Merry Christmas

We had a wonderful white Christmas this year at home.  We really enjoyed staying home with just our family and not dealing with the hassles of traveling.  We did get to see Danny's family the weekend before and we had fun shopping and hanging out with them.

At the beginning of December we had a family home evening of setting up the Christmas tree.  Sorry the first picture is blurry but they have the cutest smiles:)

Christmas Eve morning we went to Cabelas and Danny bought some things with his gift card he got from work and we also bought a sled.  Then we headed over to Pizza Pie Cafe for lunch.  We had been trying to go there all month but the wait was too long every time.  Going on Christmas Eve and getting there right when they opened was perfect.  We were the only ones there for half an hour and they made any kind of pizza we wanted fresh.  Then we went home and played games and watched Christmas movies.  That night we did a tradition I grew up with.  We ate cheese, crackers, meats, and soup by candlelight.  Then we talked about Christ's birth and we read a children's story about it so the kids could follow along.  We were going to open up their Christmas pajamas they get from my grandparents but because of the weather we never got them so we let them pick one present to open. 

Memphis opened up this guitar.  One thing we love about Memphis, the night we went to Thanksgiving Point to see the lights Memphis said, "Thank you so much for taking me to see the lights mommy.  They were so beautiful!"  He was so sincere.

 Kayzee opened up this baby penguin from her aunties.  Kayzee is obsessed with baby penguins right now.  She got three for Christmas.  She named this one baby Jesus:)

 Christmas day was spent opening presents, playing with our new toys, and having a relaxing day.  We made cinnamon rolls (Danny did an amazing job they were so yummy!).  Our neighbors shoveled our driveway of snow so we took some over to them.  And that night we had ham and church potatoes.  Yummy fun day!

Christmas morning after Santa came!

 Waiting to go downstairs to open presents

Danny's presents

 Thanks everyone for the gifts

Aleena's presents

 Thanks everyone I am excited for all of them

 My wonderful hubby was so thoughtful and bought me a new digital camera.  I had no idea!!!

Last year the kids took forever to open their presents because they just wanted to play forever with each one.  This year they were so patient and they took turns with all of us and they watched each person open a present.  They also wanted to know who each present was from and they would yell THANK YOU really loud and then the person's name.  So everyone the kids say thank you really loud to each of you!  Memphis would also say..."this is my favorite!" after EVERY present.  He loves all his presents and so does Kayzee.  

Memphis and his haul of presents

 So spoiled and so loved.  

 New car track from Daddy

Kayzee's haul of presents

 Kayzee also got this baby penguin from her daddy.  This penguin moves and makes sounds and you can feed it a bottle.  She feeds it all day:)

 Yay...lots more girly toys...and Grandma Thorpe made the cute apron she is wearing.

 Thanks for the aqua doodle mat Grandma and Grandpa Royer

 Playing in her new princess tent from her mommy!

One present Memphis got from his aunties was a me reader.  It reads stories to the kids as they follow along in the book.  PERFECT for my kids who love to read stories.  But we only have one reader and the kids fight over it so my sister Alicia is sending another one (for Memphis since his birthday is coming up soon) so they will each have their own.  Thanks auntie Sheesha!

I saw this dancing wii game on a tv commercial.  It was nick jr and had all my kids favorite nick jr cartoon charaters my kids love (Team Umi zoomi, bubble guppies, and Dora) so I had to buy it.  They love to do zumba with me so I knew they would love to dance with this game even better.  We are going to do it every day just me and the kids.  Here they are dancing...Kayzee beat Memphis in a few of the dances!  

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE.  It was fun to skype with our families.  Hope you all had a wonderful day and can we believe it's almost 2013!?!

Family Pictures December 2012

Here are our family pictures we took at Camera Shy!  My kids are too cute and they did so well:)  We have over 80 pictures but here are my favorites...

Playing...

I didn't really know what to title this post because it is just about what is going on right now, some random pictures and some fun things we have done the past while.

Life has been SOOOOOO BUSY!!!!!  I teach health the month of December and I have to grade 2,400 health assignments, I am doing all the extra work for my PE grant, I have had a bad cold since Halloween, the kids have had pink eye, I have been trying to get Christmas ready, keep the house clean, and now Memphis has a weird rash all over his body.  It's worse in the morning but the doctor says it is just an allergic reaction and it should go away after five days of taking a steroid and benadryl.  But if it doesn't then he has to go see an allergist.  My Christmas break starts next Thursday so I CAN'T WAIT!

We are taking our family pictures finally after too long and I am excited for that this weekend.

Now on to the pictures and fun things we have been doing...

Playing at Mommy's school:  A perk to being the PE teacher at an elementary school, when it is too cold outside to go play at the park then I just bring my kids to my school and they love running around the gym and playing with all the fun equipment.  And with my grant I am getting THOUSANDS of dollars worth of new equipment so we will have more fun stuff to play with this winter.  Here we are playing musical dots.

Playing with Kate:  This is Kayzee and and Kate playing with stuffed animals.  Kate goes to the same day care as Kayzee and Kate is my friend's little girl.  Her mom (my friend) is the music teacher at my school and on Thursday's she has play practice so I watch Kate.  They have a lot of fun playing together.

Playing with Mommy's phone:  My kids love playing with the camera on my new phone.

Playing with Pinterest:  I found this idea on pinterest and my kid's loved it.  GLOWSTICK BATH!  Glowsticks + bath time + lights out = FUN!!!  Had to use my flash to get a shot of their happy faces:)

I have a million other things I want to blog about but I really need sleep so off I go.  Hope you are all having a good December!