Before Christmas...

The first half of December wasn't very exciting.  We didn't have a bunch going on...

December 1st

 Mondays are my days to drive to and from preschool for our carpool.  Lots of times I bring the boys over to play and feed them lunch.  Noah loves it.  Recently though he hasn't wanted to go to anyone else's house to play. It's kind of weird considering how much he used to love to go and play.  We can't figure it out.  So, the only time he plays with friends (besides preschool) is if I have them over here.  

 In our pantry (which is the little space under the stairs) is where I store all of our Christmas decorations.  So, when it's time for decorating for Christmas--the kids have a little play area to play in for a couple of days.  They love it!  I wish I had some other place to store decorations so they could play in it all the time!

December 3rd

 Basketball was starting to get underway and her first game was tonight against Liberty High.  I think this is a picture of her JV2 team and the JV team.  

 Maggie (#30) waiting for her turn to play.  

Also that night was our mutual night and we were all combined and we made gingerbread houses.

 December 5th

 Maggie had basketball every week day.  She usually had 3 practices and 2 games.  Sometimes the practices were from 6:30-8:00 in the morning.  Ugh!  This was another game--a home game this time. 

 Lydia also got her Pixie cut today.  She is so funny--she wanted this for such a long time!  I made her wait just to make sure that she really wanted it.  When I picked her up when she was done (I couldn't stay with her because Noah burnt his finger right as I was about to take her to her appointment), anyways, she was SO EXCITED!  I have never seen her so happy in her whole life.  She was dancing and she kept saying she wanted to scream--so I told her to go ahead!  It was so cute!!  She was excited to show it to everyone!  

December 6th

Garrett and I have gone to the Singing Christmas Tree quite a few times and really enjoy it.  This year, even though it's really expensive, we decided to bring the kids and grandma and grandpa McKibben.  We decided to go to the afternoon performance instead of the evening one, because it would've been too late for the little kids.  

 Don't they all look terribly excited?

 They had it in a different place--a lot smaller this year and it wasn't quite the same.  It was still good, though.

 I don't know if you can tell, but Santa is up on stage and Noah was pretty excited about it.  I was trying to get his face in the picture, too.

 During intermission...

 This little boy was pretty bored 15 minutes into it.  It was a long afternoon for him!

 After the show was over, we went out to dinner at Sweet Tomatoes.  Then we had Jim and Georgia take the kids home for us and had Maggie babysit so that Garrett and I could go Christmas shopping. 

December 7th

 I think we were on our way to church when these girls took this picture.

December 8th

 Cooper was over to play today--playing trains.   I love that they were wearing the same shirt.  

December 12th

For one of Maggie's classes (child development), everyone in the class has to take home a baby doll for the weekend.  They have to take care of it like a real baby.  Everything they do is recorded.  The baby cries and they have to figure out what to do so that the baby is happy again.  They also have to write down everything they do for the baby.  If they have other things going on that weekend, they tell the teacher and the teacher will turn it off for a couple of hours so they aren't held responsible for that time.  So Maggie had a basketball game on Friday night, so it was turned off for that time and also for church on Sunday.  Maggie was very grateful for those little breaks.  She didn't get much sleep that weekend.  She said the baby cried on and off a lot--every night she had him.  I thought they might take it easy a little bit, but nope.  It was just like having a newborn.  She was up almost every two hours or so feeding the baby or rocking it or changing it's diaper.  She was so glad when Monday came so she could give "Lloyd" back.  

Feeding Lloyd

Bella loved to help out with him.

 This Saturday, we took the kids to the store and had them each pick out a toy to donate to the Firefighter's Toy Drive.  They had Santa at the drop off, and they got to sit in the firetruck.

And they got to see a pretty fake looking Minnie and Mickey.  Ha!

Feeding Lloyd again, while she ate dinner.  I think she looks pretty tired in this picture. 

Noah helping out too.

December 17th

Noah's preschool had their Christmas Program and Activity.  They sang about 5 or 6 songs...Noah actually sang and did some of the actions!  I was pretty surprised!

So cute with his reindeer hat

Then they had donuts and juice and then the families could make a craft together.  This year we made a snowman.

We really love his preschool!

December 21st

After church on Sunday...these girls like to take pictures.

Selfie Sunday...Is that what they call it for Sundays?

I sure love these beautiful girls of mine!

