Oops! This was from last Sunday, March 12. I’ll move it to that date shortly.
Xander, Owen, and Nic (left to right) were all in kindergarten together. Jayden just moved here in January and is in Owen’s class (and lives one street over from us!)
Category Archives: Holidays
This is the extent of us celebrating today.
Some holidays I do things for…but this is NOT one of them. All the kids’ stuff came from Grannie Lin. 🙂
Leprechaun Katie
Miss Anne, the teaching assistant in Katie’s classroom, texted this to me. 🙂
It’s like Christmas all over again.
When you’re cleaning your bedroom and you happen upon a Christmas present that you left inside something else so it’s like Christmas all over again.
Candlelit dinner for two
I know, not quite what you thought, eh? 🙂
My friend’s husband is deployed and she had a hell of a day so I took the kids over to keep her kids occupied while we had a big drink.
Valentine’s Day Cutie
May the next 20 years be just as awesome!
It’s been 20 years since the night Tom and I met…
Our dinner splurge:
Tom in beer heaven:
Another birthday cake for Owen.
Gramma made a yummy-looking cake for Owen! Grauntie Rose and Gruntie Jim came over to celebrate, too!
Time for Owen’s mini cake!
Since we’re heading out on vacation tomorrow and didn’t want any leftovers, I made a small “personal” sized box cake mix.
Birthday boy/girl gets to lick the candles!
Everyone got to pick their own sprinkles (because Tom and I hate them). 🙂
Owen:
Katie:
My plain piece, with a frosting height even Papa would love. 🙂
This is how they helped with the cake!
Happy 8th Birthday, Owen!
And then I had to take some of Katie because she felt left out.
Birthday shopping from Toys R Us
I belong to the birthday club for the kids so when mail came with Owen’s name on it, he was excited. It was a $3 coupon and a certificate for a crown and birthday balloon. When we turned it in, he also got a plush and a book!
He knew exactly what he wanted so it didn’t take long. He looked so grown up waiting in line…
Unfortunately we were one day early for the coupon (of course!) so daddy bought it for him and he lucks out with an extra birthday present.
Both of them HAVE to be right under my feet.
Can I pack her away with all the Christmas stuff?!
Sorting Christmas Legos for next year.
We got the kids the LEGO City Advent Calendar Building Kit so after they had opened all the doors and built everything we asked if they wanted to do it again next year…because if they did, we had to sort all the pieces and take everything apart. They said yes. So I tasked Katie with that job to keep her out of my hair while I started putting away Christmas decorations. She did amazingly well! 🙂
Happy New Year 2017!
In probably the most unexpected detail ever in the history of this blog…I did not take ONE. SINGLE. PICTURE. ALL. NIGHT. 😯
So, we were the surprise guests for this party. Meaning, obviously, no one knew we were coming (except the host and one other friend). We’ve had surprise guests at other Tivo events before and it’s always fun, so when it worked out that we could do it for this party (due to our White House tour) we were excited. And it was cool—we’re so glad to have surprised our old (and new) crazy ax murderer internet friends and spent the evening with them!
This was taken by Jay, who I haven’t seen in real life…
…since 2009.
You know you’re old when you have two glasses of sangria and think it’s got to be getting close to midnight…and it’s not even 9! There was lots of good food and games, and we all managed to make it to midnight (waiting for the ball to drop, below), but the party broke up shortly thereafter. I really knew I was old when I wasn’t drunk heading back to the hotel. 😆
I slept in until 10 (!) the next morning, and then it was off to brunch with friends before the wave of goodbyes (again, I did not take one single picture).
It took some prodding, but…
She did it! She finished Rapunzel’s castle!!
Pirate puzzle gift: complete!
Katie’s very first Lego sets she built all by herself!
The first was a Christmas present from Grauntie Marge—a supermarket!
I only had to put about three pieces together (and I had to keep prompting her) but she did it!!
The second one was a present from Gramma Jean—Arial!
Lego Mixel Max + Evil Minions
Owen’s Lego Mixel Max (a bigger monster Mixel built with all three packs of the set) with assorted evil minions he created from the remaining pieces.
“Okay, now take a smiling picture!”
Katie’s Frozen Cookies
Santa brought Katie a Frozen Cookie Mix kit so we had to do those IMMEDIATELY. The tiny snowflake pieces were a pain in the butt and they look like a total FAIL but they were delicious.
Christmas Morning 2016
We set the kids’ phones outside their rooms so they will stay up there until we get up at 7. 🙂 Then they come in and cuddle for a few minutes while mommy wakes up (daddy has already been up for at least an hour). Then it’s downstairs to check out what Santa left… I didn’t take many pictures this year.
A tiara from Grannie and Papa.
A Lego train for under the Christmas tree from Grannie and Papa (complete with all the electronics to make it run!).
Princess shoes from Santa!
Charlie right in the middle of things!
Owen in his MSU hat from Grannie and Papa—we all got one! (It was a very MSU Christmas, which we all loved!)
Katie’s Elsa cape (from Santa!) and wearing her princess shoes!
Trying to get them to sit still with their new hats from Grannie and Papa:
Owen’s favorite gift this morning—a whole box of Pokémon cards! 🙂
Look what our video camera caught last night?!
We moved the video camera in the living room to hopefully catch something…and we did! The kids LOVED it! SANTA’S BUTT!! 😆
And the annual matching PJ and Santa hat picture.
Opening their one gift the night before (they both happened to pick a book).
And then some silliness trying to get a picture of them with Santa’s cookies.
Christmas Party 2016
Me and Heather, the hostess with the mostess.
The White Elephant gift of the salmon plank has a long and sordid history. It should end sometime in 2019 or maybe slightly before.
The whole group!
Merry Christmas from the Hudsons!
We were dressed for a friends’ Christmas party so we took some family pictures!
Throwback Thursday—Christmas five years ago
Santa & Grinch
Painting ornaments
We made salt dough ornaments at our friends house the other day and went back tonight to paint some of them.
A cool time at ICE!
I’ve been wanting to do this…so since this is our last winter here it was now or never! ICE!® featuring Christmas Around the World — We told Katie we were going to see an ice castle so she was totally on board. 🙂
Experience the magic of more than TWO MILLION pounds of hand-carved ice sculptures and slide down two-story ice slides. All kept at a chilly 9 degrees! Delight in the celebration of cultures through holiday scenes and travel to the North Pole to see Santa and his elves.
They give you parkas to wear OVER your own coats.
Now, I grew up in Michigan. I know 9° weather. I’ve lived in 9° weather. And let me just say my body no longer likes 9° weather. EGADS was that cold. I’m very glad they gave us the extra parkas…
Waiting for the ice slide!
The ice slide!
And this is where my phone died from being too cold. It had only been out 12 minutes! Thankfully Tom’s had been under all his coats so he got his out and his worked better in the cold.
The kids liked it but it was really quite cold. I have to be honest and say I rushed through a bit faster than I’d planned because I was FROZEN. OF course after you exit, the outside 34° felt like a sauna! Then it was back inside the resort where they had lots of things set up to siphon away your money like photos, hot chocolate, mini carnival rides, Build-A-Bear, cookies with Mrs. Claus, etc… Katie really wanted to ride the tea cups and since I’m all about either of them learning to like rides, we spent the $5. She enjoyed it.
Then since it was lunch time and we were close to a yummy restaurant…we went to Succotash (it’s where we ate lunch before the USMC ball). The kids had a bit of hat head. 🙂
And then after we left we drove around National Harbor Pokemoning for about a half hour!!
Overall I’m glad we went…but it was a big chunk of money for what it was.