Christmas #2

 

Saturday we headed over to Earlham for Steve's family Christmas. It's always nice to head out there since we don't see his family nearly enough. The girls got some great presents! Seems like they got exactly what they wanted.

 

Piper laying on her doll house from Uncle Matt

Ava and Presley got a ton of Frozen stuff from Grandma Kathy and Grandpa Jerry. I love that they get along so well!

Cousins Austin and Zac playing Connect Four....it was awesome. We actually ended up having a Connect Four tournament instead of our usual pool tournament!

Piper is the only granddaughter (the youngest of the 5 girls) that isn't and hasn't been scared of Grandpa Jerry. Twice she walked right over to him and got up on his lap! I love it!

 

We didn't get home until after 10:30 and of course, Piper didn't fall asleep in the car. By the time we got home and went to bed it was after 11, we were exhausted! I'm glad we only have 2 Christmas's a year! 

I woke up at 9 this morning and was the first one yet....about 9:30 everyone was up. We hung out, opened all the presents, did some cleaning and organizing and then headed to my parents for the final regular season Packer game!

Piper was much more into the adults during this game instead of playing with Boston and Presley but she was pretty good and pretty cute, so we didn't mind! :)

 

 

Presley is staying with my mom overnight tonight. My mom is watching her for 'daycare' tomorrow, so instead of everyone getting up and ready early in the morning, we thought it might be easier for her to just stay there, in hopes that everyone would sleep in a little! :) Kinda weird only having one kid in the house tonight, and so quiet by 8:00!

Merry Christmas!

The girls woke up about 8, which I was happy with!

Their big gift from Santa...the Frozen Jeep...it has a radio that plays 2 songs, will go 5 mph and will even go in reverse! How many times will they run each other over and/or fall out?

Princess clip dresses, she has been watching youtube videos of these things for months!

While Presley opened presents, Piper would run over to the jeep, push the radio button and start dancing...over and over and over again!

She was excited about her 'American Girl' doll....sorry but Target's dolls are just as good as the real thing. I just can't justify spending that much money for the 'label' of the American Girl.

Piper got an Elmo doll...she kept squatting down saying 'Hi Elmo!'

This was her other gift from us....the Barbie camper....this thing is pretty darn cool!

They tried to get as many toys as possible in the jeep with them.

After we put together toys and got ready we headed over to my parents for Christmas with the family.

Piper might love Scott more than anyone else...she always gives him hugs and insisted on sitting next to him!

Presley has a hatred for Iowa State and anything red/gold, so Susie was nice enough to include Cy in the gift that she got her! HA! On the otherhand, she really did like the Hello Kitty underwear she got!

Presley has been obessed with getting a Monster High doll....Aunt Sam granted her wish and bought her one. I think they are creepy but she really likes it!

We got an Elvis decanter, it's pretty cool and pretty tacky!

Piper decided she wasn't going to take a nap. Fun for us. Good thing they do a really good job of going off and playing with Boston and Mary...away from the adults!

Piper doing wheels on the bus with Grandma, so cute!

It was a great day, kids were good, we all got so many nice things. We were able to actually have adult conversations while the kids were off playing. We all ate too much but we are just chunkin' up before our family weight loss challenge in January! :)

Christmas Eve

Presley wanted her own tree for her room...well after weeks of having good dropoffs at KTC Steve took her to Hobby Lobby to pick out a tree....she was so excited and proud of her purple tree!

I finally put the stockings up.....we were too afraid that Piper was going to pull them down on top of herself.

We finally got around to doing our gingerbread house (while listening to the Pentatonix Christmas CD). Piper 'cheesed' for me.

and gave daddy kisses

and they did pretty good decorating and sharing the candy.

We decided to let them open one gift from us...their small gift, new pajamas.

This was her face before she freaked out. Telling us they were terrible, too hot, she wanted a toy. She threw them, I took them and told her fine, say goodbye, the pajamas will go to someone else! Merry Christmas!

Don't be jealous of my new jammies! I've always wanted a pair and Steve is tired of hearing me say how cold I am....so I stole Presley's cheerleading pose for a picture.

(bad part of these pajamas...they make me look chunky!)

Then Presley was mad b/c she wanted pj's like mine. I originally wanted to bake a couple different things, but after not having one of the ingredients and me crying in the kitchen b/c of Presley, I was not in the mood. So we did our normal bedtime routine.

Presley did put a plate of cookies out for Santa and did spread her 'reindeer' food in the yard before going to bed.

