Let's Ride.......

And then there was sledding!! Ross and Alyssa brought down their 4 wheeler when we had Christmas at my mom and dad's, so after dinner was ate and presents were opened and the weather had gotten blistering cold......the kids were ushered outside to play!! :) And of course they loved it!! A few of us parents hid out of the wind and 'supervised' from a distance. But a huge thanks to Ross and Alyssa for really braving the cold and playing outside with the kids. They had a great time!!!

Holden's no dummy......he took the back and used Ella as a wind block!! hahaha
Ross cautious at first with the two youngest......ironic part......they were the last ones to come back inside. I'm pretty sure they would have stayed out all afternoon had we of let them!!
Evan waiting for his turn.....
The snow hill they played on while waiting turns for the sled.
Ashlyn and Evan taking their turn.
And then Ross dumps them........bad Ross, bad Ross!! haha
I didn't get any of Landon or Corbin because Ross would take them farther and faster......I wasn't willing to sacrifice my 'warm' spot for those pictures!! But needless to say, they were dumped quite a few times!! Ahhhh....good times.

Random Christmas

A few more of our Holiday celebrations!! Fast moving kiddos and bad lighting = me not taking lots of pictures. :( But check out this gorgeous tree.....my mom and dad really go ALL out when getting their tree!! Always the biggest tree ever!!

Merry Christmas!!

My oh my.....what a crazy exhausting weekend we just had....and we only really have three different places to be. I couldn't imagine having any more to squeeze into one weekend. It's a Christmas Eve tradition that Joe and I attend midnight mass, so we 'try' to prepare the kids for a long night.......and we definitely don't plan anything for early in the morning on Christmas to allow the kids to sleep in (and us too)!!

It's also our tradition to give the kids pajama's and a movie on Christmas Eve to 'tide' them over. So here are a few pictures from Christmas Eve.....dressed and ready for Church.

Now some on Christmas morning in their new pj's of course!! ;)

Card Window !?!?!

Love this time of year!! :) Even though I can no longer see out my kitchen window......oh well, nothing to see out there but snow ;)

I hope everyone has a Very Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year!!

Santa

Today we had a Christmas 'Program' at Evan's preschool. The program involved everyone going from room to room and there were different activities in each room and in the final room they had Santa!! Ella was excited......Evan, not so much. :) Either way, the preschool did a great job and the kids had lots of fun.

I realize that Ella looks a little scared in these pictures, but she was actually really excited to sit on Santa's lap. Especially since she didn't get to sit on Santa's lap at the lights at the fairgrounds this past Saturday!! She even told Santa what Evan wanted since Evan wouldn't talk to Santa.

School Christmas Party

So Evan's school year has been going so well!! We got a wonderful report from his teacher at our conference, and everyday he wakes up he asks if he has school.....and is pretty bummed when I say 'not today.' I'm just hoping that his enthusiasm will continue throughout the years!!

I received a note from the teacher informing me when the Christmas party would be. And the next day that I dropped the kids off at my sitter's house, she informed me that Evan had asked her to make cookies for his party!! What.....!! Evan I ask, 'why didn't you ask me to make your cookies?' 'Um mommy, you don't have stocking cookie cutters!' Evan informs me. :) Oh who am I kidding......I love to cook, but am not the best at baking. So I was pretty much ok with Pat making the cookies. Plus as she informed me, they pretty much fall out of her oven this time of year!! So our wonderful sitter whipped up some cookies for Evan's class, and he's so excited to take them in and share them. I of course had to contribute something, so I got some cute gift bags and some Santa straws to include with the cookies. Hopefully the kids will enjoy the gifts and they will all have a wonderful Christmas.

waiting for Him....

This is one of my favorite pictures from last Christmas! I had actually forgotten about it until my mom put out one of her Christmas frames with this picture in it. :) This was taken shortly after I had set up the tree last year. Ella was so excited for Santa to come that she just sat there and stared at the tree. I love it!

Brrrr.......

So I can't really say I'm excited about this weather......but unless I move, I'm sort of stuck!! I just wish I had my chauffeur here to drive me to and from work....and anywhere else I need to go too!! ;) The kids are absolutely loving all the snow, and Evan can't wait to make a snowman. Hopefully he'll get to make one with daddy when he gets here!!

Here's a few pictures of the pond which has been frozen solid for quite a few days now. It always cracks me up when I see Brutus walking on it. He was actually out into the middle further......of course once I came out he ran over to the edge. :( Go figure.....even the dog hates my camera!!

Christmas Picture Finalists!!

Even with all the below mentioned attitudes.....we managed to get a few pretty cute pictures from these two!! Now to just decide which one to use......the toughest part for me.

These pictures were taken in Kim's house. She had her house decorated for the YWCA home tours. Her house was gorgeous!! Kim along with her group of helpers did a fantastic job making her home look even more beautiful than it typically does. Thanks a lot Kim for allowing me to intrude for a little bit!!

Christmas Picture OutTakes!!

Have I ever mentioned how much my kids just LOVE having their pictures taken?!?!? Well, they really don't. They see my camera come out and they run and hide and whine about why I want to take their pictures. So instead of using some of my fall pictures to put in our Christmas card, I figured I'd better step up and get some Christmas pictures done for the card!! Perhaps next year I'll just stick with the fall pictures!! :)

We had pouting

And sulking
And super fake smile with no longer paying attention
More fake smiles and now super silly.....
Poor Evan, he really does try so hard. But that Ella.....well, she's certainly her mommy's girl. ;) And no matter how they choose to 'smile', I still Love them very much!!

Christmas Tree

So I finally broke down and put some kid friendly ornaments on the tree this year. I'm pretty set in my ways, and really like my white lights and red and silver balls. So it was pretty hard to put some 'other' ornaments on the tree. But there aren't a lot, and the kids really enjoy them, so I'm ok with it!! I got the cute ones with the kids' names on them at the Apple Festival this year......I love that place!! :)

So here's a few of the tree and the stockings hanging.

And my favorite snowman.....also purchased at the Apple Festival (several years ago).

Let the Countdown Begin....

:)

eLF vOmIT....

So I went a little farther this year with the decorating!! The kids and I put up Christmas lights outside a few weeks ago.....and with one strand left over I had been contemplating what I would do with them. Then Evan asked if we could hang them in the house. I laughed at first, because where would you hang icicle lights inside?? Well......in the 'O' of course!! So we set out to put the last strand up. I then unpluged the red lights that were already up there and we flipped on the switch. I thought it looked great!! Evan asked where the red lights were......so we plugged the red back in. Well then we had red and white, but were missing the green. SO.....off to Wal-Mart we went for some green balls to hang.

I laughed the whole time I was stringing the decorations up. Why you ask......Many years ago when I lived with my college roommates some of us decided we wanted to decorate our house for Christmas. So we hung balls from the ceiling and decorated the crap out of the house......well not everyone in the house was a big fan of Christmas. So when said roommate woke up, she proclaimed: "It looks like an elf threw-up in here!" And we all had a good laugh. So I had a good laugh last night while I was putting these finishing touches up and thinking of Beth the whole time!! :)

Good Morning :)

So this is what most of my mornings look like now.......and for now, I'm just fine with that! The funniest part is that most of the time I don't even hear them come in. I just wake up and there they are!! Little sneakers.