Monday, January 28, 2008

More old pictures--See below

This is Luke. Mr. Happy.



This is Chloe, striking a pose, in some of her new Christmas duds!



So, when you have 4 kids under 5 years of age. And you are helping to babysit your sister's 4 kids while she is away on a fabulous Hawaiian cruise, you stay home on New Years Eve. You count down to 9:00 pm. You play pictionary with the kids and you toast with Sparkling Cider.
Life doesnt get any better! Wink Wink!

So, these arent really traditions...

See an earlier post for an explanantion of why I am posting Christmas pictures when it is almost February.
These kids are 2 months apart. Brooke, the red headed girly is 2 months older than Luke. Yeah, she is tiny, but really Luke's head is just huge! :)

Luke, hanging out in mom's lap.

All the kids and cousins decorating a ginger bread house.


No, this is not the finished product. This is just a fabulous gift from my visiting teacher. Yes, that is our address on the candy cane if you were wondering. And, the best part... if you pulled up on the ribbon that was the smoke coming out of the chimney, the whole roof came off and the house was filled with homemade goodies. Man, do I have an awesome visiting teacher or what?

Christmas Tradition Pictures

Tyler and I with the group from Redlands BluePrint that went to see the Rockettes
Chloe and Chandler as Mary and Joseph

Logan is a wise man
Connor in the back with the white head dress is the angel. Logan and Gavin were wise men. Chloe and Chandler in the middle were Mary and Joseph.

These are the Christmas Tradition Pictures

See my last post, for the explanation of all the Christmas pictures.

Here the kids are cutting out cookies!

Chloe made a lovely candy cane with nerds!

Waiting for the train...

The kids with Mr. and Mrs. Claus

Sunday, January 27, 2008

It's practically February already!!!


Well, since it is practically February already and I have yet to post any Christmas pictures, I thought I would skip it all together. Well, almost. I thought it would be kind of fun to post some pics of our Christmas traditions. You know, fun things our family does around Christmas time.
First, we always take a family photo. This year we posed in front of the train station at a friends house.
As a gift from Tyler's mom, Tyler and I got to start out this Christmas Season by seeing the Radio City Music Hall Rockettes down at the Orange County Performing Arts Center. It was a great show, my favorite part being the famous "Toy Soldier" part. It was also kind of a traumatic night in the way that I am a breastfeeding mom and this was the first time I had ever left Luke --who did not want to take a bottle for Grandma.

Another thing our family does is sugar cookies. The kids love it! We always get together with Tyler's mom for this and this year I think she had us make 6 dozen sugar cookies. I am not sure if that includes the 2 dozen gingerbread cookies that we added this year or not, but needless to say, we ate a lot of cookies.

Another thing that our family loves to do is to go to the Festival of Lights at the San Diego Wild Animal Park. Of course, Santa is there. But there is also a snow hill, face painting, cookie decorating, ornaments to make, and all sorts of other free stuff. We have had a blast every year.

The last couple years we have been able to ride the train at a friends house. This guy's backyard is amazing. He does it up especially for Christmas and invites everyone to ride his train and of course see Santa. This year, Mrs. Claus also came for a visit.

Last but not least we started a new tradition this year. The kids and cousins are finally old enough to act out the Nativity. It was really special to hear Chloe tell the story of Christ's birth in her own words.


Thursday, January 3, 2008