Wordless Wednesdays (Goofy faces of a 5 year old)

Christmas Day

It was a beautiful Christmas Day, no white Christmas this year.  The kids really enjoyed their Christmas this year but we did miss not having Nana and Papa.  We did have Grandma Sherry with us this Christmas and that was nice.  She has never been to our new house since we moved.  The kids were excited for her to come visit for a couple of weeks, it had been almost two years since they had seen her! 

We also had some good friends come for Christmas Dinner and pie, they did not have family in town either so we enjoyed each others company.  They were are guinea pigs for dinner because I have never cook a turkey.  Thank goodness we had a back up ham because the turkey took way too long to cook!  We ate around 3:00pm and the turkey did not get done until after 6:00pm.  I will say the turkey did turn out good but we had it for dinner the next night.  My boys love potatoes especially mashed potatoes so we made 15 lbs of mashed potatoes!  We had 13 people for dinner that night and believe it or not all 15 lbs were gone!!  I would have to say my boys ate at least 10 pounds between the 4 of them.

Ava really enjoyed her first Christmas.  Her favorite gifts were her baby stroller from Santa and Legos from Mommy and Daddy.  She did have a couple of pretty good melt downs from all the craziness and took an early nap.  After sleeping a couple hours she dealt with the rest of the day and evening very well.  

All and all it was a great day, even with sugar energized kids!

Preston trying on his new hat knitted by Grandma Sherry

Soren enjoying his new pj's from Nana and Papa

Gavin excited about his real flight suit from Uncle Heath and Aunt Julie

Yaya in mid sneeze but excited about her gift

Keaton with his favorite playmobil set from Nana and Papa

One present Christmas Eve

Enjoy the pictures of the kids opening their Christmas Eve present.

Preston gets Iron Man movie

Boys and goofy faces!  Soren gets an ipod dock and alarm

Gavin and more Legos!

Keaton having fun with cars from Papa!

Yaya opening a lock puzzle

It's Christmas Eve

The kids energy level is so high right now!  It's Christmas Eve and our tradition is to open up one small present after dinner.  The boys are already asking if you can change it to now.  It is 8:50am so it will be a long day.  We decorated our tree about a week ago, it had been up for quite awhile but with Daddy's travel, school and sport activities we finally had a free night last week.  The kids love to look at all the ornament's and remember the story of each one.  Yaya was very curious with what was going on and loved to look and touch the tree and pretty lights.  She has done very well and has not bothered the tree.  The first picture below is a gift that was sent to from a gift exchange last Christmas online.  I dont know who the sender was but it is very special to me and will always remind me of our very long wait for our daughter/sister.

The older boys have talked us into going to midnight Mass tonight.  We have my husbands Mother here so we will put the two little ones to bed and head out about 11:00pm.  We usually get home around 2:00am finish a few stocking things then off to bed.  Then we only have a few hours of sleep.

What a special Christmas this will be having Ava here with us, it is still so hard to believe after three years of waiting.  I am so grateful for all of Gods blessings to my family and for the birth of his only son on Christmas Day!  May you all have a very blessed Christmas!!  Happy Birthday Jesus.

We pray for Ava's birth parents always!

  Hanging her first ornament!

Keaton helping with the ornaments

Soren hanging ornaments

Finding for our Christmas tree

We have a Christmas tree farm right down the street from our home.  So the first weekend in December went to find our tree.  There was a few inches of snow on the ground from a few days before but for the most part it was a beautiful day.  As you can see my boys dont understand that it is winter and decided to go out with shorts and no jackets.  The trees are not the prettiest trees but they will do.  After living in the Northwest for over 15 years we were used to the beautiful Noble furs, my very favorite!  Now we have to settle for a Pine and they are usually oddly shaped.  We still had fun hunting through the snow for the perfect tree.  The boys played hide and seek and Yaya has learned how to eat snow.  Darn it my pics are backwards and I dont feel like changing them around!

Having a snack!

All the boys were at school and Yaya wanted a snack.  I have not taken pictures in awhile so I got the camera out and took pics of my baby having her pretzels and water, in a big girl cup.  She now has to have a big girl cup to drink and she does really well.  My boys would have had it all down the front of them at this age. Six more days until Christmas!!!

Lego Land

My lovely hubby let me sleep in last Sunday.  We had a bad snow storm come in and there was no way we were getting to church.  I rolled out of bed about 9:30am and came down stairs to Lego Land!  The sad thing is that this is not even all of them.  I guess when you have 4 boys in a row it is the toy of choice for every occasion.  With our oldest being almost 14 years, we have had many many years to collect them!  So this was our Sunday morning and afternoon and by evening the roads were clear enough to make the 5:30 service.

Even Yaya was enjoying them

I hate when you step on these things!

The kitty has come to check out the action

We even have all the booklets just in case they put the sets back together (Haha)

This picture does not do this pile of Legos justice!!

Wordless Wednesdays

We have been back for almost 2 weeks

Having fun at the park

Going on a train ride

The troops with Great Grandma

Playing at Great Grandma's house

Visiting old friends from High School, this is also where my hubby and I met for the first time when we were 16!!! Peter Piper Pizza. :-)

We have been back from Arizona for almost 2 weeks and I cant find time to post!  Plus I have not even used the camera until last night at the boys band concert.  Trying to still decorate for Christmas and get the cards out on time.

Our all time favorite Christmas comedy movie is "Elf", tomorrow night we are having an Elf party at our house with some friends.  So I'm cleaning  like a crazy woman and getting dinner and treats together.  My boys want to have spaghetti with syrup for dinner but I think we will stick to the roast, potatoes and carrots I have already planned!!

I also have to bake 1oo cookies this weekend for a cookie exchange and dinner I'm attending in the neighborhood Monday night.  Wow, and less than 2 weeks until Christmas!!

Here are a few pictures from our time in Arizona with family.