything each and every member did. And to Mother Nature for providing the 2" of freshly fallen snow that afternoon to add to the ambiance. I hope a way good time was had by all!