Dec 25th-2

After Santa, we headed to my in-laws to have Christmas with Nathan's extended family and another yummy breakfast (I could seriously eat that whole pan of hashbrown casserole).



Another game of Dirty Santa- Brynn decided to make herself designated gift opener for everyone there! And wasn't it Pap that ended up with the neck trimmer?! (That I may or may not have brought....) His neck should be looking more slim in no time. Or 3-4 weeks.






These two make QUITE a pair!


We left there and headed to my mom's... games first while we wait on Uncle B and family! Who knew my 6-yr-old would be that good at Apples2Apples?! (Have to tell this story: Once when I was judge, the word was "Unforgettable". After I chose my favorite card, Layla Paige revealed she had played Men In Black... "You didn't pick Men In Black?! Men in Black is unforgettable! How could anyone forget Cale?!" Oh my word.



Food and gifts galore.


Here's the problem with all the house-hopping. It's not the here to there, it's not the roads, it's a little bit the loading and unloading all day long, but it's most the FOOD. We eat all.day.long! But it's always the most irresistble things, you can't pass them by. And it's Christmas!




We finished up at mom's and got back on the icy road to go BACK to the in-laws for Christmas with the immediate family. Ate a little more. And played more games :)







It was a little insane, but much more controllable than year's past and MUCH more enjoyable. We were exhausted, but not stressed! That's a big improvment!

Dec 25th-1

CHRISTMAS!!!

Jolly Old St.Nick came to our house :) He didn't leave a whole lot, but it doesn't take much to make people happy in this house! ha.

He even left Oakley a little something.

The kids slept until 7am (whoop whoop) before stumbling out to see what was under the tree. Because Santa is smart, he brought the twins new booster seats (no more convertible seats! whoop whoop).

Layla was THRILLED to see her unicorn Pillow Pet, ("This is all I wanted! Well, that and an iCarly iPod and a Holiday Barbie.") What is it about those things!? Whatever it is, they love them. And it may have broken Brynn's habit of dragging her pillow all over this house with her. Her hippo stays on her bed to "play" until she comes to sleep.



There were a few surprises, of course. We weren't allowed to have toy guns when I was growing up, but it firearms are obviously a big part of Nathan's life and he's already started teaching our kids about firearm safety so, Little Man got a (plastic) rifle. And he LOVES it. He wasn't interested in looking at anything else he got.




Brynn had her purse on her arm, sunglasses on, cellphone in hand within minutes. "Cinderella, I TOLD you I would call you back!".



They were are so excited. It's so much fun to watch!!

We got to play for about 30 mins before we had to get ready to head out for the day!



He was so happy with his Moose :)


Fixing Sissy's hair with her new salon set! (Ignore half-naked Nathan. Please.)

Dec 24th

Christmas Eve starts at Nana's house, bright and early!
Breakfast, gifts, and GAMES! For the most part, we can all hang out for a while for some fun before we start heading to Christmas dinners. It's so nice to not have to rush anywhere for a while.

We are very "traditional" at Nana's, at least- they are our traditions! We open gifts one at a time, youngest to oldest and clap for every gift :) You learn the rules quickly. And there are a lot of people in the room, so once you find your seat, it's safest if you just stay there.





Waiting for Nana to give them their "stockings"...


GOOD NEWS! Layla was feeling better :) Not quite yet for me...


Next up... Meme's.

The brothers three.




Clothes for their new AG dolls!
And DIRTY Santa.

Not dirty-dirty, just dirty-spirited ;)

MORE GOOD NEWS: I was feeling relatively normal by the end of the night AND it started snowing!!

EVEN MORE GOOD NEWS: Everyone gets to sleep in Mommy and Daddy's room on Christmas Eve :)

Dec 23rd

Jesus' birthday party!
Lots o' fun except... Layla and I spent it S.I.C.K. She vomitted off and on all day, and as soon as she finished unwrapping her gifts, she went to bed :(

About half-way thru opening gifts, I realized I had it. YUCK YUCK YUCK.

Jesus did have a cake though and I think I heard the little kids sing "Happy Birthday" at one point? I can't say for sure.

Cale opened his first box of clothes. I was thrilled! His response? "Oh no, this is bad." haha. Two of his shirts were hot pink (and so, so cute!). He kind of liked at least one of them at first bc it as a gorilla playing drums on it, but later this week when we tried to put it on him, he strongly protested bc "it's pink!" and then once we did get it on him, he kept his coat on and zipped up the rest of the night because he didn't want anyone to see his shirt! I have NO IDEA where he got the mentality that he couldn't wear pink! We have never applied any gender-specific rules in this house, I'm pretty sad about it! (Um... (cough) Ge.)


