Christmas is coming...

My Christmas kids!  They are getting SO excited!  

Still putting everything in her mouth...

This is not the best picture, but I love her little face in it.  Her dress is from her daddy.  He picked it out all by himself in Malaysia.   He couldn't wait to bring it home and show it to me and her.  

Gus has still been visiting when the kiddos are being good.  I love these little tags he put on some gifts he left under the tree one night for us.  Kaden was so thrilled to wake up to see some presents since I do not wrap until the very last minute.  I don't want peekers and also do not trust Addie!  

Presents from Gus

The opening in the morning

Everyone got new Christmas p.j.'s!

Last year at Christmas, the boys got SO many things, I decided to hold a few things back for when we have those "I'm bored" days.  During our big snowstorm, the boys didn't have school and I was at my wit's end.  We had all this snow outside, but it was dangerously cold, so outside play was not happening.  I remembered Aunt Jessica got the boys some cute little crystal trees.  I ran upstairs, dug them out of a little box I had a few things left from LAST CHRISTMAS and brought them down.  The boys LOVED them.  A neat little science experiment and Christmas decor in one!  I have them on my kitchen windowsill...they are really pretty!

I still am shocked that I kept these alive AND blooming so pretty! I will be buying one every year from now on.  It does something for my mood to see a flower blooming in the dead of winter.   

Nothing better than watching the wonder of Christmas in a little one's eyes!

"Where's the heart ornament, Addie?"

A really nice gift from some really nice friends! 

Mmm!  Goodies!  And Lisa's fudge!  Give me a SPOON!

Gus

We have a little visitor that comes to our house every night after the kids go to sleep.  Sounds slightly creepy huh?  He is our Christmas elf, Gus.  The boys are having an absolute ball with Gus.  I love hearing Kaden talk about Gus and wondering if he could catch him or see him.  Gus wrote us a letter telling us his rules and it sounds as if we won't be meeting him since he is so fast and doesn't like to be seen.  The first night he asked for some food since he was so hungry.  Kaden left out a little cookie Grandma made and some sour straws!  Gus left the kids little pre-maid letters to Santa for them to fill out.  Since we had a huge snowstorm over the weekend and we haven't left the house, it has been nice to have some activities to do! 

Kaden's letter to Santa

We decided to make some sugar cookies during our Minnesota snowstorm.  Hudsen liked rolling the dough into balls (and of course, stuffing as much dough into his mouth that he could without me seeing).

Kaden was into frosting the cookies.

Gotta love staying home together and having no place to go!

Gus left us a self-portrait since the boys were SO curious about what he looked like.   Also, he gave us the recipe on how to make ice cream out of snow.  Almost all of us liked it!

It's beginning to look a lot like CHRISTMAS!

   

We are all getting in the Christmas spirit at our house!  I have vowed to not be stressed this year and just to enjoy the season with my children.  I thought Adalyn would just be enchanted by our trees, but not so much!  She likes to take the ornaments off and put them in her mouth and try to eat them.  Maybe next year she won't be such a home-wrecker!  She does say, "Santa" and "snowman".  Also, trying to teach her a little about Jesus with our kid-friendly nativity set!  The boys, of course, have that all down! 

I bought this star the first year we were married, 10 years ago.  I went to Target a week or so after Christmas to score some good deals.  I lucked out by getting a tree for 90% off (yes, 90!), this star and some other misc. Christmas stuff.  Money was tight those first years, so we were pretty happy with our luck! 

Kaden LOVES getting the star up (with a little help from dad)!  He still remembers the year he "fixed" the star.  He had the magic touch and got it working! 

 

We literally had to "trim" the tree!

Trying to reach the plug-in!

Let there be light!

The kids had fun digging in the ornament box (with Jeremy working with Malaysia in the background!  Gotta love the 14 hour time difference interfering with our Christmas decorating.  Ugh.)

Hudsen putting up an ornament given to me by my grandma.  It says "You're an Angel".  I truly believe she thought I was!  Now she is mine!  (I find myself REALLY missing my grandparents at Christmas)

Hudsen LOVES Christmas (what kid doesn't!?!?).  He may just be our future pastor!  He has got it all down!  SO cute to hear him tell us about Jesus and the first Christmas.

On to our next event!  Hudsen's preschool Christmas program at Precious Pebbles.  I love this little school so much and feel so blessed to have discovered it this year for our little Huddy.  He has benefitted so much from being there.

Miss Judy with all of her special little preschool friends.  Hudsen is in the back.

This should have been my first indication by his face that he was going to be shy up there.  He had been singing his songs, especially "Go Tell it on the Mountain" for about a month on the top of his lungs.  I thought he was just going to blow us away...

Not so much.

Watch this.

At least he is cute, right??  :)  

I thought he was going to fall asleep up there!

He felt much better when it was all over with!  So much for his singing career! This is his best buddy Simon.  

Giving Dad a Huddy hug

Our first real snowfall happened last Friday, the 3rd.  

The boys were thrilled of course!  Grandma got here just in time to do some Christmas shopping with me.  We had a blast late Friday night at Toys R Us and we were both feeling quite miserable, delirious and overwhelmed (me especially!) when my mom announced at 9:30 or so, "I need a margarita!"  So, we paid for our stuff, got the heck out of there, took off in my 4 wheel drive (thank GOD for those!) and headed to her favorite, Applebees.  I am not usually a big fan of the place, until...I had their pomegranate margarita!  YUM!  We had some appetizers and could not believe how many crazy people were there that late at night during a snowstorm!  I went to bed that night thinking, "I can get through the craziness of Christmas with the help of my mom AND MARGARITAS!"  :)

Addie LOVED watching the boys go down the hill on their snowboards and sleds.  It has been way too cold to take her out, but the first 30 degree day (March!?) we will have her out!

                                               

CrAzY Minnesota kids!

      Smart girls, staying warm, watching all of the action!

                                             

November Happenings

 November came and went about as fast as every month does.  Jeremy left for his work trip to Malaysia on the 11th.  We decided to take advantage of the beautiful fall weather a few days before he left and went down to Silver Lake to feed the ducks and geese.  
The boys had a blast chasing and feeding the wildlife!

 I love these moments between brothers.

We decided to make it easy on ourselves and leave Miss Addie in her stroller when we were by the lake.  :) 

We walked over to the little playground and Daddy was a little "helicopter-ish" with Adalyn!  

She has a very protective daddy! 

It was SO nice to be wearing t-shirts in November.  

Every year for the last 4 years we have packed shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child.  This is such an awesome giving experience that I feel like the kids actually "get".  They help with the packaging of the toys and goodies and then we drop off the boxes at a local church.

Addie has a little friend named Landon.  He is Hudsen's friend Simon's little brother.  He is just a doll and such a good little boy!  Addie loves him.

Addie liked to feed him.  Poor little man! 

When daddy got home from his big 10 day trip around the world, he was SO tired (so was I, but for different reasons!) he didn't even know what day it was.  I felt so bad for him.  Addie stuck very close to her daddy.  If she had it her way, she wouldn't let him ever leave again!  

 She was full of hugs and kisses for her daddy.

One last picture.  Our drooling dog.  Kinda gross, but kinda funny too!

 Next up, CHRISTMAS is coming!