Gingerbread and Christmas Pageants

I brought gingerbread houses for my primary kids to decorate.  I debated about having a gingerbread party at my house, but then decided that too many of them wouldn't be able to make it.  Christmas is such a crazy time of year.  Plus, I thought they would love doing this during church.

The primary sang in sacrament meeting today.  Preston and I went up together.  After we sang, Mike and I snuck out and he helped me set up everything in the kitchen.  I met the kids in our regular room.  We had a prayer and I told them that this lesson was going to be different. They could ask me any church related question they wanted and I would do my best to answer.  This would all be done while they would decorate gingerbread houses.  Needless to say, they thought this was a great idea!  They did ask questions.  For example, Avril wanted to know how the church started.  That led to a discussion about Joseph Smith and the restoration of the priesthood.  She knew all of the pieces, she just hadn't seen how they were put together.  There were also questions I couldn't answer.  Like, how was Heavenly Father created?  How did everything start?  They were really cute discussing this.  One of the kids wanted to know who came first, Adam and Eve or the dinosaurs.  I love what kids think about.

Luke, Crew, Georgia, Addison, Ava, Avril, Eliza

 With filters

My entire class was there except for Burke.  Not a good day to miss class!  I came home and started cooking.  I wanted to make rolls and veggie bars for the pageant tonight.  I almost got the rolls to the rising stage before the home teachers came.  I should have just done it anyways and been five minutes late.... oh well.  We were about ten minutes late to the party, but I needed to cook my rolls once we arrived.  Scoop was there for a few minutes.  I don't think he was happy we were late.  He wanted to hug the kids before he left to head back to St. George.  It really is sad that he is not a part of their lives.  It's weird that he doesn't stay for his own family party.  I hurried to get the rolls in the oven.  I went back to look for Scoop to say hi and he had already left.

Anyways, this year Maysen was not with us, obviously.  Preston was a shepherd, Stockton and Jorja were wise men.

Preston

 Derek as Joseph, Nova as Mary

 Taylor is the innkeeper, I think Champ is the donkey (not sure)

 Leo did not appreciate being baby Jesus

 Erica was an angel

 The three wisemen ~ Jorja, Stockton, Weston

 The cast.  Preston is now next to Jorja

 Nova and Leo, who has now accepted his role as Jesus

 Preston playing with the donkey's ear

The kids love having the pageant at Brent and Kim's house.  Stockton cheered when I told him it was here.  He said, "I'm glad it's not at the warehouse.  The only thing to do there is to have contests to see who can sit next to the fireplace the longest."  Haha!  Stockton seemed to forget about visiting with family, that is important too!