Sunday, December 30, 2012

Christmas Travels

This year we traveled to Oregon for Christmas. The roads cleared up just in time for us to leave so we got to make the trip down to spend Christmas with my family in Oregon. It was the first time in a loooong time that we have all celebrated Christmas together. The cousins are all at an age where they play nicely together and can also occupy themselves (mostly) independently. The last time we spent Christmas together we all had babies and toddlers so the parents were kept busy, busy, busy trying to keep the little kids out of trouble. Not so this year!

We were able to stay for a few days after Christmas, and then went back home to celebrate Christmas with John's family. We got to meet our niece for the first time (and the boys got to meet their cousin), so that was pretty exciting! The boys loved having a "baby" around. The boys kept commenting how lucky they were that they got to have 3 Christmases! Seriously hope they don't start to expect that though...I was exhausted by the end of it all!


















Sunday, December 23, 2012

Christmas Festivities

This was the first year in quite a few years that we weren't home for Christmas. It was a little weird to put up our tree and make Christmas preparations, even though we weren't going to be around. We actually ended up celebrating Christmas as a family the weekend before we left, but it still felt odd!

I really wanted to focus on homemade gifts this year. I feel like it's such a crucial time in our kids where they are developing their own ideas of what Christmas is about, and I don't want their impression to be all about the latest and greatest toy. I made a bunch of superhero and Star Wars peg dolls which they seemed to love, and then I made them each a toy/game as well. Archer got a set of blocks with mix and match people and animals on them, Bryton got a fishing game, and Preston got a Checkers game. It was fun for me to try to come up with things that I could make that they would enjoy, and it felt a lot more personal than just going to buy something at the store. I had planned to make them pajamas as well, but I ran out of time! Next year...maybe.

We also were able to fit in a trip to the North Pole before we went to Oregon. The boys had been asking about it (we skipped it last year and they were disappointed), so I'm really glad we could do it. The Journey to the North Pole is put on by the resort in town. It is a cruise that goes across the lake to the "North Pole" which is all lit up, and Santa reads the names of the kids on the boat. Our kids are not Santa believers, but they thought it was cool...even though Santa accidentally skipped our boat and we had to turn around so he could read the correct names! There were a lot of kids on our boat who thought they were on the naughty list! Archer's favorite part was seeing the Grinch run alongside our boat as we left the dock. Silly kid didn't really care about Santa, but the Grinch was pretty awesome!













Friday, December 14, 2012

First Day

 The boys went skiing for the first time this season today, and Archer got to ski for the first time! He was so excited. He has been wearing his goggles and/or helmet around for the past couple of weeks, so to actually get to use them for their intended purpose was a pretty big deal.

He LOVED it (as if we had any doubt...), and his big brothers had fun too. They are all nagging me now that I need to learn to ski. P & B say they are going to teach me. Scary!









Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Waves & The Robot

Okay I'm seriously irritated right now, because I finally got up the motivation to blog after months of silence, and the new (probably not new anymore, but still new to me!) blogger app ate my post! Argh. Quick synopsis it is...

Tonight was Preston's Christmas program at school. He walked in and searched the crowd for us. He finally saw me and broke into the biggest grin & waved like a maniac. I love that he still does that. I also love that he waved to me after every single song. But most of all, I love that while most kids were shuffling back and forth while they were supposed to be dancing during one of the songs...my son was doing the robot. Front row. The entire song. Hilarious.

Love that kid!!!

Monday, December 3, 2012

Around the house

Just a few random pictures...
Hanging out with the boys, our FINISHED kitchen, and our daily backyard visitors!