-Yes, he opened presents in his underwear. His clothes were in the wash bc he also threw up, only his wasn't illness, his was to show that he didn't want to eat dinner. He does that.-

Layla had asked Santa for an iCarly iPod (MP3 player), so when she opened it from Ba and Ge, instead of being as excited as we all hoped she'd be... she was confused. She was stressing out about Santa also bringing her one (because that's who she asked for it, not Ba and Ge) and leaving her with two. What a conundrum. We tried to give her a satisfactory answer, but she seemed much less interested once she realized all her favorite songs were already downloaded for her :)



We did manage to watch Christmas Vacation (The real Christmas miracle! after I found it when Dad thought it had been missing for months) 1 and 1 1/2 times, sickness and all.

Dec 22nd

This year we opened gifts with Nathan's parents early, on the same night we did his birthday dinner with the family. We had to open early just incase Santa brought our kids something(s) that go with the gifts Nonie and Pap were giving them.



My kids were SO sweetly surprised by their gifts. They were precious. They were obviously excited about everything they got, but this night they lit up exactly the way you imagine them to- so much that I teared up watching them!

Layla opened her American Girl doll! She had the option of picking out one that looked like her, but she had wanted Julie (who, ironically, looks just like her lol). She was sqealing with delight.




Brynn also got American Girl- Bitty Baby twins! She was adorable... "It's Cale and Me!" She actually ended up naming them after her cousins, Isaac and Olivia. But for days she has carried them around asking, "Do you want to see my black babies?" haha.(BTW- she has about five other "black babies", I guess she just never noticed.)



Cale got a Thomas the Train track! But he loooooves his Batman car. It crashes! lol.
And I'll be honest, I was fine with them getting snuggies, but it wasn't anything I was excited about. However, they LOVE them. They have used them every day since and they are already coming in handy!




And we all got a Wii!! Nathan and I stayed up until midnight playing that night and I have used it every day since! ha. I do share, though :)

Dec 21st

This is our Christmas Kick-off!


We do Christmas with all four of my parents, all three of my brothers, sis-in-law, niece and nephew. My parents exchange gifts and then we each get one gift from the four of them. Usually something *extra* special or if there was a big item any of us asked for, we would probably get it here so that one set of parents doesn't use up our whole Christmas allowance on one gift, ha.




Nathan and I got our "Annual Weekend at Opryland plus one expensive meal while you are there" gift, our favorite :) We ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS choose to eat at Old Hickory (best steaks EVERRR), but we are thinking about trying something new this year. The hotel added great (so I've heard) new resturants when they re-opened. We'll see!

My girls got THE cutest rain coats and matching boots you've ever seen. No, really. They aren't just cheap plastic ones like I usually buy them, these are heavy, lined BEAUTIFUL rain coats!



I made homemade BBQ to prove that I could... it's awesome. I don't love BBQ (Nathan doesn't like it at all and he LOOOVES mine :) Says it's the best he's ever had... and his brother owns a BBQ resturant! ha.). My parents ate the left-overs for a couple of days afterward and I kept getting texts about how good it was! Go me.

This was the "to-go" bag Brynn fixed for herself. She said, "I have all the food I ever need."
It contained:
one brownie. one piece of dark chocolate bark. three cherries. one deviled egg. and two (real) dog biscuits.




When we got home... all that was left was a cherry and the bark. Oops.

Cristmas Card Rejects.

I had a really cute idea for our Christmas cards this year using all five of us. But that didn't work out.

Then I had another cute idea.

That didn't work either.

I tweaked it a little bit and decided to shoot just the kiddos and keep the idea.

It didn't work. Well, it worked okay, but in the end we couldn't afford to do Christmas cards anyway so the whole thing was scratched.

I did end up with a couple of cute shots of the kiddos I thought I would still share! Hate to waste smiles!

















p.s. Can someone get me a thesaurus? I need another word for 'CUTE'.

Christmas Crafts.

Uno:
Reindeer with the littles' hands and feet!

We did this one night when Nathan was at the base for a reception. It was super easy and fun! The kids loved it. Plus, it was a great opportunity to practice tracing, cutting, and gluing for the twins.

Trace their foot on one piece of construction paper and cut it out.


Trace their hands on a darker piece of paper and cut them out.


Then just glue the hands on the top of the foot for your reindeer head. Add eyes and a nose (we just happen to have red glitter, so we used that, but you could also use a red pom-pom or just draw with red crayon/marker).






Voila'. Adorable reindeer.
I actually made four of these using Cale's hands and feet for his teachers at school (since there are so many of them and we don't know them well yet), added a bag of oatmeal butterscotch cookies and that was their gift!



Dos:
paper snowflake ornaments

This one was incredibly easy too, just not as cute.

All you do is cut up the cardboard from a roll of wrapping paper into several strips (They will need 8-10 each). Flatten them out and let them decorate their strips, add their name/date to one. Punch a hole on each end of each strip, about 1/2 inch away from the edge.

Then using pipe cleaners ($1 for 50- we used white/glittery white), string a pipe cleaner thru the bottom hole of each strip of cardboard. Twist two pipecleaners together and do the same on thru the top of the strips. Twist the ends together and you have a snowflake!



They weren't THE prettiest snowflakes I've ever seen, but I love a good cheap craft! Plus, watching the kids try to hang them on the tree by themselves was worth it :)