A New Calling for Adam

Our ward had its boundaries changed and this necessitated a mostly new bishopric for the new Lake Wilderness Ward.  Adam has been our ward clerk for the last year or so, and initially Bishop Pike asked him to stay on as ward clerk in the new ward.  Then Bishop Pike pulled us aside and said he had decided to have Adam become the Executive Secretary instead, and gave us the heads up that we'd be hearing from the stake. The stake called us in for the interview on Saturday, January 12, and we walked in expecting a simple step from clerk to secretary...no biggie.  But President Millard told us they were calling Adam to be the 2nd counselor in our new bishopric.  We both felt certain he had made a mistake and gotten us mixed up with someone else, but it was no mistake.  He let us know that Adam needed to be ordained a high priest within the next week!  As if the calling wasn't enough to blow our minds, we had foolishly brought our children with us to the interview.  After all, we really thought we'd be in & out in under 10 minutes.  But while President Millard talked to us about Adam's new responsibilities for a good half hour, Holly ran around the room asking us all questions while Ben babbled "Ah-blah-blah-blah-blah!" the whole time.  We both walked out of the stake center feeling dazed and confused.  That night we read through Adam's Patriarchal blessing and were reminded of his spiritual potential.  It's a reminder everyone needs sometimes.

When Adam called Jan to tell her the news, she said she'd like to try to come up for the ordination.  She ended buying a plane ticket that night to fly up the very next day!  When she got here, I welcomed her as Mother of the Year.  It was awesome of her to make it such a priority to be here.  I know Adam would have loved for his dad to have been here to ordain him as a High Priest, but thankfully Jan was able to be here, as well as Aaron & Rayana's family.  Our good friend Spencer Hansen ordained him, and Bishop & Bev Pike came over along with President Millard, who set him apart as 2nd counselor. 

Our family the night Adam was ordained a High Priest - January 14, 2013

He was put to work right away and life has definitely changed for our family since.  But I am so proud of him, and not in a condescending way.  Maybe instead I should say that while we didn't expect that call to come during this month of our lives, I'm really not surprised at all.  I knew it would come some day.  I am grateful to be married to someone so well behaved.  I know he wonders why he was chosen over many others in the ward who are older and perhaps more experienced, but I don't wonder that.  Sure love you, Budge.  You are great and you will do great things.

Christmas Eve and Christmas Morning

We had Christmas Eve dinner and festivities at our house this year.  This is the menu I planned for dinner:

Turkey and gravy
Mashed potatoes
Sweet potato casserole
Green bean casserole
Braid bread
Spinach and fruit salad
Christmas jello

Peanut butter black-bottom pie
Coconut cream pie

I went Christmas shopping first thing in the morning, began cooking mid-morning (with lots of help from Kate and Jan) and planned to eat around 4:30.   All the food turned out nicely and tasted great when we sat down to eat at 6:00. Thanks to this blog, it will now be recorded that I no longer wish to do extensive holiday menus and am liking Mom's idea of soup, salad and rolls on Christmas Eve.  I've prepared similar meals several times, and I think I might be getting worse at it.  Maybe it's the last 2 1/2 years of sleep deprivation, but I just felt I was going in 12 different directions all day and my brain was not cooperating! Happily, Mom gave me these festive new Christmas dishes that added a merry flair to every meal in the month of December, but especially Christmas Eve dinner:

 

After dinner, we gathered props and costumes to act out the first-ever nativity with the Johnson family.  I was super impressed with how seriously everyone took their costuming.  Holly was first excited to be the angel and was all dressed in white, but when she heard Gavin wanted to be a donkey, she insisted on being a donkey too.  Luckily Rayana doubled as both narrator and angel, and actually memorized her lines as the angel.  Andrew was so committed to his role as Joseph that he grew a full beard to look the part, and the paper crowns from the holiday crackers came in handy for the wise men. 

 

2012 Johnson Family Nativity

The full cast in costume

We put some cookies & milk out for Santa and some carrots for the reindeer and got the kids off to sleep.  Once we got everything cleaned up, it was time to start wrapping presents.  Unfortunately we hadn't wrapped a single present before Christmas Eve, and we were up until 2:30 a.m. wrapping.  We were so exhausted, but at least we got some sleep after that...how does Santa do it?

