Family Christmas- Part II

And finally some pics from our visit up at Mimi's cabin. We were only able to visit for a few days, but it's always fun to stay at the cabin even for a short time. We did a night of Christmas gifts, games, playing out on the lake, hiking, and just hanging out. Good times!

Grandpa Zan reading a card with Elin.

Nate was SO excited about the Wii Star Wars, and he's done a pretty good job with it since.

Mark was in from Idaho- great to see you Mark!

And Mary was up from Purdue- great to see you, too!

April with some cool new pottery.

Elin turns into a sort of crazy goofball when she gets excited around family (Nate, too, for that matter), so here's some of her goofiness...

Aunt Mishay and Aunt Mary became very popular with Elin... all she wanted to do was hang out with them and sit in their laps.

I was very impressed with the kids... they survived a 1.5 mile hike through the forest. Great job kiddos!

There were a few snowball fights along the way...

and toward the end when legs were getting tired, they resorted to rolling down the hills. Hey, whatever works! Afterwards it was hot pizza and hot chocolate for lunch.

Zan put some deer feed on the driveway, and one morning we found 11 deer chowing down.

Aunt Mary and Mishay were big helpers decorating princess crowns with Elin...

And here are the princesses!

Family Christmas- Part I

The week before Christmas my Mom, Dad, and sister's family came up to visit us for a couple days. It was a quick whirlwind of a weekend, but we were glad we got to see them even for a short time. Thanks for coming Mom and Dad, Shawnta, Mike, Dylan, Lexi and Sadie!

April waking up on "Christmas" morning.

I beat him to the picture!

Lexi sporting her new leapord-skin warm-ups.

Lexi (with a "why are you taking my picture" look) checking out a new game.

The two princesses are trying out there matching "Paresian" princess outfits. Elin wore this every day for the next two weeks!

My Mom gets very excited about Christmas morning... I think she likes to see all the smiles on the grandkid's faces. Me too!

My Dad helping Sadie with some cool new jewelry.

Me with my little princess and her magic wand.

Shawn and Mike with their gang. It was great to hang out with them!

It wouldn't be the holidays if someone didn't get sick in our family. Nate came down with a low fever that day, but really no other symptoms.

Ibuprofen works wonders! And the fever never came back, and no other casualties. Yeah!

We had to take advantage of the snow, so Mike and I took the kids sledding. They had a blast, of course, but we sure wore them out. Nate was on his last leg by the end.

Dylan, master of the snowhill, showing us how it's done on his snowboard.

He actually did a great job and could stay on all the way down, way to go Dylan!

Elin was taking the easy way down, and up.

Mike, Lexi and Elin

These two were pretty funny together, I'm not sure how they ever got to sleep.

Are they 3 years old, or 13 years old?

Good night, sleep tight!

Christmas Eve and Day... Finally!

So yes, it's only taken me 3 weeks to get some Christmas pics up on the blog. Better late than never, right? We were lucky enough to have some good friends over on Christmas eve, with about 15 little ones running around. Here are a few pics of the festivities...

This incredible spread of goodies was a hot place to hang out.

April's shot of a centerpiece.

The kids had a blast singing some classic Christmas tunes, and they even had bells to jingle!

Not sure how these two managed to sleep through the background noise, but they did seem to sleep most of the time.

Happy faces on Christmas Eve.

Not sure what kind of face this is...

Lia graced us with some beautiful Christmas songs on the piano... and she's only been playing for a few months!

Some were singing along, while others were dancing to the music.

After the festivities, the kids had to put out some treats for Santa (and also some carrots/parsnips for the reindeer). I think Santa liked them.

On Christmas morning, after the kids dragged us out of bed, we spent some time reading about baby Jesus out of the Bible.

Elin and her new chimes (yes, they are loud).

Nate and his new microscope (we were both really excited about this one!)

The kids did an awesome job setting up the nativity.

For lunch we had some yummy honey-baked ham. Here's Elin sneaking a taste right off the bone (I definitely never showed her how to do this).

Two happy campers on the way to the movies after our Christmas festivities!

I feel a little bad because, since April was taking all the pics with her camera, nobody took pics of April. Apparently, though, I didn't feel as bad as April, because she resorted to taking her own pics. I'll have to do a better job next year.

First Winter Snow and Gingerbread Houses

Our kids were so excited when the first real winter snow hit, they had to get out and build something and make snowballs. Even if it was freezing and already dark, they were rearing to go.

As you can see, Nate didn't even get his gloves on.

Elin, not as big a fan of the cold as Nate, was still happy to play.

Afterwards it was smiles and hot chocolate all around!

For a family night we made gingerbread houses... you should have seen our kitchen after this little project! I was scrubbing hardened frosting off the counter for days. But the kids, of course, loved it.

I was surprised at Nate's need for perfection and symmetry. Elin, not so much, at least not yet.

Dad was helping glue the sides and tops together, as well as snacking along the way.

And the finished products.. here is Nate's, and next is Elin's. I think next year we may have to try a two-story deal.