Snow Fun, Wedding Celebration, and 2013

We had an impromptu snow day the day after Christmas.  The kids were really excited to go sledding and throw snowballs at their aunt and uncle! :)  We tried to build a snowman, but the snow wasn't the packing kind.  And, of course, you can't forget about the yummy hot chocolate and marshmallows to warm up inside.

On Sunday, December 30th (besides being my mom's birthday and Landon's adoption day) we got to experience a beautiful wedding between Jenn and Jared in Convington, KY.  Nate, John, Jessica, Matt and I drove together.  We stopped for lunch at Panera Bread and arrived at our hotel around 2:30.  The boys found a smoky bar to watch the Bear's game and since I still wasn't feeling the best, I stayed at the hotel and took a nap (I think Jessica got a nap in too!).  It was a great night to be able to dress up, have some yummy food and wine, and watch 2 people in love join together.

My camera was in manual focus instead of automatic, so all of my pictures turned out blurry.  This one is from Jess!

The next day, we drove back to Indiana, went to pick up the kiddos at Gma and Papa H.'s house, and drove right to the Frye's for our annual New Year's Eve party.  We were pretty tired after a long weekend, but we still had a great time!

The kids put on a play written by Grace.  They were pretty excited, even though I'm still not sure what the play was about! ;)

Then we had our Euchre tournament.

Jess, Steven, and Kristina were the top 3 finishers for the tournament.

We also played Buzz Word and Pictionary.  Kristina was pretty much master of the games!  We had a great time ringing in 2013 with some great friends!

Berger/Clark Family Christmas

This year, we spent Christmas Eve night and Christmas Day with the Bergers and Clarks.  We were supposed to spend Christmas Day with the Vantines, but everyone on that side ended up sick, so we changed plans and went over to visit with Mom's side.

On Thursday of Christmas week, we had planned to have the Bergers/Clarks over for dinner and gifts.  I ended up with a sore throat and cough and didn't feel the greatest.  So Matt cooked rabbit stew and Kristina came early to make the white chicken chili.  I didn't take many pictures because I spent most of the night on the couch! :(

After the kids were in bed, Dad and Steven went home and the rest of us played Imaginiff.  It was a pretty fun game, even though Matt (the only guy) dominated! :)

Kristina and Steven have been able to spend the whole 2 weeks of vacation up in Northern Indiana.  We have really enjoyed having them around!

Our Family Christmas

We had such a joyous Christmas with our family this year.  We've been so blessed to have children 8 months apart and Christmas has been such a fun time for all of us.  With a 3 and 4 year old, the magic of the season was so apparent in everything from Santa, to Tricky the elf, to buying presents, to making cookies.  Everything was fun and wonderful!

all dressed up on Christmas Sunday

picture for our Christmas card 2012

The kids got the cookies and milk ready for Santa and the carrots ready for the reindeer.

On Christmas Day, Emerson was the first one up.  She came in our room to check the stockings at 7 a.m. by turning on our bedroom lights full blast.  Then she ran out to the tree to see if Santa brought her a "dolly house."  She was quite disappointed when she didn't see one under the tree, but thankfully Santa brought a note saying a big gift was downstairs!

Landon got a new scooter, which was "Just what I wanted," (even though he never mentioned it!).

The kids wanted to open the gifts they got for each other.  Landon got Emmy a Belle Princess Doll (which unfortunately lost her arm later that day) and Emmy got Landon (and Daddy) Star Wars Blaster guns with darts.
Matt got a new version of Settlers of Catan and some warm outdoor clothes.  I got some new clothes and jewelry.
It was so nice to be able to relax with the family and enjoy each other's company.

Christmas with the Hahns

This year, we had a brunch with Todd, Cathy, and Nate on Christmas Eve.  The kids got to go over in their pjs and it was a nice relaxed time.  Cathy made a yummy brunch of mush, cinnamon rolls, smoky links, and fruit.  And then the kids got to play Santa.  It's pretty nice that they can recognize our names and I really focused (especially with Emerson) on the act of giving gifts to others and not just getting all their own gifts first! :) 

They had a ball ripping into the gifts and were really excited to see what was inside each one!

 They even had fun helping everyone else open their gifts.

Emmy was so excited with her new Barbies and princesses.  Landon loved playing with his Transformer cars.  And I was super excited about all the clothes that they needed!!

Todd was sick on Christmas Sunday so the grands just got a picture with Gma.

