Family Name Draw

Last night, for Family Home Evening, we tried to put up the Christmas tree. The girls were all gung-ho about it, and cleaned the living room and organized everything and brought all the Christmas boxes up from the basement. Whoa, motivation. In their mind, we were putting up the tree and decorating it and hanging all the lights and putting out the nativity on the mantle and singing carols and magically transforming the entire house into a Winter Wunderland in 45 minutes or less.

That's not what happened. Except the Christmas music; thanks to Pandora, we definitely got to sing carols. Including the songs from How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Those are Christmas Carols, right? They'd better be, because we all know the words and all sang along. 

Unfortunately, however, we got hung up on getting the Christmas tree perpendicular. No one remembers where we put the tree stand when we took everything down last year, so the tree is not up. We looked everywhere. I've decided we have too many different places to hide stuff. I may end up cleaning out the attic before we find it. A normal person would just go buy a new tree stand. I'm not normal. I'm too stubborn and cheap to be normal.

Anyway, it ruined the whole evening for my poor husband, just about. He's not much for Christmas decorating, to begin with, so it doesn't take much for it to go South from his perspective. In the end, we just did the family name draw. The kids were bummed, but accepted the Pumpkin Cookies as an appropriate distraction from their disappointment. The icing alone would cheer up anyone. 

The name draw, though, that was funny. Gabba prepared the name slips, and folded them up super-tight so no one could cheat and see who they were drawing. Eliza found a hat, and walked around doffing it at everyone until we finally gave up on finding the tree stand and were ready to draw names. After the second batch of cookies was in the oven, I plopped down in the rocking chair with my notepad and pen, ready to make a record of the proceedings. Speculation was rampant. I am posting the list here because

1. I don't want to lose it (a very real possability, since Aurora is chewing on my notebook as we speak)
2. This sort of thing needs to be recorded for posterity, right?
3. None of my children read my blog, so the information is totally secure.

Here's how it played out for 2011:

• Mark drew Lucy
• I drew Hyrum
• Hyrum drew George
• Gabba drew Aurora
• Lucy drew Mommy Yvy Gabba
• Eliza drew Daddy
• Yvette drew Eliza
• George drew Gabba Yvy
• Aurora drew Mommy

Lucy is so funny. With three names left to be drawn, she asked if she could put her name back and draw someone else. I wasn't offended. Then she drew Yvy. Forty minutes later - after FHE was over - she came to me, and asked if she could trade with whomever drew Gabba. Since it was George (and he doesn't notice or care), I allowed it. 

After family prayer and lights out, as I was tucking people in, she asked if she could trade back. I fixed her with a stern look and said we would discuss it tomorrow. A moment later, she whispered, "Never mind, I don't want to trade back. I will keep who I have."

Not sure what is going on in her head, but I officially draw the line. Anyway, Hyrum is hovering over me right now,trying to hustle me out the door to take him to the store. He plans to get a Nerf sword to give to his little brother (no one is going to regret that later on, at all), so I guess we are officially underway.