Pre-Christmas Activities

Dec. 19th was Noah's Christmas Activity at his preschool.  It was very simple and short compared to what Wonder World usually does.  They sang about 5 or 6 songs.  Noah of course didn't sing at all, just stood there.  It was cute though.  His class is so small--about 12 in there, I think that they combined with the other preschool class to sing their songs.  But even then, they were still really hard to hear on some of the songs.  

 Noah and his buddies next to him--Ethan and Cooper.  

After the singing, they had donuts for the kids to eat, but Noah didn't want one, so we just hung out until they had the craft ready.  Each family got to make a Santa Claus Craft to take home.  

 Gluing the eyes on

 Showing me the red nose

 all done!

 Noah's pretty good at sitting still for a picture, but the other 2 were pretty funny and kept moving around.  These were the best pictures I got.  

Noah loves his preschool and was kind of sad that there wasn't any school over Christmas break.  He was so excited when it started again!

That night, there was a Relief Society Christmas activity that I went to.  It was fun--there was a White Elephant Gift Exchange, Cookie Exchange, Toy/Clothing swap, ideas for stocking stuffers and hot chocolate.  

Dec. 20th

Last year, I found an idea on Pinterest to have a "Grinch Night".  I wanted to do it last year, but never got around to it.  So this year, I was determined to go through with it.  I told my kids earlier in the week that we were going to have a Grinch night and watch the animated show and have dinner.  They kept thinking it was a Grinch party with games and stuff.  I didn't want them to be disappointed when there were no games--so I kept emphasizing the "dinner and a show" part.  Anyways, I planned it for the last day of school before Christmas Break.  So, I spent all day cooking the food.  My kids love it when I print off coloring pictures for them off the internet.  We've done Halloween pictures, Thanksgiving Pictures, Christmas pictures, etc.  So, I had printed off some Grinch pictures for them to color after they came home from school.  I also found these cute props for taking pictures, so I printed them off and let the kids take pictures while I was finishing things up.  

 Lydia

 Bella

 This one of her cracks me up.

 Noah  :)

 Paige

 She is such a goof ball--such an actress

Anyways...we had way too much fun with these.  I had a Grinch craft for them to do, but we took too long with the props, so didn't get around to it.

Maggie wasn't home because she chose to go to the movies with some friends instead.  It really kind of made me sad realizing that my kids are getting older and pretty soon none of them are going to want to participate in my silly parties anymore.  It was a hard moment for me.  I'm fine and I know that I have little ones still that will want to participate for awhile, but still hard knowing that my daughter would rather hang out with friends.  I have to keep reminding myself that she is almost 14, so this is completely normal!!  :)

Anyways, enough boo-hooing and back to the dinner...

I wanted to have "roast beast" for dinner and have it actually look like a 'beast'.  I was thinking about cooking a ham, but we were going to have ham on Christmas, so then I thought about having a whole chicken.  We had this a lot growing up, but I have never cooked one in my adult life because I'm afraid of cleaning out a chicken.  Well, Garrett wasn't going to be home when I had to get it in the oven, so I had to do it myself.  Let me tell you, it was not a pleasant experience.  I had Lydia trying to help me get all the inside parts out and all the little kids were watching and being grossed out.  Maggie was snapping pictures on her ipad from across the room.  

We got it done and in the oven.  It wasn't as good as I remembered...I should've had a little gravy with it.  Anyways, here's the food on the menu:

 Roast beast

 Who Hash (Potato, cheese and sausage casserole)  Good!

 Who Punch (Lime sherbet and sprite)

 Who Pudding (Rice pudding--actually from the Dr. Suess website--and really good)

We also had Grinch Green beans, but didn't get a picture.

 Grinch Cookies (Mint Sugar cookies)

 Getting ready to eat

Loving the Who Punch!

After dinner, we watched the show and then I had some Trivia Questions to ask them about the movie when it was over.  It was fun to do something different and the kids liked it.  

Dec. 21

The next day, Paige and I went to one of her friends/classmates (Bryden's) baptism at 2 pm.  Afterwards, were meeting up with Jim and Georgia at 5 Guys Burgers for an early dinner and then we were off to the Zoo to see the Zoo Lights.  It was cold, but not too bad.  The lights were beautiful!  The train wasn't working that night, so we were all a little sad about that.  

 Lydia took most of the pictures of the lights.  

 The train was lit up, but not running, so we took our picture by it. 

 Watching the new baby elephant, Lily

 Riding the Lions

Afterwards, we went to Burgerville for Peppermint shakes and french fries.  

Fun night!