Zach's Roller Coaster

Zach got this cool roller coaster kit for Christmas.
He could not wait for Jeff to help him put it together!

He was a really good helper.....

for the first 45 minutes......

Then he lost interest.

When he saw I was taking a picture of him not helping, he got back to work. ;-)

This thing took Jeff & Zach 2 1/2 hours to make!

They are almost done here.

They are just adding the tracks for the cars.

Here is one of the cars going around the tracks!!

This really is a cool toy.

The little chain is pulled by a motorized pulley and it carries the cars to the top, where they get on the tracks & loop around and around.

Zach was pretty proud of his building skills.

(Even though Jeff helped with most of it....)

Here is a video of it:

Tea Party

Lily got a cute tea set/rug for Christmas from Grandma & Grandpa Logan.
She informed Jeff he would be attending a tea party with her.

She got herself all dressed up for the party.

She kept going back to her kitchen to "make" more things for Jeff to "eat".

I think it was the cutest thing I have ever seen.

Lily is lucky to have such a good Daddy. =)

Our Christmases

After we open presents on Christmas morning,
we head over to my parents' house.
We eat lunch and then we let the kids open their presents.
Then my mom and dad open their presents.
Then the adults have a funny white elephant gift exchange.
Now, I have eight siblings.
They all have spouses (fiancees) & children.
So you can imagine how many people are there.
Obviously with that many people, not everyone can come every year.
This year EVERYBODY was there!!! =)
So this is just one picture that pretty much sums up what my parents' house looks like on Christmas:

We took a family picture......outside.

It's the only place all of us would fit!

It's loud & crowded, and I wouldn't want it any other way. =)

On Sunday, we headed over to the Logan side of our family!

Sheril (my mother-in-law) got all of the grandkids together and taught them a song to sing for all of the adults!

It was very cute.

I love how intent these two are to get the actions right.

Then it is present time!

After all of the presents were unwrapped, we took a family picture too!

We are so lucky that we get to spend Christmas with all of our families.

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas!!

Christmas Morning

I used to think I got more excited about Christmas morning than the kids did.
I love seeing the kids' faces and how excited they get to see what Santa brought, and can't wait for them to wake up.
That's what I thought......
until Zach came bouncing (literally) into our bed at 6:30 Saturday morning talking a mile a minute.
He might have been a tad more excited than me at that point. =)

We woke Lily & Riley up.
After trying to talk Zach into waiting a little bit....unsuccessfully.
But Lily & Riley did not mind getting up to see their presents.
Imagine that!

After the kids played with their Santa presents for awhile, we opened presents from each other.

and then played with those toys....

We had a great Christmas morning.

The kids all got lots of things they wanted.

Jeff & the kids got me an espresso maker. (yeah!!!)

The kids were excited to give Jeff his new Chiefs slippers.

(He got other things, they just don't care about jeans and khaki pants.)

There were no fights and no melt downs.

I like that kind of morning. =)

Christmas Eve

Our Christmas Eve is pretty low-key.
Which is a good thing, because usually the next few days are a rush of go, go, go.
We just have a few traditions.
One is to get all dressed up and take individual and family pictures in front of the tree before Christmas Eve mass.

After mass, we come home and I slave over a home cooked meal.

Just kidding!

We pick up dinner.

That's MY present. ;-)

The kids usually watch a Christmas movie and then they each choose a cookie to leave for Santa.

We always leave hot cocoa too.

This year, Zach wrote a letter to Santa:

He was very excited the next morning, when Santa wrote on the back that he was thankful for the cookies and hot cocoa.


Then Jeff reads The Night Before Christmas.

After putting kids to bed (several times for one 8 year old.....), our Christmas Eve rituals are over.

At least for the kids.

Jeff & I usually have a glass of wine and sit on the couch enjoying the silence. ;-)

Merry Christmas!

We wish you a very blessed Christmas!

Gingerbread Houses

We made gingerbread houses today.
I bought a kit that had 5 little houses in one box.
For the same price as the packages that had one big house. =)

The kids liked making their own houses.

They were really proud of their houses.

I think we (me) are officially Christmas crafted out. =)

Snowmen Ornaments

Yesterday we made hand print snowman ornaments.
I got the idea for this super cute craft here.
I saw it and decided we had to make them too!

All you need is big glass ornament bulbs, white paint, felt, and hot glue.
I chose these blue ones, but any color would look cute.

I painted each of the kids' hands white.


Then they carefully placed their hands on a bulb.

Each bulb looked like this when we were done:

Each finger (and thumb) will be a snowman and the palm is snow!

After they were dry, we drew faces onto the tips of the fingers.

(Riley added arms too.)

Then I cut out hats and scarves out of different colored felt.

I let Lily choose the colors and what she wanted where, but I did the rest for her.

The boys helped draw their faces and helped glue on their hats and scarves.

These are their CUTE ornaments!!

Lily's:

Riley's:

Zach's:

I also wrote their names and the year on the palm of their hand print.

These cute ornaments are now hanging on our tree!