New Year’s Eve

This afternoon we headed out to visit some friends for the afternoon/evening.  They bought their daughter the Step 2 rollercoaster and oh my did our kids love it!! 

Sam had a blast while I was a little nervous watching him. 

He would get the biggest grin on his face!!  Sorry my pictures are kind of blurry.  I am still trying to figure out how to use my new lens.  It is pretty picky about where it focuses.

After a few minutes of visiting the big girls headed out to see Tangled while the babies and daddies stayed back to watch football.  The movie was soooo cute!  We all enjoyed every minute of it.  It was really funny and sweet.

On our way home from the movie we picked up some pizza for dinner and then roasted some marshmallows over a bonfire.  Instead of graham crackers and Hershey's bars we used the holiday candy cane Oreos.  They were really yummy!! It was a gorgeous day and night so we tried to soak up the nice weather!

Our cute little friend, Joci!!  The mess on her face shows how yummy our s’mores were!

And her sweet big sister, Maddie.  She is so sweet with Reese.  She even let Reese sit in her lap during some of the movie.  Reese loves her and was so sad to leave their house tonight.

We left at bed time to head home.  Sam was asleep within minutes.  The kids are tucked away in their beds now while we watch football and wait to ring in the new year.

Happy New Year!!

The Pink Pig

Yesterday I took the kids down to Lenox to ride the Pink Pig with some friends from college.  Reese was very excited about riding again and talked a lot about how much fun we had last year!

We honestly didn’t have to wait in line too long.  I thought it would be worse than it was.

Reese was afraid we were going to miss our turn on the Pink Pig by taking pictures so she did not want to be in the pictures.  She was mad at me for taking her picture.

We went with Kristin, Kaitlyn (Kristin’s daughter), Erin, and Erin’s brother and sister Nicholas and Mikayla.   

The seats only hold two people so Sam and I rode together.  He was a little nervous about everything but as long as I was holding on to him or holding his hand he was happy.

Reese got to ride with Miss Erin but obviously didn’t want her picture taken once again.

I am so glad we were able to ride the pig again this year and visit with some old friends I haven’t seen in a while!!

My Favorite Ornament

The day Reese came home from her school party she brought a gift for Lance and me.   It was this precious ornament to put on our tree!

The tag on it says:

“These aren’t just five snowmen,
As anyone can see.
I made them with my hand,
Which is a part of me.
Now each year when you trim the tree
You’ll look back and recall
Christmas of 2010
When my hand was this small.”

The snowmen are made from her hand print wrapped around the ornament.  I LOVE it!!

Christmas Highlights

This weekend has been a whirlwind and I can’t believe it is already over!  I am so very grateful that we were all back to being healthy and happy after a long two weeks of fighting the flu and everything else!!

Friday kicked off our Christmas celebrations.  Lance’s parents, sister and nephews came over midday.  We ate a late lunch and then got to open presents.  I hate that I don’t remember everything that they got (they were spoiled by everyone this Christmas).  I do know that I got a KitchenAid mixer and I am sooooo excited to use it!

After presents Reese and I made cookies for Santa.  The boys were not interested in helping make them but they both decorated some…and of course loved eating some too!

Thanks to Aunt Kathy for capturing these pictures.

That evening we all went to our church for the candlelight service.  That was a horrible idea on our part.  Ha!  Sam was not interested in sitting at all.  I ended up taking him out to crawl around.  Reese enjoyed dancing in the aisle to the music for a little while but then just started to be disruptive so she had to come out with me too.  After the service I was waiting out in the hall for everyone to come out and a sweet man asked if Reese belonged to me.  I said yes and he said that her dancing in the aisle made the whole night for him. 

After the service we headed home and Lance’s family went home.  As soon as we got home we had a quick dinner, quick baths, and then it was off to bed for the little monkeys.

As the kids slept soundly in their beds, Santa came, worked hard putting together all of the toys, and was gone in a flash.

