Winter Wonderland

Well, we didn't have a white Christmas or a white Boxing Day . . .  but it sure is white now!  And more is coming down as I sit and type this.  I LOVE it!  It's so beautiful and the kids have had a ton of fun in it already.  So much better than the brown and green we've been looking at for the last few weeks.

We decided to go for a walk in the winter wonderland but got side tracked by the park.  Big surprise!  The kids had a lot of fun playing on all the equipment there.  

Samara would hop on a swing, get going and then jump off into a pile of snow.    

She also enjoyed putting her head down in the snow.  The first time it freaked me out because I thought she was face down.  Doesn't it look like that?  

But no . . . just the hat!  

The slides were a huge hit with all the kids.  They were super slippery and it was fun to land in the pile of snow at the bottom.  

They tried to make a train of all four of them and go down all together . . . 

But two came first . . . 

and then the last two  . . . 

but it still caused a four kid pile up at the bottom!  

Even Frodo loves to run around in the snow!  

Our fingers are crossed that it continues to be a white winter.  

Peppermint's Birthday Party

In the middle of December, one of our webkinz friends had a birthday and all the other webkinz were invited.  

There were games.  

There were presents.  

There was a craft. 

Fun was had by all.  

Tinsel the Elf

We enjoyed having our elf visit us again this year from the North Pole.   His name is Tinsel and he's quite the little monkey.  Here are a few of the things he was up to this year: 

Hangin' out with our snowmen.  

Riding our giraffe on the shelf.  

Toilet papering our Christmas tree.  

Peeking in a box under the tree.  

Photocopying himself in the printer.  

Taking a bubble bath in my good dishes.  

What a trouble maker!  

Christmas Sleepover

We had our very first annual Christmas sleepover last night.  The kids had no idea.  After dinner we told them to go upstairs and get their covers, pillows and "friends" (stuffed animals they sleep with) and we told them the plan.  They were SO excited!  I can't remember where, but I read about a family that sleeps under their Christmas tree one night every year as a tradition.  I loved it and so we've taken the tradition and made it ours.  Well, technically we don't sleep under the tree . . . . there's too many of us to fit.  LOL!

Here are the kids watching a little Christmas movie before going to sleep.  

After they were all sleeping, I snapped some pictures.  I love pictures of the kids sleeping.  

Samara - still with the hat on!  

Victoria - all cozy!  

Austin and Denver - they somehow ended up on the same mattress  Too cute!  

Frodo - so happy to be able to join us for the slumber party!  No crate for one night.  

Mike - playing on his iPad - not quite ready to go to sleep when the kids did.  

We all slept really well and we're looking forward to carrying on the tradition next year!  

What we've been up to

We still haven't all been feeling 100%.  Okay, honestly, it's just me.  I'm coughing like crazy and kinda sore all over.  So I haven't been able to do as many Christmas activities as I had planned.  But we've been hanging out and just enjoying each other's company.  Oh ya . . . and I'm coughing. Did I mention that?  Sigh . . . I'm tired!  

Here are a few things we've been up to.  

The kids made these cute candy cane cards.  We got the idea from here.  We don't often do needle and thread type crafts - I think we should more often - but they all worked hard and the cards turned out really nice.  

Victoria's creation - she made it into a beautiful thank you note for her dance instructor

Denver's creation - even with some assistance his candy cane ended up a bit funky - but it's cute and he was happy with how it turned out.  

Austin's creation - he got frustrated partway through and crinkled up his paper. So we worked with it and ended up flattening it out and inking it.  It turned out looking really cool.  

Samara's creation - she did it all by herself and then added the words 

I just had to show the inside of Samara's card.  She's really into writing lately and I loved all the words she added on the inside.  We had just read Luke 2 the day before making these cards - thus the "two Luke".  And she also added in "Bible" because she explained to me that the Bible is a gift that isn't found under the tree. Smart girl!

Since we have no snow outside yet (boo!), we added some to the inside.  We thread balls of cotton onto fishing line and hung them in our window. (idea found here)  I think it could use a few more strings but it still looks kind cool.  

We attempted snowflakes with hot glue (idea found here) but it was really tricky.  We tried it with dish soap on the wax paper and without.  With the soap, it was really slippery and the glue wasn't sticking to the paper.  Without the soap, it was hard to get it off the paper.  So here's how they turned out.  I might try it again and then add glitter to them.  

Every year, Grandma has a tradition of decorating a gingerbread house with the kids.  This year she found a really cool kit with four little houses in it.  It worked out really well because each child got their own little house and they could decorate it how they wanted.  Each child got to be creative in their own way and each house was unique.  So fun!  

Austin made a cool Christmas tree at his boys club at church. I loved it and wanted to share it here.  It's a string art tree and he did a really good job on it.  

I have a few more things planned for the next few days.  Also, some of the things we've made are gifts, so we'll have to share those after Christmas.