Our new sweaters from Uncle Chuck look & fit Great! Thanks.

We had a great day yesterday celebrating Christmas with my Dad and family. They came over to our house about 9:30am and stayed until after midnight! We had a full day of fun. My Dad made us brunch that included the best french toast I've had (other than the Winter in Italy French Toast at Egg Harbor). He also made a fresh spinach & bacon quiche. I guess he is already enjoying his new Paula Deen Cookbook since that is where all his recipes came from for brunch. The kids had a great time opening MORE presents. Rick got a nap in during the day & my Dad got a nap in after 9pm while Deb, Josh & I played Rummikub. Of course Rick was already asleep for the night at 9pm. Sad to say I never got a nap in nor did I win one round of Rummikub.

two boys in a tub

who says fruitcake is no good?

I love my gramma Kathy's fruitcake cookies!

Yum Yum.

We didn't have a white Christmas but today we got a little bit of heavy-WET-snow.

11:00am

12:45 pm

3:00pm

We enjoyed a wonderful Christmas here. I am so blessed to have such a loving family and great friends. Christmas Eve is traditionally our time to host dinner. Usually Rick goes crazy in the kitchen prepping for days and cooking, cooking, cooking. This year he honored my request to have a simple meal so that he could enjoy the day with us and not be a slave to the fancy food. He did very well being simple- which surprised me. He did wind up forgetting to buy the bread to make the croutons for his butternut squash soup though, which was a bummer because it makes the soup for me. He also was so relaxed that he forgot to add the brown sugar which resulted in a soup that was not up to par. Thankfully for me, I got to taste batch #2 that he prepared for the neighbors today. Very delicious! I think next year we'll try to prepare a meal somewhere between fussy and simple.


This Christmas was so awesome because the kids really enjoyed it and their excitement was contagious. They received many gifts and did well sharing with each other. They almost didn't care whose gift was whose so long as they were able to tear into something. Unfortunately that did lead to Adeline opening a couple presents that remained under the tree this morning. We are celebrating with my Dad on Saturday so those gifts are still in the danger zone of being opened here!

football in the house? so happy


3 tired kids who needed to get to bed




Was there a Santa sighting?

We have been so busy the past couple weeks in preparation of Christmas. We have attended a few Christmas parties with the kids as well as a couple cookie exchanges. This morning the kids were soooo excited to go to the cookie party as they called it at their friend Taylor's house. They had a great time playing, eating cookies, running around and eating a couple more cookies that Auggie wound up throwing up in my car on the way home- YUCK! I could have done without that. What's worse is that I cleaned the car today but when I took D'Angelo to AWANA tonight the car still smelled gross. Hopefully I can go have it cleaned properly.

On a better note I'd like to share a few snapshots of our lives ...

playing outside in the snow Saturday evening

The naughty A Team (adeline & auggie) is at it again...

more snow fun



Xavier James loves his bath time

Auntie Michelle & Adeline 11-24-2007

Girls in Pink

This is what happened when I left these two naughty monkeys to answer my phone... I was only gone for a couple minutes!

These are Adeline & Auggie's 2 year pictures that we had taken last month.

American Girl-Monday 11/26/2007

Adeline got to go to American Girl Place for her first time - mine too.

She loved every minute of her experience there. She wanted to hold all the babies, feed them and love them. She walked around collecting all kinds of stuff for her doll. Luckily for Daddy all we left with was one Bitty Baby & a stroller.

Here we are about to go across the street to get in there!

Entering the Bitty Baby Area

Adeline loves babies!
Loving up her very own new Bitty Baby

Here's Adeline strolling along with her new Bitty Baby.

Michelle, Bailey & Eric

Me & My little brother

We have enjoyed the past week visiting with my brother, sil & nephew! We had a nice day Thanksgiving at our house with our family. The kids ate well & loved having everyone over. Friday was a quiet day. No Black Friday deals for me...my Dad & sil were out early though. On Saturday my brother and sil surprised me with tickets to see Jersey Boys. They told me at 4pm that I needed to be ready to leave my house at 6:30 to get downtown. Easy to do if you aren't at home with 5 littles! They were here with me but still...if I am home my kids wanna be under my feet and in my pocket! I was successful in getting my act together though. The fun thing was that my Dad & Deb went as well. It was a fantastic performance & I have already told my Mom I am taking her to see it as soon as she is feeling better.

The kids table

Boys will be boys

My Babies
Uncle Eric & Adeline