Christmas 2009

Christmas Treats

Today we decorated cookies with some good friends. The kids had so much fun being able to decorate the cookies however they wanted (w/o me over their shoulder trying to control the chaos). Here is one of Emerson's creations. There is a cookie under all of those sprinkles.

The girls jumped right in and started decorating

The little boys even got to decorate their own cookies. Most of the toppings went straight into their mouth and didn't make it to the cookie.

The kids "helping" make treats for Emmy's dance Christmas party

Last week we went to a gingerbread house decorating party with Grama. Instead of the kids decorating individual houses, they all iced and decorating one BIG house. It was pretty chaotic and there was candy and icing everywhere. But the kids had a lot of fun and definitely came home on a sugar buzz!

We have made a lot of treats, done lots of Christmas crafts, and decorated numerous gingerbread houses. The kids and I are ready for Santa to come!!

Santa Brunch

Last weekend we went to Cascade Country Club for our annual Santa brunch. I wasn't sure how the meeting with Santa was going to go since we hadn't seen Santa yet this year. I have to say that this year was probably the best yet. Perry wouldn't sit on Santa's lap but he let me hold him next to Santa. Kaden asked Santa for legos and Emerson asked him for girl legos. There have been lots of questions about Santa around here lately. Kaden is definitely trying to figure out all of the details about Santa. His latest question was "does Santa ever die?" I wasn't quite sure how to answer that one. Any advice is welcome :)

All of the cousins with the newest addition, Milana
(can you believe how coordinated they all are, we didn't even plan that)

Our attempt at the annual family Christmas photo, it gets harder and harder every year

Snow Day #3!!

Today was our third snow day!! Needless to say we are going a little stir crazy. Luckily I had bought our gingerbread house kit on Tuesday before the storm hit. They have kits now where the house is already assembled, so all you have to do is decorate. What a fabulous idea!! We spent the day decorating our gingerbread house, watching Christmas shows, and making Christmas goodies in our jammies. I may have even let the kids open up a Christmas gift (thanks Isabelle and Ethan!). Lets hope that the schools are open tomorrow!

Snow Day!

The kids had a snow day from school today and since it was the first snowfall of the season we were outside playing in the snow by 9:30. I forgot just how hard it is to get everyone dressed in all of their snow gear. I am thankful that I have at least one that can dress himself. So it took us a 1/2 an hour to get dressed and we were probably only outside for a 1/2 an hour.

Kaden has always loved the snow and has been waiting patiently for it for over a month. He was very happy this morning when he woke up and saw all of the snow.

I was surprised how much Perry liked the snow. I always think that it is hard to play in the snow at his age b/c they can hardly walk in their snow pants and boots. I took him and placed him the middle of the backyard and he just stood there smiling. Half of his body was covered by the snow but he loved it. He really had fun when Kaden, Emmy, and I started having a snowball fight. I had to make him come in after his mittens and hat were wet. He just keep saying, "Snow, outside, snow, outside". He repeated that all day! I guess we are going to have to get him a second him of mittens so he can stay out there longer.

Emerson was loving the snow today too. Last year she would always stay inside with me. Today Kaden and Emmy continued to play for awhile after Perry and I came inside.

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Thanksgiving in Ohio

We had a great Thanksgiving in Ohio. We had a yummy thanksgiving feast Thursday @ my aunt Lydia's and uncle Rod's.

The next day was spent....

...watching the Choo Choo Soul Live show and meeting Genevive and DC

....taking naps

....and eating coney dogs. It was a great weekend!

I am thankful for.....

these cuties and my awesome husband!

A Bubble Gum Party

Tonight was Emerson's bubble gum birthday party. Emmy and 6 of her girlfriends (+ Kaden) went to Clay Art Studio and painted pottery. The girls picked either a small animal or an ornament to paint and then we had pizza and cake. I think that all of the girls had a good time and Emmy was very excited about all of the princess and girly gifts that she came home with.

Emmy with her bubblegum machine cake

Emmy's masterpiece

Isabelle and Lindsey painting away

Perry enjoying his cake

Somehow I left the party without taking a lot of pictures, so hopefully my best friend Kristen A.K.A. photography managed to snap some cute ones with her fancy camera!

Birthday Girl!

Emerson turned 4 years old yesterday. I can't believe that she is already 4. She is definitely growing up way too fast (doesn't every parent always say that). Yesterday she had school so she was able to take cupcakes to school to celebrate. After school we did crafts together and she patiently waited till Chris got home to open her presents. After presents it was off to Chili's (her restaurant of choice) for a celebration dinner. Afterward Emerson went right to bed b/c she said that she wasn't feeling good but I think that it was just a really long day for her. Her cupcakes waited until today for us to sing happy birthday to her and eat them!

Emerson acting like some sort of animal while posing for the picture

Posing with her new bitty baby twins in their matching pj's from Grandma and Grandpap

Tomorrow is Emerson's bubblegum birthday party, so I am off to finish a bubblegum machine cake!

A Halloween to Remember

Fun @ the Nickelodeon Hotel
The hotel that we stayed at was definitely one of a kind. The kids loved it! They had a great pool and each room was decked out with favorite nickelodeon characters (although we had no idea who our characters were). We had a great time at the character breakfast meeting Spongebob, Dora, and Boots.

Magic Kingdom on Halloween
Disney on Halloween was great!! Even though there was record heat that day, we had an awesome time. The day was just perfect. The lines were short and we were able to go on everything we wanted to, some rides twice. The kids had so much fun going on all of the rides with their cousins. It really is the happiest place on earth!

Trick or Treating at Downtown Disney-
Well actually we decided to skip the long lines and go to Planet Hollywood instead. The next day Chris and Marc went and bought 7 bags of candy for the kids to make up for it!

We had a great vacation in Orlando last week. With the H1N1 flu going around, I just kept praying that none of us would be sick on this trip. Thankfully Kaden had the flu the week before we left, Perry got the flu towards the end of our vacation, and Emerson got came down with the flu on the way home from the airport! The timing worked out great b/c Perry was able to just sleep whenever he wanted on vacation, including at dinner and the entire 2 flights. Now we are in lockdown at our house and I am now praying that I don't get sick.

What do you need for the perfect Dinosaur party?

The Perfect Sunday Night

Bath
New Jammies
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The perfect Sunday night

Apple Picking

The great thing about our schedule this year is that Kaden and Emerson don't have school on Tuesday's or Thursday's, which allows us to be able to have lots of fun outings on those days. Luckily we waited until we finally had a nice day around here to go apple picking. We had the orchard to ourselves and the kids loved finding the perfect apples and sampling all of them to make sure that they were good.

Happy Birthday Kaden!

Kaden turned 6 on Wednesday. He had a full day of school but luckily it was my day to volunteer so I was able to be there for part of it. He wore a birthday hat all day at school and enjoyed all of the attention he received. I bought in cupcakes for his class to celebrate.

After school we met Grandma and Evan at Red Lobster for dinner. I told Kaden that he could pick where we went to dinner. His first choice, of course, was the Japanese Steak House. I asked him what his second choice was and he said Red Lobster. He ordered crab legs off of the kids menu for his dinner and loved them!

Kaden had a great birthday and is really looking forward to his dinosaur birthday party tomorrow. I'm off to bake a dinosaur cake!