Holly slept in her sleeping bag on the floor in our room on Christmas Eve, and when she woke up she told us she wanted to eat "breskfisk" as usual.  We told her it was Christmas morning and that we could go down and see if Santa came.  After a second, she said, "Did he come to our house?"  We got her excited and told her to wake up Andrew & Kate.  We all went down together.  Holly's reaction to it all was a little different than what I expected, but I don't think she really knew what to expect either.  This is just the first two minutes of Christmas morning.

                            


Adam got me a new sewing machine, a lovely blue dutch oven pot, two pretty pairs of earrings, and lots of good stocking stuffers.  I got him a remote control helicopter, a storage rack to hang from the garage ceiling, a solar-powered mouse robot kit, a dry-fit basketball t-shirt, and an SD card for his Surface.  Holly got him a pair of hula hoops, an adult-sized one and a kid-sized one, which were her idea while we were out shopping. 

We gave Holly a Hello Kitty nightgown & slippers, Uno Moo, a Baby Jaguar stuffed animal, a soft sheepdog stuffed animal, a Dora van, and some childrens' books about Jesus and having faith.  Ben got an alligator puppet, a little dog that rolls along on the floor, and a ball that rolls around on the floor on its own, and a nonstop top.  Santa brought Holly a Biscuit dog puppet and a Little Pup, a Little People airplane, and Biscuit books.  Ben got a toy microphone, a puppy car, some board books, and fruit feeder.  We were the fortunate recipients of plentiful Christmas giving.  

After all the presents were opened, we had a breakfast pizza and homemade eggless egg nog, then everybody except me got ready and went up to Aaron & Rayana's to play with all the new toys for the afternoon and record the musical number they sang in our ward the Sunday before, "Away in a Manger."  (Video hopefully to come soon.)  Unfortunately I started feeling sick, so I stayed home with Ben and we had a very quiet and peaceful Christmas afternoon here together.  But it was a good Christmas all in all, and by the end of the day I felt that annual feeling of sadness that comes when the Christmas season ends.  Can't wait till next year.

Leavenworth Christmas Cabin

This was our year to be with the Johnson side of the family for Christmas, and since Aaron & Rayana live in Washington now, Jan, Alex, Andrew & Kate came here to celebrate with us.  It was great to be together, but we wished Angela's family could have been here too.  It would have been even more fun with all the cousins together.

We planned a snowy getaway for two nights in Leavenworth, a Bavarian-themed town in the mountains of central Washington known for its Christmas lights, nutcrackers and shops.  We rented a big cabin where we could all be together under one roof and have plenty of space.  The day before we left, we learned there would be a lot of snow on the roads and we got tire chains for our cars.  Most of the drive was fine, but as we turned off the highway to take the road out to the cabin, we found it was steep and buried under a lot of unplowed snow.  Adam, Aaron, Andrew and Alex got to work putting the chains on our car and Aaron's van, but none of them had dealt with chains before, and they were standing in the snow working for about two hours by the time we were ready to make it the rest of the way to the cabin.  It was a bummer to get things started off that way, but luckily the children all did well waiting in the car and everyone seemed in good spirits.

Rayana, Kate and I made a couple of yummy chicken pot pies for dinner while the guys watched the BYU game and the kids had fun with Grandma Johnson.  Once the kids were in bed, the ladies hung out around the fireplace and we all had cookies and caramel popcorn.  The next morning we had cinnamon rolls for breakfast and everyone went outside to sled and play in the snow.

Preparing for the snow battle

This was the most and best snow Holly had ever seen!

Holly had been excited to make snow angels long in advance

Snowball action

That night we ventured back out onto the snowy roads for our chance to see all the Christmas lights in Leavenworth.  We felt it was worth the risk of going through the chain pain all over again.

