Merry Christmas!!

Yep, Santa came!  This is before the madness!

Clara asked for a giant horse...she had no idea it came in pink!

Nora's first request this year was a giant bear!

Lila wanted a puppy in purse and here she is with it!

Stockings!

I love that I caught this pic.   The girls exchanged gifts this year and this was Nora's reacation for both of her sisters after opening her gifts!  I wonder what her love language will be...

Of course the fur babies get gifts and even fun things in thier stockings!

Christmas Eve!

We went to the 3:00 church service for Christmas Eve.  Clara sang in the choir and it was precious!  She has the best facial expressions when she sings!  From there we headed to Dad and Char's.  Santa came early and he was so fun!  After Santa went on his way, we had dinner and opened a ton of gifts!  The girls got some great things and so did Brian and I!  I am always amazed at the generosity of my family.  We are truly blessed!!  We changed the girls in to their jammies and headed home.  Clara was still awake from excitement when we got home and had a hard time falling asleep.  I can still remember that excitement!  Luckily she did fall asleep, so Santa could come! 

Sittin' With Santa

Guess who showed up to Papa and Gram's for Christmas Eve??  Everyone got a chance to sit with Santa! 

Brian's New Toy!

When you get a foot of this...

You really appreciate this:

I had planned to surprise Brian for Christmas with a snowblower. I had bought it a few weeks before and hid it in our neighbors garage,   However,  the Wednesday before, we were forecasted to get up to a foot!  Once the first couple of inches fell, Brian went out to shovel.  I just could not stand to watch him, so I went outside, told him to put the shovel down, and had him follow me next door.  I opened the garage and told him that the snowblower was his!  Luckily I bought it from Ace, so they had already put oil and gas in it so it was ready to go!  Could not have been better timing! 

When I grow up...

Nora is so funny with the little things she says!  She just cracks us up!  Here is a conversation between her and Brian this morning...

Nora: "I don't know what I want to be when I grow up, maybe a teacher, an engineer, a baker..."

Daddy: "What about an astronaut?"

Nora: "No, I like gravity.  I want to stay on Earth."

Good Nora, me too!!!

Ho, Ho, Ho

Look who came to dinner...

This is where Lila and Presley hid right after the guest of honor showed up!

Of course Clara was over the moon!



Nora sat on his lap, but was a bit hesitant at first!



 Luckily, Lila warmed up much later in the evening, so I did get her picture!

Family picture!

All eleven kids with Mr and Mrs Claus (one little Henry is not so happy)!

By the end of the hour, these two made some new friends!

Dear Santa,

Winter Break!

Winter Break started last Friday, so we planned an fun outing!  My friend Audra from high school recently moved back to Colorado and lucky for us, Highlands Ranch!  So her little ones, Anna and AJ met us there.  Everyone had a great time!  We even got to see a live snake...fun times!! 

Clara's Class Party!

I love going to Clara's class parties.  She is always so considerate of her sisters and if they are having a good time...I can say this time everyone did!!  Yeah!

Dance Dance Dance

The girls had their Progress Performance for their dance classes!  So now I am attempting to upload video.  They do a little dance and then show thier skills.  I can only put the skills on the blog since it will only let me upload a short video, so you can see a little bit! 

Holiday Fun!

Each year we have a lot of holiday traditions, both old and new.  Here are a few!

Our elf, Choddle.  The girls love finding him each morning!  One night Choddle got into the rice in the pantry and made a snow angel!  Another night he got into the M&M's and last night he was rockin' out to Mitch Miller Christmas Sing A Long in the car.  Thanks to the fact tha the Elf on the Shelf is so popular, lots of fun ideas have sprung up on the web! 

Nana sent the girls this cute advent tree this year.  Clara really loves the count down, since she gets the whole idea and is so very excited for Christmas! 

For my birthday, I asked Brian for a card holder.  I love going to the mail in December and I love having a place to display my cards! 

Gingerbread cookie making and decorating with the girls.  They love all things sugar (could they be part elf??) So cookie making is perfect!  (I also love that you can make this mix from the box since baking is not my sort of thing!)