Christmas Recap

We went over to Grami and Poppi's house for Christmas. Since we were so close to my Grandma we decided to visit her too. We took the scenic route to Grandma's house and stopped along the way to see some sheep. Look Mom...they're up there.

We saw lots of bald eagles too...beautiful!

We had some lunch and a little visit with Grandma.

Then back to Grami and Poppi's to begin Christmas preparations. The kids put out cookies and milk for Santa.

We woke up bright and early to see if Santa actually came...he did! The kids asked Santa for umbrellas and he answered.

Have you ever seen kids get so excited about umbrellas??? It doesn't even rain that much where we live! :-)

Marcus checked out his stocking first...lots of good stuff in there!

Marcus' big request this year was a Spiderman Scooter. Santa gave him a picture of one with a note that said it would be waiting for him at home. He was pretty excited.

Olivia's big request this year was a zebra pillow pet. She must have been a good girl because she got one!

Marcus got his own hunting riffle.

After we opened Santa gifts we decided to wait on the rest for Elle and Baylor to come over. They came later Christmas day. First we let them relax a little from the long car ride. Here's Elle with Poppi and Emma.

The kids took their baths and we opened the rest of the gifts. Grami and Poppi got the girls a Barbie house! Very cool!

Olivia took good care of Baylor. She's going to be such a great Mommy some day :-)

We let the kids watch a movie...look at those cuties! Getting so big!

Baylor just hung out and showed off his big smile.

The next day we woke up to snow! We haven't had much snow at home so the kids were super excited. Marcus tried to ride the big wheel in the snow but it didn't go very fast.

The girls tried to break through the ice in Oergel Creek.

They didn't have much luck with that either.

So it was off to sledding!

Uncle Colby pulled the sled. Climb on in Elle...this is fun!

Marc and I left the kids behind for a week since school and daycare are closed and we have to work. Poppi is watching them and from what we've heard things are going well. They actually come home tomorrow and I can't wait! I miss them so much!

Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas...have a Happy New Year too!

Tis the Season

Here is what our decorated tree looked like this year...turned out pretty good!

The kids really participated in decorating it this year. Unfortunately there were a few broken ornaments as a result, but overall they did very well.

So Pretty!

Marc brewed his own beer this Christmas Season. He had a little helper too.

Marcus did a great job holding the strainer.

The kids are really into Hot Chocolate this year. They ask for it all the time. Of course we have to have marshmallows too! YUMMY!

Santa Visit 2011

We finally got over to visit Santa today. The kids were super excited. They posed very well for the picture. Then Olivia told Santa she wants a Zebra Pillow Pet, Marcus wants a Spiderman Scooter and Emma wants Santa and Mrs. Claus barbies.

Chuck E. Cheese's

The girls got a gift card to Chuck E. Cheese's for their 3rd birthday so we decided to finally put it to use last night. Say Cheese Emma!

Olivia immediately made a friend...should I be worried? These two started off playing air hockey and proceeded from game to game. It was quite amusing watching them. They were both good sports...when one would win the other would still be happy.

Typical Olivia...making friends with whoever wants to play. Lately seems to be more boys then girls though...I think I am a little worried...

Marcus followed Daddy around. Here they are with a fire hose putting out fires.

Emma just stuck with me and we played lots of games too.

We had a great time! Especially because the gift card covered the entire cost!

The Perfect Tree

This year we were invited out to our friends' property in ID to find our perfect Christmas Tree. We hiked for what seemed like forever and also took the opportunity to get a family photo for the 2011 Christmas Card.

The kids started out really excited. Our friend, Scott, gave each of the kids a whistle with the instructions that if they felt like they were lost they were to blow three times. What a great idea!

After a while the kids started to get warm...hats and gloves kept coming off.

They were wondering when we were going to find that perfect tree. We kept finding some but Daddy was never satisfied so we had to keep moving.

Marcus decided he found his and was ready to go!

Emma was soooooo tired...but put on a brave face.

Ok Mom...when is Daddy going to find that perfect tree???

Here it is! Ironically this is the same tree that is in the first picture of all of us. We literally picked this one out then kept on hiking and turned down others just to come back to this one. Should have stuck with first impressions...but oh well...it was fun to hike in the woods.

Finding the perfect tree brought back the energy in the kids. They ran behind Daddy trying to keep up back to the truck.

Marcus was going so fast he even rolled a few times. Typical little Marcus.

Here's the whole crew. The property we were on is our neighbors, Scott and Julie. They have 100 acres in ID just about 54 miles from our houses. After we all found our trees we had lunch and a little bon fire and just hung out for a few hours. It was perfect!

We didn't even make it off their property before all three kids were sound asleep.

They did wake up quickly to see the bison along the way. There were a lot of them! Pretty cool! The tree is in our living room now waiting to be trimmed down and decorated. We will more than likely decorate tomorrow. I'll be sure to post pictures of the Completed Perfect Tree soon :-)