A Very Merry Christmas....and back to civilization

We hope that you are all having a wonderful holiday season. This was the Shaffer's year for Christmas, and as per tradition, we spent it in a cabin away from civilization for a couple of days. To any who may have sent messages and not received a reply from us, we're sorry...cellphone reception was sparse and we weren't able to get to our computers until today. The isolation was actually quite relaxing. Here is a quick rundown of how our week went:
We drove up on Christmas Eve after Cea had to work for majority of the day. This week has been "bring your husband to work" week for Cea, so I was able to hang out with her at her office (Thanks Brandon for being so entertaining). Doesn't Cea and Kaniela look so cute?
Christmas with four+ families yields many presents (and this isn't including what Santa brought later that night). The kids had a blast and it was so fun to watch them open their gifts. Their eyes were as big as dishes and the room was full of laughter and joyful screaming (the not-so-pleasant screaming came later when they began to try and play with each other's gifts...territory wars are hilarious). Our goodies from Santa included a charm bracelet for Cea (plus her camera and printer) and books to read and running gear for Kevin to help him train for the Moab Canyonlands Half Marathon.



The entire week it was snowing, and there was a ton of snow the entire time. We spent hours in it on Christmas Day. We spent the day jumping off the porch into the snow, sledding and trying to catch each other off guard with a snowball to the side of the face.


I think these pictures give a pretty good perspective as to how deep the snow was.
Kev hanging out with Cea's niece CourtneyLittle two-year old Emma braving the hill by herself. Unfortunately we don't have pictures of our snowboarding day...our camera had to go to the hospital with one of the little ones who needed stiches :(

And of course, Kaniela keeps growing. He seemed to have a lot of fun with his cousins around. We're under nine weeks left, enjoying our sleep while we can, and anxiously awaiting our little boy's arrival.