.the snow.

The kids love the snow. I’m glad because it’s taking me years and years to get used to it. But kids are never as cold as you are.

We bought a sled this year. Our first, I might add. Now I am guessing we will be sledding every Saturday until the snow is gone. The kids loved it that much. They ask everyday if we can go sledding.

We started in the our backyard at the park. Beginner hills. Then I suggested to go to this area in our neighborhood that has bigger hills. That was the best. Other kids have already made little jumps on all the runs. It was perfect.

I can say I am glad I am prego because Tyler had a very sore bum the next day.

 

 

 

 

 

.Organize Me.

I got this brilliant idea from my MIL a couple years ago.

When your kids start to become school aged, you will find a whole lot more paper gathering in the kitchen.

Now I don’t keep very many things the kids draw or do BUT there are those paintings that impress me or the report card that was great!

So I got The Black Box. Each child has a file and label with the school year on it. So you have a place for those papers you can’t part with.

I put my Black Box in a cupboard in the kitchen, since that’s where I end up going through the backpacks.

And when the school year is over you can place all the papers in each child’s baby book, scrapbook, or even take pictures of the papers and put them in their very own blog book.

 * Very important tip- I always write the child’s age, date or grade on the paper right away. So you will know when the child did the wonderful masterpiece, because believe me, you will forget!

.new years eve.

New Year’s Eve is my Dad’s Birthday. So we did what we always do and wrote little notes on balloons and let them go up to Grandpa in Heaven!

That night all of Tyler’s Mom’s side got together for New Years. I left early to put the kids to bed and just couldn’t muster up the energy to go back for more fun. I’m lame and hit my pillow at 12:04am.

LUCKY for me, our friends back home waited for us to get back to Utah so we could all go out to dinner to celebrate!!! Best neighborhood in the world.

And that’s our Christmas Vacation! Glad it’s over but we will never forget all the fun we had. Now it’s time for a vacation from our vacation! Just Tyler, me and fat belly. Can’t wait!

.after christmas.

Tyler’s parent’s gift to all the grandkids was Gilroy Gardens!

This was my little families first time there and we LOVED it! It’s an amusement park for little kids. It was so much fun and I can’t wait to take this kids back.

Alex had a love-hate relationship with the rides. He would cry when we put him in the ride. Love it when the ride was going. Then cry when we would have to take him out of the ride.

  

The “oldest” of the group. The seven year olds.

 

Then another day, when all the other families left back home, we took the kids to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We have been here several times but this was Alex’s first time and being the Nemo lover he is, he loved it!

.christmas.

We had a wonderful Christmas. All 22 of us!

 

Alex would open one present and then go play with it for a half an hour. So when all the big kids were done opening we sat down with Alex so he could open the rest of his.

We had a big breakfast then Grandma and Grandpa offered to watch all 11 kids while we went to a movie!

 

We finished the day with a big Christmas dinner.

*I want this on the record even though I have no pictures.

It’s the game us adults play to “win” our gifts from Tyler’s parents. It’s always so frustrating and fun!

So there’s 4 couples and each couple draws a number. This is to determine which order we go in. Which happened to go in birth order this year.

In Tyler’s parents room they have set up 6 different gift groups. The first sibling goes up and picks which gift she wants. Then her husband goes up after and picks which gift he wants or what he thinks his wife picked.

If you both pick the same one, you get it! But that never happens. So then the next person goes up and does the same thing.

I think we went through all 4 couples twice and still no couple has picked the same gift.

This is where it get’s frustrating!

A month before Tyler and I are at Costco. I’m seriously putting a nativity scene in my cart when he says 80.00 is too much for something we don’t need. In my head I think, whatever I will just buy it when you are not around. Since we don’t have ONE nativity scene in our whole house over the holidays. I was just trying to be Christ-like, but whatever.

Soooo one of the gift groups had THAT nativity scene in it, along with that big drink dispenser from Costco and a roasting pan.

PERFECT! Right? Why isn’t he picking it???

So every time Tyler and  I wouldn’t pick the same group I would call him names and ask what are you thinking??? Obviously you can’t talk too much so you don’t give any hints.

LUCKILY, we did end up getting our group. Just because know one else was picking it. So I said thank you (cause I got what I wanted) and called him a couple more names. He was picking another group that we REALLY didn’t need.

We play this every Christmas we can and it ends up being really fun if it doesn’t cause a fight!