Christmas in Sisters

Ryan and Michelle invited us all out to Sisters for Christmas this year. We drove over on Christmas Eve morning.  We had a sickness scare and some family drama, as two of the cousins were sick that week, and we debated for a bit about what to do when we found out. We decided to go anyway, and we are glad we did. We had some great family time, and God was merciful and kept everyone else well the whole time. Thank you, Lord! Our kids were so happy to be with their cousins. Ryan and Michelle's next door neighbors were out of town and gave us the use of their house while we were there. It was the perfect set-up, with two houses for 21 Moffats. We went to the Christmas Eve service at their church that night. The kids woke up bright and early Christmas morning, and we had a great day together.

That evening we drove into Redmond to go ice skating. It was so much fun (and I didn't even skate)! Our kids had never been ice skating before, and they were so excited to try it. It was downright magical--ice skating on Christmas day, cold crisp air, and Christmas music playing. Ryan timed it so it was light out when they were all getting geared up and figuring out how to move on the ice, and then the sun went down, and they got to skate under the twinkling lights.

Grant clung to the side the whole time but loved it. Joel started figuring it out by the end. Kari looked like a pro, and Aubrey shuffled her way around the rink. They were awfully cute!

The next day we had a low-key morning and then drove into Bend to a bounce/play place for the kids to expend some energy. Michelle, Leah, and I did a little shopping while they were bouncing and everyone else sat and watched them.

 

Everyone but our family left on Saturday, and Ryan took us to see a fish hatchery and the head of the Metolius River. It's pretty crazy to see the start of a river flowing out from under a hill.

 

 

Later in the day, we left all the kids at the house for Kari and Ashlynn to babysit, and Ryan and Michelle and Greg and I took an oh-so-exciting trip to the local Bi-Mart to check out the after Christmas sales and then walked around downtown Sisters for a while. It was great to get out for a bit, just the four of us. Kari turned eleven just a few weeks ago, and we're loving the babysitting benefits! ;-)

 

We went to church Sunday morning at Ryan and Michelle's church. We like their church. It's a good place with good people. While we were sitting there, it started snowing like crazy outside, and we watched through the big windows as snow piled up, a day too late! The kids wanted so badly for it to snow while we were there, and then the day we were leaving, it snowed. AHHH! We took off right after church. This is what Ryan and Michelle's neighborhood looked like as we were driving away.  

 

 



 Our drive ended up being more eventful than we had anticipated. It took us seven and a half hours to get home. It's normally a three hour drive!  The snow storm on the mountain threw a big hitch in our travel plan. We had to put chains on here.

 

 

Chains, broken chains, bad road conditions, lots of traffic, stuck in traffic on the top of the mountain for an hour, kids needing to use the restroom, eventually turning around and going back down the mountain through Hood River, kids turning the snow yellow on the side of the road, Aubrey wailing for a solid 30 minutes about her ear hurting, stopping at Rite Aid in Hood River for some children's ibuprofen for Aubs, driving home from Hood River in a rainstorm. It was quite the trip! We were so glad to be home. Wowzers. It was all worth it, though. It was a great Moffat Christmas.