Merry Christmas Everybody!

Randall and I watched It's a Wonderful Life this year and I bawled through the entire thing.  I'm pretty sure that's the first time I've watched it since becoming a parent, and I could totally relate to all the stress of sick kids, bills, work, etc.  I loved it!  We had an amazing Christmas this year and once again...I'm totally bummed it's over.  We did all the usual stuff -

Decorated Cookies
Don't look at my pathetic sugar cookies. If anyone has a delicious FOOLPROOF recipe, please let me know because mine NEVER turn out right. 

Decorated Gingerbread Houses

(or gingerbread trailers)

Decorated Ourselves

 Performed in the Nativity at our ward party.

 Had Christmas Eve dinner with the Brown side.

Thanks for the pictures Laura. I couldn't find my camera that morning. 

 My mom made Jedi robes for the boys and Red Riding Hood robes for the girls.

 Opened gifts and played with our new stuff on Christmas morning.

 Cameron REALLY enjoyed all the candy in his stocking (and a few pieces he found in everyone else's).

 LOVE the headphone feature included with this toy. 

 My Mom, Dad, Rachel, and Jana came to see what Santa brought everyone.

 The experienced sniper -

 His worthy opponents - 

 The fierce SWAT sisters -

I just realized that I didn't get a single picture of Savanna opening up her presents on her first Christmas.  That's probably because her siblings "helped" so much that she didn't really have much to do. She still had a great time rummaging around the mess and tasting all the wrapping paper, new toys, and candy wrappers she could find.

 I don't know why Santa's encouraging this whole WALKING thing...

My girls hanging out in their new "carriage."

One of my kids happened to take a picture of Randall's Christmas present during a take-a-ton-of-pictures-before-Mom-catches-you-playing-with-her-camera extravaganza...so I figured I'd include it. 

I received some new clothes, jewelry, boots, a 4-slice toaster (yep, my family's officially too big for a 2-slicer), and a waffle iron all bought lovingly by me...with my husband's money.  The best thing about that is most of it I used/wore before Christmas (which was only fair because Randall started using his present in November) and I LOVE all of my gifts. ;) Surprises are SO over-rated for psycho sale-seekers like me. At least when it's from someone that shares my bank account and doesn't possess my mad deal-finding skills.  Randall has managed to pull off some amazing surprises in the past, but I'm mostly just glad that he accepts me for who I am (a SUCKER for a sale).

I forgot my camera (again), but we had a delicious Christmas dinner over at the Stewarts on Christmas Day and had lots of fun playing games with everyone. 

FAVORITE GIFTS -

Carter - "There are three.  Star Wars Clone Wars III, DS Bakugan game, and my scooter with light-up wheels."

Lydia - "My Barbie Rapunzel and Eu-gene." 

Meleah - "Ree-punzel!"

Cameron - "Woody toys!" (Toy Story sets)

My kids are totally spoiled and my house is a disaster, but we've had a WONDERFUL Christmas.  Now I'd better go clean up this pig sty! 

 

Fortunately, my husband has mad trash-organizing skills and was able to fit all the garbage into our 2 cans (including the box pile from my previous post).  I'm a lucky woman!

I can no longer hide...

In my defense, some of those boxes are from diapers and wipes which are a necessity.  Only a few of them came full of toys to give to my already spoiled children. Really!  ;)

Carter's Santa Letter 2011

First a shake maker, popcorn maker, money machine, an ice cream maker, a robot that does my homework, a secret clubhouse, a flat screen in my room, my own computer, a dog.

Could I please can I have everything on my list? From Carter. p.s. Am I on the naughty list?

I think he must have been hungry when he wrote this list.  I'm hoping that he gets the money machine. The robot that does his homework would also be nice.  Then I wouldn't have to nag him every week to get it done...

My little angel is STANDING!

 Will someone please inform my baby that she's not even 9 months old yet?  Thank you!

Already?!

First, I find this in Lydia's backpack -

Then Carter brings home this -

(was folded in half like a card) 

At least with Lydia's I could console myself with the fact that the "masteryas pearson" could be a sweet FEMALE friend in her class.  Carter's however, is actually his "girlfriend" that he's been "in a relationship" with since the beginning of the year.  I was originally pretty happy with "the relationship" because it made Carter really excited to go to school every day.  But upon further review, I have decided that having a child with a girlfriend makes me feel entirely too old.  Fortunately, Carter has informed me that his crush on Haley has subsided a bit.  For instance, at the beginning of the year when she would ask him for his fortune cookie at lunch, he would just give it to her.  Now he hurries and eats it before she gets a chance to ask.  He's also developed a little crush on a girl named Paige so he's "kind of cheating on"  Haley.  Fortunately, Haley also has a little crush on Brady, so it's okay.  Apparently as long as they're both cheating on each other, everything's fine.  Part of me wonders where he even learned the terms "cheating on" and "in a relationship" in the THIRD GRADE, but I guess I'm just "old school" (another favorite phrase from Carter) and I don't know anything anymore!

"Clean up, clean up, everybody, everywhere!"

The other day one of my kids spilled a baggie of Cheerios on the floor and I decided to make them clean it up themselves for once.  I opened up the little sucky think at the top of my vacuum and they put the O's in one by one, laughing hysterically as the vacuum sucked their fingers.  Sure, I could have just vacuumed up the mess in a couple of seconds, but where's the fun in that?  Now I just have to hope they won't intentionally create messes so that they can play with the vacuum again.

If you don't understand the title, it's a song that I picked up from somewhere YEARS ago (Dora?), and I sing it to my kids ALL the time.  When they were little they used to love to sing it with me as we put their toys into buckets.  Now they pretty much hate it.  Hopefully someday they'll think of it fondly again... ;)

Clean up, clean up, everybody, everywhere. 

Clean up, clean up, everybody do your share!

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Gotta LOVE shopping online!

I really haven't been buying THAT much.  They just send everything individually...in humongous boxes.  Remember this post?

I probably should have taken a few more in between pictures, but he really DID dive in.  "wink" "wink"

 My choo-choo box train keeps growing.  Wasn't it just yesterday that it was only this long? -

Happy shopping everyone!  I've gotta go hide all these boxes before my hubby gets home!