Christmas...finally :)

Okay, so I'm about a week and a half behind. Christmas time was CRAZY, but in a very good way. My parents came down from Oregon and my brothers and their wives & my nephew stayed over quite a few nights and we had a lot of fun together. So, I've had a lot of people at my house = a lot of cleaning = much deserved rest afterward. Now I'm back in the blogging mode, as you can see by the fact I've done 4 posts or so today alone.
We sure had a lot of fun having everyone together for the Holidays. My sister Michelle and her family live in New York & Steve is on a mission in California, but other than that everyone else was together. We got on the webcam a few times with Michelle's family, and had the opportunity to talk to Steve on Christmas Day! We only had about 30-40 minutes on the phone with him so we kept it on speaker phone and we all just chatted together. It was SO FANTASTIC to hear his voice - he sounds so much older & more mature. He sounds like a missionary! He has been gone 8 months already, can you believe it!? We miss him, but time is going quickly and we're grateful.
We even made the traditional trip to HIRES out in Salt Lake (thank you Brandie & Megan for putting up with the weird Cook traditions!). Joshua had a lot of fun playing with "baby Sol", & Mom and Dad got to have "the Christmas Eve they've always wanted". They stayed home at my house ALONE while all us kids had to go the in-laws' houses for Christmas Eve. My parents watched Christmas movies, listened to Christmas music, and worked on a jigsaw puzzle. We felt so bad for leaving them home, but they said it was FANTASTIC. Glad they enjoyed themselves :) Hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas!
Enjoy the pics...