Kansas City Christmas visit

This year we went to Kansas City to spend the Christmas holiday with our KC family. It was a whole new setup since everyone has moved to the same neighborhood in Blue Springs. We were excited to see everyone's new houses and to celebrate Christmas together. Before we arrived, we were sad to hear that Griffin was diagnosed with "Hand Foot Mouth" and had some contagious rashes. Everyone talked and decided it would probably be best to keep Graydon separate from him so he could still be with everyone and he stayed at Grandma Genies with us. 

We got in on Friday, and the first night the girls made Grandma's famous cookies.

It was super cold, but Amanda and Nate still got out to run, and they invited me along. We got bundled up and stayed mostly warm and got our fitness.

On Saturday, we went to see Andrea's Aunt Marilyn in the hospital. She had been planning to host the Anders Christmas celebration at her place, but wasn't feeling well so we visited her instead.

Overnight it snowed and on Christmas Eve we woke up to a couple inches of snow. The Chiefs played that day and we got some BBQ and watched the game at Grandma's house.

After the game, some of us put on our snow gear, and we played out front. Amanda brought one of Graydon's Christmas gifts, a sled, and we played outside until we were frozen solid.

Connor had watched a documentary on Otzi the ice man on the airplane and posed like him in the snow.

In the evening, we put on our church outfits and went to the church in Odessa for Christmas Eve service.

Christmas morning, everyone except for Griffin and Ryan came over to Grandmas to open presents. We took a few pics in front of the tree of our group and then everyone jumped in and opened their gifts.

The rest of the day (and the rest of the week), we relaxed around the houses, tried to stay warm, and tried to stay healthy. Connor and Paige spent the night with the Rudolphs a couple of times and watched some Mizzou football and basketball.

On Wednesday, Abby took the cousins all out for a fun day together. They all went through Taco Bell for Connor and then brought it to McDonalds and everyone ate there together. The kids wanted to play in the ball pit, but with all the germs around they thought better of it. After lunch, they went to Target and did a little shopping. On the way home, Abby took everyone for custard at "Custard's Last Stand".

Late in the week, we heard that Griffin was feeling better and his rash was mostly cleared up. Andrea and I went over to the Gobles house and hung out with Griffin and Amanda for a little while in the afternoon.

Unfortunately, while we were there, Griffin seemed a little lethargic. Amanda checked his oxygen levels and they were in the low 90's. Amanda hooked him up to their oxygen machine and suctioned his nose, but his oxygen levels stayed low and they eventually had to take him to the hospital. He had to stay at the hospital.

Wednesday night, we went back to Grandma Genie's and I played with Graydon and we did some Legos together. We'd really enjoyed all the time we got with Graydon since he was staying at Grandma's with us. We had been taking everyone's temperatures throughout the week and Graydon's had been a little high. On Thursday morning Grandma Genie took him to the doctor and they found that he had Influenza A. Graydon had to go back to his house after that and it was definitely quieter and lonelier without the little guy around.

On Thursday, the kids hung out with the Rudolphs and Nate had a choir party for his students. Connor and Paige were pumped to see his students and Nate let us stop by for a little while. Connor enjoyed playing ping pong with the high school students, and we ate some of Nate's hotdogs and hamburgers that he grilled in the freezing weather.

On Friday, we took family pictures in the morning. It was supposed to be a big group photo of everyone, but with the sicknesses, we just did an appointment with our family. In the afternoon we played a lot of board games with the Rudolphs and ate at McAlister's Deli one last time. We had such a fun visit, although it was definitely not everything we'd imagined since the Gobles' guys were sick. We barely got to see Ryan and Griffin during our visit and hope that we will get to catch up with them soon.

It was neat to see everyone's new houses, and we appreciate everyone's hospitality during our visit. Merry Christmas and farewell to 2017!

Genie sends me nice emails from time to time after reading the blog and I thought I'd add her response to this one below.
On Sun, Dec 31, 2017 at 12:06 AM, Genie Anders wrote:
What an awesome story of our Christmas time together. I always enjoy the story and all the pics. It was a wonderful week. I enjoyed it sooo much. It wasn't exactly how we thought it would be, but we all made the best of it. Thanks for taking all the pics and telling our story. You are awesome and I appreciate you so much. You are an incredible husband, dad, uncle, and son. I love you so much. Genie