January 9th is my brother's birthday. We so wish we could have celebrated it with him this year, but Heavenly Father had other plans. In honor of him, I bought him a "Matilda Cake." For those of you who are familiar with the show Matilda, there is a part in the movie where one of the kids has to eat a gigantic chocolate cake and the whole student body cheers him on. Brian always wanted a Matilda Cake for his birthday, so this year we got him one. We sang Happy Birthday to him and hope he had a great day. He would have been 37.

Mom and Dad blew out the candles for him.

We love and miss you TONS!

Merry Christmas

Well Christmas has come and gone and I am finally posting some pictures of our Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Since I am so late posting these, you can probably guess that my trees are still up too! Hope you enjoy sharing with us.

Our family's custom (like everyone else's) is to open jammies on Christmas Eve. This year we were given strict instructions to open my sister's presents on Christmas Eve. So, we did and we all had matching "Grinch and Max" jammies and a new, bigger tradition has begun.

Last year my brother and sister and their spouses got matching jammies for Christmas. That night my parents were in a car accident and everyone went to the hospital. Both Brian and Nancy had not changed their clothes and were at the hospital in their matching jammies. Everyone thought that they were married, but no...just crazy siblings.

Before Brian passed away, Nancy promised him that on Christmas Eve all of us (12 of us) would have matching jammies. She kept her promise.

Nancy and Vance, Grandma and Grandpa Denkers

Tanner, Austin and Rita

Christmas morning....Santa has arrived!

On Christmas morning, someone (I won't say who so they get in trouble with the Bishop) slipped Lottery tickets into our stockings....unfortunately no one won. We were hoping to pay for Christmas! Jason got a gatorade because he is not 18 yet. Check out those jammies!

Josh isn't surprised at this gift...pillows. Among other things, he got things for his new apartment at BYU.

Jeremy gets loaded down with white shirts and ties....getting prepared for that mission!

Jason was the only one who sent Santa a list. He got a bunch of Nike and Jordan stuff.

Cassie enjoys Christmas as well. Santa left a toy and two packages of kitty treats in her stocking.

Jeremy gave Josh the Joseph Smith Papers book....the first of many volumes.

A Jordan shirt.....notice the logo Mama Rhoades?

A sweatshirt with the country and flag of the Czech Republic.

Something besides apartment stuff....YEA!

Jeremy gave Jason a TF 1000....Jason was really excited...even if it doesn't look like it!

Santa left Jeremy a Czech Book of Mormon.....click on the picture and see if you can read it.

Mark gets a camcorder!

After we have our Christmas morning, we head over to Grandma and Grandpa Matson's house and have freshly squeezed orange juice and open the presents from Grandma and Grandpa.

Jason got a gift card attached to some Sour Patch Kids from Aunt Jenn and Uncle Steve and some slippers, sweats and an I-Tunes card from Grandma and Grandpa.

Jeremy got new LaBron shoes and his temple clothes.

Josh got more bedding and a book from his favorite apostle...Jeffrey R. Holland.

Our niece Abby and her "twin".

We think Garry liked his Texas shirt...hey they won the Fiesta Bowl last night!

I wanted an oven mit and got two - thanks Jenn and Steve!

Grandpa was happy with his camera.

We hope your Christmas was very special too!