Busy week

By Monday we knew it was going to be a busy week. I had my late night on Monday, which isn't THAT big of a deal but I don't get home until 6:30-6:45 so the night with the girls is basically over and bedtime routine is starting.
Monday night we had to get some wrapping done, we hadn't done anything....didn't really know what we had, what we didn't, what we needed. Took us an hour together, getting it all done. Perfect.
Tuesday Steve had a half day for work so he was able to get some additional shopping done and once the girls went to bed we he had to work on putting together their big present. Hour and a half later, he was done.
Tuesday was a irritating day for me in general, with work, with people and then once Steve picked up Presley from school I was irritated even more for 2 reasons.....1) For some reason they had her down as being picked up by a parent after school....and not going to KTC, which she has NEVER done. So she stood outside with a teacher waiting for one of us to pick her up....well we never did since that was NEVER the plan. Somehow they realized that she would go to KTC and went on her normal early-out afternoon....but why didn't they call one of us?
2) She told me they had a Winter Party, I didn't think twice about it. Until she said that some parents had come to watch them sing....what? Was this something that we could attend? Why didn't we know ANYTHING about it? Did these parents just drop in and invite themselves to watch? Were we supposed to be there to watch? I don't know!

Wednesday......Christmas Eve, we both had to work which I don't normally find to be that big of a deal. So Presley spent the day at Grandmas and Piper went to Generation. Steve got off a little early, but had to run some grocery shopping errands and by the time he was done with that and work, I was lucky enough to cut out of work at about 3:15 to pick them up anyway.
Now.....as I said, working this day doesn't seem like that big of a deal to me...until my kids are the ones in daycare while others aresleeping in at home....and until other people I work with took this day off to do nothing. If they were with their kids or family, that is one thing...but just to take the day off and not have plans....that is irritating to me! So Piper was one of the very last kids picked up from Generation at 4 pm (they were closing at 5 anyway) so that made me feel bad too. UGH. So next year, this mama is fighting for some more time off during the holidays!

Sunday Funday

We went to my parents for our Packer party on Sunday and did our Christmas cookie decorating at the same time. It's so fun to see Presley get excited about this kind of stuff. (she had me straighten her hair this day....she looks too grown up)

Boston was more interested in eating the sprinkles

We saved 2 cookies for Piper once she got up from her nap, she was mostly interested in eating the sprinkles too (you know, after grandma poured a pile of them in front of her!). She got mad when the sprinkles wouldn't stay on b/c there were SO many on there already!

Well because my family is totally grown up.....Holly and my mom started smearing frosting on each other....it was SO funny!

Scott decided to tickle Holly's feet...which you DON'T do....this was his payback!

Ahhhh.....just a typical Sunday at the parents house!

Steel Panther

Saturday night we had Carlyn come and babysit while we went to dinner and to the Steel Panther concert. I hadn't even heard of them until about 2 weeks ago. They are the ultimate 80's band. They actually have really catchy music but the lyrics and overall show are completely sex related. I'm sure this is why Steve liked them but it was a really good show, really funny and completely inappropriate. You definitely have to go into the show with the right attitude or you will be totally disgusted and shocked.

Brought out my big hair for the night. We met our friends Fuller and Kruse (who we haven't seen in years!) at Twin Peaks for dinner (I told Steve I would be a cool wife for a night and go there with them)

 See the best mullet ever? Yes, his hair line was really that far back and yes, his hair was as long as mine. Totally awesome.

It was a great night out and the girls were perfect for Carlyn!

Catch up time

Miss Presley Pie! (I think she looks too thin in this picture, but I know it's just the angle) either way, I'm slightly biased but I just think she is gorgeous.

Miss Piper can't just smile. She has to cheese at me, this smile just melts my heart!

And the girl can hold a pen/marker like an adult! #gifted

 

 Friday night we had our first annual Sips and Sparkle party that our friends Angie and Nicky organized! It was fun, good food and such a great idea for girls to get together and enjoy the holiday season with some sparkle!

Me with my BFF at work, Amy and Holly

 13 girls showed up! Good turn out and so nice to meet some new people and see people that make you realize what a small world it is!

Saturday we didn't do much, as usual. Steve went to work and the grocery store. Presley begged to have her friend Allie over (who lives 2 block away), we gave in. They go to school together and get along pretty good.

 

FYI....Piper the elf has made it back to our house this year. I have not taken pictures, I have not bragged about it on FB, I am not fond of the fact that other parents are now having their 'elf' give presents to their kids some mornings. Not cool parents! For the record, Piper the elf played poker with some animals, took a ride with Ken in Barbie's car, went for a ride on Barbies horse and spend two days hugging a snowman (oops!) along with many other, not very exciting things!

Piper did have to leave Presley a note last week reminding her to be good....this week Piper left Presley a note telling her how much better she was behaving (yes! It worked!)