Winter 2012

This blog has been very neglected lately, so here's to trying to get back on track and an all-in-one post of Thanksgiving, Christmas, Christmas break and New Years! We had such a wonderful holiday season, filled with family, friends, food, and making memories.

We spent Thanksgiving day with my parents, Aunts, Uncles and cousins. It was a houseful of 29 people. Matthew loved playing with his second cousins, he just didn't like sitting for a picture.

Much better! Makayla loved playing with Matthew's mic and guitar.

We ate way too much food. But it's Thanksgiving, so isn't that what you are supposed to do?!? Mollie slept all the way through her first Thanksgiving dinner and enjoyed a nice warm bottle when she woke up!

We held our first annual Friendsgiving. Justin excuse to get together with good friends, fellowship and eat a yummy thanksgiving dinner!

Mollie is always pulling Autumn's hair. I think she's a little jealous that she doesn't have any.

Matching Christmas Pajamas! Thanks Gabby

Trying to find the perfect Christmas tree with Papa. We went fake this year, so we headed out to the Christmas tree farm just to hang out with our family and help them find the perfect tree. Okay we weren't much help, but we had a great time! Afterwards we headed over to Grandma and Papa's house for our annual breakfast and ornament exchange.

Matthew wanted to hold "Kee's" hand the whole time. So sweet!

Love my family! Growing up too fast.

Checking out all the Christmas tree ornaments

 

 

Priceless! One is stunned...the other screaming. He loves talking about Santa and looking at pictures of him. Obviously sitting on Santa's lap wasn't included in Matthew's idea of fun.

We made up for the tragic experience by letting them ride a couple of rides at the mall.

The wonder of Christmas!

Making sugar cookies. Lots of time, work and cleanup. One toddler who was interested for about 2 minutes. At least we had yummy cookies!

Oh. My. Soul.

Looking at Christmas lights with Grandpa and Gabby!

We celebrated Christmas with Matt's dads side of the family the Sunday before Christmas. As soon as Matthew saw Uncle Thom he kept calling him Santa Claus! Seriously one of those times where I want to go hide as a mom. Kids sure don't have a filter yet! Thankfully Uncle Thom thought it was pretty hilarious. Of course he loved looking from a distance, but was never thrilled to get very close. I couldn't help but get a picture.

Mollie and Emalynn with Great Grandma Stevens.

Uncle Adam and Aunt Willow came for Christmas! They were only here for a few quick, and busy days, so we tried to squeeze in as much time with them as possible. I was really bad about keeping my camera with me, but here's a few pictures of our time together.

We spent Christmas Eve with my dad's side of the family. We ate way too many yummy appetizers and had an amazing Christmas cookie spread! This is a picture of all the cousins.

And all our babies!

Christmad Eve night we always go up to Matt's parents house for grilled cheese sandwiches, gift opening and a Christmas movie.

Matthew liked Sissy's binkie ornament

Matthew was exhausted and a little overwhelmed with all of the excitement. He enjoyed opening his presents, and then headed to bed.

We woke up first thing Christmas morning, and while the kids enjoyed their bottles (and yes, Matthew has since given up his bottle!), Daddy read the Christmas story from the Bible. Isn't there something so beautiful and cozy about sitting by a glowing Christmas tree in the morning with a good cup of coffee??

With the kids still in their PJs, we headed over to my parents house for stockings!

Both Matthew and Mollie loved opening their stockings!

I forgot my camera, and I took some with my parents but I don't have them uploaded yet, so I'll just tell you about it instead!

After stockings, we ate a yummy breakfast. We got the kids ready and started to open presents. My family has always opened presents pretty slow, opening them one at a time. I love this time of watching everyone open their gifts and it makes it seem like Christmas morning lasts even longer!

