Happy New Year!!

This New Years Eve, my aunt and uncle volunteered to take the kiddos and celebrate the New Year with them! We got to hang out with good friends and had a great night! These are my girlfriends that I have known since kindergarten. I am lucky to have these relationships that have endured awkward school years, college adventures, dating, marriages, and children! And we are just as close now as we were then!

This was our attempt at a self timer group picture around 1am ;)

And just because I found this pic on my camera, here's the same group on a couch in the bathroom at Nordstrom's a few weeks ago!

Cousin Fun

We had lots of fun with our cousins while they were here! One morning after breakfast the kids decided to turn the dining room table into a train.

The train cars (chairs) were crashing into the girls!

The cousins showing off their new jackets.

Bottoms up!

We love spending time with our cousins!

Reindeer Games and a little more Christmas!

My sister and her family came to visit the day after Christmas so we got to celebrate an extended holiday!

Little T thinking about how he was going to get that train table out of the box.

We played our family's 2nd Annual Minute To Win It games. The pictures speak for themselves!

Don't these winners look familiar? They won the tacky sweater contest and the Minute to Win It games!!

A Holly Jolly Christmas

A few snapshots from Christmas morning...

The kiddos were up bright and early to see what jolly St. Nick had left! AP really wanted a DS and a new Baby Alive. C really wanted a go-kart. Santa delivered both!

Last year we decided that Christmas Day afternoon was a great time to catch a movie so we did that again this year. We took the kiddos to see "We Bought A Zoo". Although it was a really cute movie, there were a few lines that were a little too "mature" for the kiddos to hear, but AP promptly repeated!

They have both really enjoyed riding the go-kart. We have had unusually warm weather since Christmas and the kiddos can be found riding around our cul-de-sac most of the time!

I just love this last picture!

Tacky Sweater Christmas Eve

Our family decided to have a tacky sweater-themed Christmas Eve. I thought it would be cute AND tacky to make us all matching elf shirts- Mamma Elf, Daddy Elf, Nanna Elf, Big Elf C, and Lil Elf AP.

We all voted Survivor-style by looking into a camera and casting our vote for the tackiest sweaters. We voted for my cousin J below and his fiance. Their trees lit up and on the back it said "Merry Elfin' Christmas"! They ended up winning, too.

Way too many gifts later, we headed home to spread reindeer food in the front yard.

The kiddos were super excited about Santa's pending arrival. We had been tracking his location throughout the day on Daddy's phone so they hurried to bed and were out in a flash!