Fortunately, the kids slept in a bit Christmas morning because of the busy day before. 

As we were coming down the stair, Lance was trying to race down before us to get the video camera started.  Unfortunately, Reese looked through the bannister and saw her dollhouse and took off running.  We didn’t get the best part of the morning on video!!  She ran down the stairs, around the corner to the family room and squealed with delight that Santa had brought her a dollhouse.  It was so sweet!! 

They both enjoyed opening their gifts and stockings. They also had a lot of fun playing with their toys and each others toys!  We have to remind Reese that some of the toys are Sam’s!

My parents and Becca (Leah had to work) got to our house around noon or so, we had a quick lunch, and then once again tore in to some presents.

It had started snowing right as my parents were arriving so Lance and the kids went out for a second to check it out.

After opening presents inside, my parents had one more surprise for the kids outside. 

Their very own Jeep!!

Even though it was freezing out and snowing pretty hard we had to let the kids go for a ride!  Reese loved driving it but still has a lot to learn in the way of steering.

Sam had a huge grin on his face the whole time and loved having his sister drive him around the neighborhood.  I think they are going to both love this…until Sam is old enough to know he can drive it too!

It continued to snow the whole day and stopped shortly after the kids went to bed.  It really was beautiful.  According to the AJC, there has not been a white Christmas in over 100 years in Atlanta.

The day after Christmas some of my mom’s family came over to celebrate Christmas with us again.  Some of them could not make it due to icy roads and trying to get my Grandma out of the house on icy steps.  We had a great time visiting with those that did make it!!  Some of them got roped in to going upstairs to play with Reese’s dollhouse and all her new toys  (haha…thanks Amy and Bryan!)

Later that afternoon, Lance, Reese and I went outside to play in the snow.  We had so much fun chasing each other around and throwing snowballs at each other.  The snow was actually not icy enough for us to make a snowman.  It was really hard getting it to stick together.

One of my gifts from Lance was a new lens for the camera.  We enjoyed playing with it outside and seeing what it could do.  Basically it makes the background super blurry the closer you are to your subject. 

Reese wanted to make a snow angel. 

Our little snow angel has a head full of curly hair!

Sam had been taking a long nap so I woke him up so he could play in the snow with us for a bit.

We had a wonderful Christmas.  I can’t believe it is already over and Lance is back to work.

Christmas Lights at Life

For months we have been talking about Lance taking the week of Christmas off of work.  We had a list of fun Christmas activities to do and see.  

Then we all got sick and all of our plans went out the window.

Yesterday we were all suffering from some major cabin fever so we decided we had to get out of the house.

We didn’t want to go far from home so we decided to go get some milkshakes at Steak N Shake and head out to see the Christmas lights at Life University.

At $5 a car, what can beat that??

And the lights were nice!

Merry Christmas!

I finally got our Christmas cards in the mail earlier this week.  I love how they turned out (and the best part was the price since I got 50 free!!). 

I hope you all have a very, merry week of Christmas!!

Picture Updates

Pictures from the past week or two…

Haha…

The first day that it snowed this season…Reese was still in her pajamas but she put her gloves and hat on.  Then got one of Lance’s sports coats and her crocs.  She didn’t stay out long.

Reese’s Christmas show was last Monday.  I honestly don’t remember much from it because I felt so bad.  I know it wasn’t very long, it was called “Jesus is My Best-est Friend”, and the first song they sang was “Happy Birthday Jesus” hence the birthday hats.

Reese didn’t look like she was feeling too well throughout the show.  When we got home she had a fever.  I felt so bad having had her at school.  It ended up being her last day of school for the week because her fever never went down.

Lance got to experience his first class party.

They had snacks and did a little craft.

I was sad to miss the party but I am glad Lance got the opportunity to see it all. 

After all of his help and taking care of everything, Lance has a fever today.  I hate that he isn’t feeling well now.  I was praying that he would stay healthy but it looks like he is coming down with it too.  Hopefully it will pass fast!!