 

 

 

 

 

We didn't get to eat at a German restaurant because of a water main break on the main street, but everyone was quite happy with our selections at Sandy's Waffle & Dinner Haus.  Unfortunately we ended up in a second lengthy tire chain situation on our way home, and this time the four brothers (and Kate) were out in the even colder dark of night.  It was definitely not what we planned on when we set out on our pre-Christmas retreat, but at least the guys had a brotherly bonding experience and gained a valuable new skill set...

We got the kids off to sleep and enjoyed some Tres Leches Hot Chocolate around the fire while the guys practiced singing "Away in a Manger," which they would be singing at our ward's Christmas sacrament program a few days later.  Despite a few vexations, it was fun to have lots of snow to play in, and it was nice for the adults to be able to hang out together after hours.  Thanks to Grandma Johnson for treating us to the cabin!

Celebrating the Christmas Season

We had a festive Christmas season this year filled with nativities and angels, Christmas music, Christmas treats, Advent calendars, "gingermen," and "Red-nose-off the Reindeer." 

I started singing Christmas songs to Holly in place of regular bedtime songs every night even before Thanksgiving.  I wanted her to be able to learn lots of Christmas songs this year.  The first song I sang to her was "Holly Jolly Christmas" and she was a big fan.  Every night she would request a song with her name in it, and when she'd hear me sing her name she would get this proud smile on her face.  She also enjoyed "Deck the Halls" (with boughs of Holly), "Silent Night", and "Angels We Have Heard on High."  The first time I sang "Angels We Have Heard on High" and got to the "glorias" she asked, "What means gloria?"  I told her that's how the angels said "Hooray, Jesus is born."   From then on, the angels in our Fisher Price Little People nativity would say, "Gloria!"


As soon as we got home from Thanksgiving in California, we put up our lovely Christmas tree and began to decorate the house.  Holly loved hanging "ordiums" and "ordamums" on the tree.  We pulled stuff out of the Christmas bins one at a time, a few times each day over several days, and made each one a "Christmas surprise."  I'd tell Holly that as soon as she'd finish her lunch, I had another Christmas surprise ready for her!  Then we'd pull out a $1 sheet of gel clings and decorate a window, or find the snowman pillow to display on the armchair.  The snowman snowglobe, a tiny wind-up music box, a cereal bowl with reindeer on it, a vinyl placemat dotted with gingerbread men...each was a treasure received with excitement.  It was pretty fun to be able to offer so many thrills.

We read a scripture to the light of a Christmas candle on at least most of the nights in December, and Holly did seem to internalize a few of the characteristics we learned about the Savior.  One night the scripture was on service, and I briefly explained that Jesus wants us to serve people like he did, and we talked about some examples.  The next day Holly heard Ben fussing and brought him a toy, then exclaimed, "Mom, I served Baby Ben!"

We went to Journey to Bethlehem at the Seventh Day Adventist church for the second year in a row.  It's an elaborate, real-life nativity experience that you walk through, as if on your own "journey to Bethlehem" like Mary and Joseph were.  Holly was too scared to enjoy most of it, but at the end when we got to the shepherds, angels and finally the stable and baby Jesus, she seemed relieved.  At our stake Christmas Creche, Adam, Ben and I spent an hour dressed as the Holy Family in the stable, and I sang some songs with a quartet of ladies from our ward at the creche as well.

My calling is the ward music chair and I had the job of rounding up a lot of musical numbers during the Christmas season.  One musical number for each Sunday from Thanksgiving through Christmas, which was 5 numbers, plus 8 numbers for the program at the ward Christmas party, and then 6 more for the Christmas sacrament service the Sunday before Christmas.  So when added to the 6 songs my quartet sang at the creche, I was involved in the development of 25 musical numbers this Christmas.  It was quite the whirlwind of merry musicmaking, but I was glad when all the performances were over.

We checked out some Christmas books from the library and have a couple board books retelling the Christmas story, and we read them every night.  I have found the repetition of the Christmas story to be a very good thing this year.  Not only does Holly know the story quite well by now, but telling it so often has kept the birth of the Savior on the forefront of my mind each day.  Despite the stress and demands of the holiday season, teaching a little child helped me to keep Christ at the center of my Christmas.