This year, I envisioned Matthew absolutely loving opening presents and playing with them all morning. That's at least what I was hoping would happen. Instead, Matthew was tired from a busy weekend, and simply overwhelmed with opening all of this presents. We made the mistake of just wrapping up his gifts, still in the box and packaging. He would open up this gift, and would be frustrated because it was still in the cardboard box, and he didn't understand why he couldn't play with it right away. We learned for next year! He did like playing with the boxes and paper! So we decided to take a break from opening presents and give our tired kids an early nap. While they were sleeping, we opened and put together the rest of Matthew's toys. Best idea! When he woke up, he loved exploring and playing with his new toys without the frustration of waiting! Some of Matthew's favorite toys were a remote control car, Chuggington train set, some awesome books, a Mickey Mouse backpack, a Little People playset, and a ride on horse! Mollie, our easy going baby, was happy and content to play with any toy or stuffed animal we gave her!

Mid afternoon my Dad cooked a delicious steak dinner, and then we headed off to Matt's aunts house for dessert, Christmas carols and a visit from Santa. I didn't make Matthew sit on his lap this time. He clung pretty tightly to me! We ended the night by watching a movie back at my parents house. A day filled with family....I couldn't have asked for a more prefect day! Merry Christmas.

Matt and I celebrated our 5 year wedding anniversary! Seriously, where did the time go?? My parents kept the kids overnight and we enjoyed a nice dinner out and a quiet night at home. We even got to watch a movie in the morning. It was perfect and exactly what we needed!

We got to enjoy 2 weeks together as a family on Christmas break! We kept pretty busy with just getting redy for Christmas and having family visit, but we had plenty of time for fun too!

We had play date's with Autumn, and of course Kyle and Alyssa.

Kisses!

We spent lots of time with Gabby and Grandpa, and loved going to look at Christmas lights!

We spent a family day in Seattle at the Seattle Children's museum, and enjoyed lunch at the Center House.

Matthew drank "coffee" hot chocolate from Starbucks.

We went to Bridges pet store and looked at tons of fish, cats, dogs, reptiles, rats and birds. Seriously, it is a pretty awesome pet store and somewhere we will be going back to!

On December 30th Matt's best friend from high school, Bobby, got married. Matt was the best man and Matthew was the ring bearer! I had no idea, or really any expectation as to how Matthew was going to do. Both the flower girl, Aisha, and Matthew were pretty young, so we decided to have them walk down the aisle together.

The rehearsal was the day before, and oh my soul, these two were so adorable. They practiced walking running down the aisle over and over again. It turned into one big, adorable game for these two. They held hands every time, even while they walked up the stairs onto the stage. Matthew kept saying, "run, Aisha!" I was hopeful they would do the same thing during the wedding, but I didn't know how it would go with a couple hundred eyes on them. Thankfully, it went perfect! Aisha and Matthew held hands, giggled as they ran down the aisle, and climbed the stairs, never letting go of each others hands. Precious! Thankfully that part went well, because Matthew was a mess the rest of the wedding. Bobby and Stacey had such a beautiful wedding and we are so excited for them as they start this new journey as Mr. and Mrs., and probably even more excited to meet Bobby Jr.!

Here's a video of the rehearsal. Precious.

 

Happy New Years Eve! We usually go out to dinner with Matt's family, but with new babies and busy toddlers, we decided to order take out and enjoy the night at our house. The adults had an amazing spread of Chinese food, the kids enjoyed pizza.

Mollie and Emalynn in matching outfits!

The kids played the Kinect and loved it!

Matthew was having a tough night. I was hoping he could make it to 9pm so we could at least celebrate with the east coast! Ultimately, it was best for him just to go to bed a bit early. So we busted out the party hats and noise makers, and Matthew, Mommy, and Daddy had our own little ringing the the New Year party at 8:30! Mollie was already asleep. Needless to say, my kids NEED their sleep!

We rang in the New Year with the rest of the kids at 9pm. Matt was in charge of the tv so that we could watch the ball drop in New York. Something happened and it wasn't on the right channel. Next thing we knew the countdown was over and the ball had already dropped! Whomp, whomp! It was pretty funny and we decided to do our own countdown, just a couple minutes late!

We officially rang in the New Year at midnight by relaxing on the couch with some of our very best friends, Kyle and Alyssa. I think we're getting old!

Blessings this New Year from our family to yours! We are so excited to see what The Lord has planned for our family and some pretty big changes coming our way!

 

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