Bring on the Holidays

As in many households the upcoming Christmas season brings lots of extra activity - decorating, shopping, increased school functions, wrapping, shopping (because it is hard to get it done!). The past weeks have been filled with those activities and we still have two more days to go (to finish it all!) before we hit the road for Christmas in Michigan. Here's a look back at what's been keeping us busy: Decorating the tree, finally! The boys have been asking to do this since Halloween. Unfortuanately I didn't get many pictures since I was more focused on keeping the ornaments from having accidents ;)
Watching the Packers play: 'Tailgating' on Santa's annual trip through the neighborhood as part of the fire departments food drive. This involves bundling up, putting the seats down, lots of snacks and sometimes a movie. We almost had to call it quits before Santa showed up due to it being so late, Santa must have taken a different route this year! Bundling up for some outside fun! And then coming in to warm up with hot chocolate and cake. Some very rosy cheeks! A nice afternoon visit with our friend Jess and her two kids, Ethan and Grace. Grace really likes the kitties - a lot! Ethan wasn't as enamored with the cats, but did have a good time with the toys. Unfortunately before they came I had a little stove mishap so lunch was delivered and the house was a little smelly and cold due to many open windows, I'll explain more later ;) So, I was going to make lunch for Jess and the kids. I had cleaned up the counters and in the process put one of Brendans 'experiments' (consisting of rocks, sand, water and chalk) in a plastic bowl and set it in the oven where I wouldn't spill it and it would be out of the way. Yeah, you guessed it, I preheated the oven (to 450 no less!) and walked away. Obviously plastic and ovens don't mix very well - the result was a very stinky smoke and a huge puddle of melted plastic on the bottom of the oven. Thankgoodness for delivery to save the day for lunch! Here is the result: Wellyn celebrated the big 3-6 this past Monday, but due the kids having school a preschool program, work, etc we celebrated on Saturday morning. The kids were having a great weekend playing dress-up and doing all sorts of adventures so they were in pirate costume for the gift opening. Some birthday pie ;)

Playing in the snow after our first real storm of the season:

A little baking with the babysitter while we were out shopping. (thankfully all cleaned up by the time we got home ;) Last Monday was Aidens first preschool program, the Birthday Party for Jesus. He was so excited about it - unfortunately he was feeling down with a cold, but there was no missing this performance! Brendan with his buddy Mason, buddies from their year in preschool.


Enjoying the cupcakes and their friends afterwards!





This will be the last post before the holidays and we wish all of you a safe and joyous Christmas and New Year. May the new year bring many new joys, adventures and memories.