Christmas Day!

Christmas morning this little guy waited very patiently on the stairs for us to deliver his little sister:

Trent carried her through the living room (covering her eyes) to the stairs so they could come down together:

But not before morning hugs! Someone was not quite awake yet:

Santa came and delivered exactly what they asked for!

We took a break for breakfast. Yummy, homemade cinnamon rolls!

This is one of my all-time favorite pictures now:

 

After lunch we got the best gift of all….SNOW!!!!!

Snow makes my heart happy.  It makes my sweet boy happy too (and my sweet girl, but from a distance…she is not a big fan of the cold):

We didn’t get much, but enough to call it a White Christmas!!! It was the first time in my life that it has snowed ON Christmas.  My kids are going to think we get snow like this all the time…little do they know. :)

We had a Mexican feast this year for our Christmas meal (Trent cooked his big meal for Christmas eve). This is definitely our new tradition! Yum!

Hud and I took frequent breaks to check on the snow:

After waking up from another long nap, Harper rested on the couch. Sweet baby was still not feeling like herself:

The boys enjoyed some legos:

After baths, we jammied up and headed out to look at some lights:

Despite Harper’s illness, it was a wonderful, peaceful, beautiful celebration of our Savior’s birth. :)

Christmas Eve!

Since baby girl was still not 100% on Christmas Eve, we decided to forego church this year. Since we would have gone to the 2:00 service, we would have had to cut Harper’s nap short.   That turned out to be a good decision because Harper napped for three plus hours that day.

My attempt to get pictures of the kids in their Christmas outfits:

     

We had both sides of our family over for Christmas Eve dinner. 

The kids table:

Then it was time for the kids to exchange presents…you can see Harper is starting to get her spirit back:

   

I have the FUNNIEST video ever of Harper. It is on Trent’s phone though, so I am going to have to post it later.

After getting our dose of medication in:

We went out in the (freezing!) cold to spread the reindeer food:

We were in such a hurry to get everyone to bed, we TOTALLY forgot to leave cookies for Santa!!! I was kicking myself for such a major mom fail, but then Hud woke up out of nowhere!  So like any good mom, I brought him downstairs to put the cookies out:

Good thing because Santa paid a visit not long after that ;)

All Aboard!!!

The Sunday before Christmas, we were scheduled to do one of my favorite traditions – the Polar Express!

Unfortunately, Harper came down with strep. :( I was very disappointed that she wasn’t able to go (and she was super sad as well).  Trent stayed home with her while mom and I took Hudson.

They have changed things up (for the better!) at the train this year. They added a tricycle “waiting area”:

Showing off  his ticket and meeting the polar bear:

I didn’t get any good pictures once we were in the tent. However, they changed up the pre-show and it was for the better!  After, we walked through the “snow”, it was time to board the train!

The conductor was a super sweet man:

The big guy himself came and sat down with Hud (maybe it was a good thing Harper was sick – she would have been FREAKING out!!! :))

After the ride we grabbed a quick hot chocolate before heading to dinner:

Such a fun night with my sweet boy! I look forward to ALL of us going next year!

Baking Day 2012

Every year we have a baking day with my mom. Due to various circumstances, this year it was a very short day…but bake we did!

We didn’t do the decorating until the next day:

New play area…and why does she look SO big???

We checked out a new (to us) playscape with the Oaks.  It was really neat and we will definitely be going back!  This was the only picture I got and I look at it and wonder when did she get so big???