Grip and Rip

Another fun Christmas has come and gone with only the pictures and memories left...and the gifts of course! We spent Christmas Eve with the Young side and were lucky enough to have Santa (Bob Theis) come again this year. The kids were so excited. Their eyes just lit up when Santa walked into the room and I don't think any of them said a word. They just sat and stared and smiled. It is amazing how they truly believe Santa exists. Even after Santa drove away in a car!

Here is Sydney absolutely thrilled with her new doll.

We spent Christmas Day with the Nystrom side and as always there was plenty of food and presents to go around.

First Snow Fall

Okay so the first snow fall was awhile ago but here are some pictures of the girls happily shoveling the quarter inch of snow. To most of us snow means shoveling and longer commutes, but you just can't help but like the snow a little when you see how much your kids enjoy it.

The day after Thanksgiving we put up the tree. The girls were very anxious to help and actually did a pretty good job. The tree looked pretty sad though this year but we thought it could make it one more year. Last weekend we noticed it was tipping quite a bit and decided it was time to get rid of it before it fell on someone. Luckily Target had just clearanced out their trees and we were able to get a great price on a pre-lit one with 750 lights. Score!

Here is Sydney posing with her cookie. The girls love to bake cut-out cookies but get impatient waiting for everything to be mixed etc, so this year we cheated and did the pre-cut ones. The girls were happy, it was a ton easier for me...life was good.

We have been very busy at our house preparing for Christmas, buying and wrapping gifts. In the midst of wrapping and preparing gifts for the girl's teachers, I asked Lindsey "Which is better, giving gifts or receiving gifts?" and said said "Giving gifts!" What a great answer....

Questions

So we all know that kids have LOTS of questions but as they get older the questions seem to get harder and harder. Last night Lindsey hit me with a couple hard ones. First she asked if we celebrate Hanukkah. That one wasn't so hard to answer. The second was rather intuitive of her. She said "Mom, when do numbers stop?" The third question was by far the best and this one I left up to David to answer. David was telling me that little baby Payne was circumsized yesterday. Lindsey overheard and with a puzzled look said "Mom, what does circumsized mean?" Ahh, the fun has just begun.

Turkey Day!

Happy Thanksgiving from the Pilgrims!! (not sure why Sydney made a boy hat at preschool instead of a girl one, but we'll just have to use our imaginations here....)



Just what Thanksgiving is all about....family love.
Leave it to Sydney to tackle her sister.
Have a great day everyone! And to all those crazy shoppers on Friday morning, is it really worth it??? Seriously, 4 a.m. people?? I love a good deal, but sleep is much more important!!!

Little Chefs

Ever since daylight savings time started a few weeks ago we have playing indoors after dinner. We hadn't played with the easy bake oven for ever so we pulled it out and three nights in a row the girls begged to bake something with the oven. It was a lot of fun until the third night when Sydney broke out in a rash around her mouth after just tasting the tiniest bit of brownie mix batter. I looked at the package and sure it enough it said "may contain traces of peanuts." Who puts peanuts in easy bake oven mixes, c'mon!! So that night I had to tell Sydney she couldn't eat the brownies she was about to make. She was so sad. Then Lindsey, sweet as can be, said "Sydney, if you can't have the brownies, I won't eat them either." Then Daddy came up with the idea to have huge ice cream sundaes instead. He pulled out every thing of chocolate sauce and sprinkles we had. Soon Sydney was smiling again!!

Happy Halloween!!

Happy Halloween (only 5 days late!!) Lindsey went as Cinderella this year and Sydney went as Uniqua from the Backyardigans. We went with some of our neighbors and made it all around the two neighborhoods by our house this year which means LOTS of candy. I thought for sure Sydney would get tired but she kept up the whole time.

Above are Lindsey, Sydney and Colin getting ready to go out trick or treating. Below are Lindsey and Sydney with the neighbors, Teagan, Colin and Josh and we can't forget the cutest trick or treater, Amelia. Isn't she adorable!!!

Pumpkin Fun

We went to our favorite pumpkin patch, the 101 Market in Otsego, and got our pumpkins again this year. The girls had fun digging the guts out. David helped Lindsey with hers and I helped Sydney. David was done with his and Lindseys by the time I even had Sydney's eyes done. I guess the power tools he used helped, although it made quite the mess! We had pieces of pumpkin all over the kitchen!!