Done with December

Time to get the Tree!

Such a bummer this year with the weather and the fact that we had NO snow!  We still managed to have fun picking out a tree (in a different field this year!)  The girls were goofy and had a good laugh every time they found poop on the ground.  There was another family with college aged girls that were having the time of their lives.  It was so much fun to watch them interact with their parents and made me think how much fun we will continue to have even when the girls are older.  The family also drove a silver Toyota Sienna and also put their tree on the roof of their van.  It was quite funny to Brian and I.  We always have such good luck with Brewery Hill in LeSueur and its a great little family run business.  After the tree hunt we headed back to St. Peter to start a new traditon, eating at ElAgave...yummy!  Next year I'll get a margarita!  It wasn't as festive watching Brian drinking by himself!

Emily-Middle School Choir/Band Concert

It was fun to watch Emily at her Choir concert.  Still a little hard for me to believe she's in middle school.  She is having a good 7th grade year and meeting new friends and just seems to enjoy all aspects of 7th grade.  She got to play instruments with an old friend Abby, who used to go to JI and that was fun!  THe kids did a pretty good job overall...its definitely not JI quality of performance but it is always entertaining. :)

JI Christmas Program

I really look forward to watching the girls perform at the JI Christmas program.  Even though I tell them to stop singing their songs around the house weeks before the program.  I tell them I want to be surprised.  However, hearing them sing around the house tells me that they enjoy learning the songs and that they are excited about the upcoming program.  Barbara Frank, the choir director does such a good job highlighting each class and their talent.  Every year I'm amazed at the kids and I usually tear up at some point.  It's so hard to hold back but I know that I'm an ugly crier and I wouldn't want people sitting near me to experience that sort of thing.  Rachel was an angel this year and is in her 2nd year in the JI choir and 1st year in band.  She surprised both Brian and I with her drumming skills.  She's actually quite good!  Natalie just always has such a good time performing and is smiles the entire time.  She makes my cheeks hurt-I can't watch her without smiling from ear to ear!

Christmas Card Photo Session

We had hoped to have got a good family picture back around Thanksgiving, but no such luck.  So with a few instructions for the girls to make this photo session easy on all of us, we managed to get quite a few good ones to choose from in only a matter of 20 minutes or so!  I couldn't put all the pictures on the card this year but these are two of my other favorites.  In all of our craziness at times these are the moments I'm most excited for them-to have an abundance of sisters.  Imagine the fun they'll have when they're grown adults.  It makes my heart happy.

Cookie baking!!

This year the girls were exceptionally productive and worked together so well!  No fighting, teamwork, snitching the chocolate kisses-too many for me to even want to know!  They managed to bake/make 7 different cookies and roughly 4 dozen of each one so that was alot of cookies!!!! 

Progressive Dinner with Friends/Godparents

Our friends the Gracks, Gilbertsons and Crowleys and our family are not only great friends, we are also honored to be Godparents to some of the kids.  So to celebrate Christmas, Mary had a great idea to do a progressive dinner and throw in our family traditions too.  So we started at the Gracks with Appetizers and their family tradition, singing christmas carols and added our family tradition of wearing our PJs all day on Christmas by wearing our PJs to all the houses.  Next was the main meal at Gilbertsons, reading a book to the kids which is their tradition and also opening up presents.  The Crowley's also added to the main meal and then their family tradition at our house, reading "Twas the Night before Christmas". We ended at our house with desserts.  It was a great night despite Cody being quarantined to his room because of his flu sickness not able to join us.  I think this will be a fun addition to our Christmas celebrations.

Christmas with the Moore's

We celebrated Christmas with my side of the family a week before Christmas.  It was a fun day hanging out with cousins, playing bingo and eating yummy food.  

Kiwanis Lights and Dino's

A new favorite family activity before christmas is heading to Mankato for the Kiwanis lights show at Sibley Park.  It was a beautiful night to see all the amazing work these volunteers put in to put on such a great light show.  After a walk in the park we enjoyed delicious pizza at one of our favorites, Dinos.  

Christmas Eve

I didn't get a picture of the girls Christmas Eve, but they did all look beautiful.  I also didn't coordinate their outfits like I have in the past and low and behold I survived not doing it and they weren't disappointed either.  We went to Christmas Eve mass, which is always lovely at our church.  Rachel sang in the choir.  Lauren talked THE entire time.  It was hilarious and we kept people around us entertained.  After mass, we headed back home to get ready for round one of present opening.  Here's the before shots.....so pretty, so clean, so peaceful.....

PJ Time!

A tradition, one of many at this house, is PJs for presents on Christmas Eve.  In the past it's been pretty easy coming up with a theme, whether it be a certain color or character, etc.. This year I was a little stumped on what to do.  I wanted to get everyone stripped PJs from Hannah Andersen but I couldn't justify spending that much money for stripped pjs and I couldn't find a comparable cute knock off.  So finally decided on the girls' favorite character, cartoon, super hero, etc....  Here's what we came up with.  Next year...no theme...maybe I'll splurge and get those stripped pjs. :)

Lauren-Minnie Mouse

Caitlin-Captain America

Natalie-Elsa from Frozen

Rachel-Minecraft

Emily-The Flash

Brian-Batman

Mandy--Curious George

Christmas Morning

Looks like Santa did leave somethings for the kids and our family.  The girls all surprisingly slept in til about 8am and even waited patiently while Brian brewed some coffee for us.  Christmas day is my favorite of all because we don't have to go anywhere, we can stay in our pjs all day long and work on Legos and puzzles and play games with one another.  We can eat candy and cookies and not notice the time, because it just seems to stand still.  

Bye Bye 2015!

We hosted our annual New Years Eve bash once again, having 42 of our close friends here to ring in the new year.  There were 12 people that were unable to join us but we were thinking of them.  It's always a fun night, very loud with kids running everywhere, but in the end we are all grateful to have each other.  New this year was playing BINGO!  What a great game for all ages to play and we were able to contain the kids for a solid hour and a half!