We are so thankful to have Grandparents close by and an uncle who can come home to celebrate our greatest gift, Jesus!!

Christmas with Friends

The Sunday before Christmas (Dec. 23rd) was a busy day for us.  We had church, Christmas with the extended Hahn family back at church, and then Christmas with the Davis' and Frye's at the Davis' house.  We look forward to the annual Friend Christmas every year.  The kids get to decorate cookies for Santa and then the adults get time together to talk and play games.  This year we played Battle of the Sexes.  Somehow the boys won (twice!).  I think the ladies may need a rematch!

And yes, I did HIGHLY recommend that that kids change into their play clothes, but they insisted on wearing their fancy clothes!

Amazingly, NO frosting was found on their "fancy" clothes!

Everybody concentrated so hard on getting their cookies just perfect!

Miss Kenna enjoyed just eating the frosting.  Look at that face!!

We had such a great time getting prepared for the Christmas season.  We are so thankful to have such wonderful friends and kids who enjoy being together!

Christmas Angels

This year at church, the kids performed in "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever."  They are both too young to have any speaking parts, but they did get to be in the small angel choir.  Landon and Emerson both did a great job singing and doing the motions.  Landon asked when he could say some words...maybe next year buddy! :)

Landon had a bit of an issue once his halo started to fall down.  He is super ticklish and did NOT like the tinsel around his neck! :)

Tyler did have some speaking parts and did a great job!!

 Great job to all of the kids (and adults) who put in a lot of time to make the CHRISTmas musical a success!

Christmas Posts to Come

Update: Well, I upgraded to Google + (I honestly don't even know what that is!:))  But with that I guess I have more storage for photos.  Because now instead of being at 98.9% full, I am only at 17.8%.  So, if you have the same issue, try upgrading too.  As far as I can see, nothing is different in blogger...

I am a bit behind in my Christmas postings.  Mainly because lovely Blogger told me that I had reached my maximum capacity in photos and I couldn't post any more.  And I figured, it's not that fun to share about Christmas without pictures.  So if anyone has any suggestions to me adding more pictures without paying a per month fee or deleting pictures from my older posts, I'd be happy to hear it!

Birthday Celebrations

We had the pleasure of celebrating 2 wonderful people this last week (and my mother-in-law today! :)). Matt turned 35 this year and we celebrated by going to Hacienda and ordering dinner and a mudslide. Yum! Then we came back to the house to open presents. Emmy is starting to become more aware of others and asked Daddy if he wanted some "dar woars dies" (Star Wars guys) for his birthday. She ended up picking him out some and I think she plays with them more than her Daddy, but it was a nice thought! :) 

Playing in the box with Daddy's birthday present from the Clark's!

For Jess's birthday, she had the awesome idea of going to a Wine and Canvas event at Papa Vino's.  We each got a canvas, paint, and an art lesson to create a "masterpiece"!  I think they turned out pretty good (although it does kinda bother me that my vase is not symmetrical!!).  We had a lot of fun and even tried out some peach bellini's!  Thanks for the fun girls night out!  I'd definitely do it again sometime!!

Thanks to Jessica bringing her camera, we got some great pictures of our work!

Happy birthday to 2 of my greatest friends!  We all love you both!

Christmas Traditions: Old and New

We LOVE going to search for the perfect tree every year!  This year, we had to change our venue since Wilfong's is going out of business.  We traveled a bit farther and ended up at Eby Pine's.  We were not disappointed.  There were so many trees to choose from, a horse drawn wagon, and popcorn.  We also got to visit with Santa.  The kids BOTH did a great job talking to the jolly man in red and sitting on his lap!  Apparently Landon wants a race track that he saw on tv and Emmy wants something that Mommy has: a jewelry box (even though she already has a jewelry box! :)).

Our tree is behind Emmy

Our new Christmas tradition has to do with a little elf the kids named "Tricky".  He is an elf on the shelf and he watches the kids during the day.  Then, at night, he magically flies back to Santa to report what he's seen.  Each morning, then, he appears in a new spot.  The kids, especially Em, LOVE trying to find where Tricky is hiding each morning.  So far he's been in the Christmas tree, wreath, the lights, and in a packing box (see below).  We've really enjoyed seeing the kids' faces light up when they find the elf.  They're at a great age to REALLY believe in the magic of the season!  They've also had fun changing the numbers on the days till Christmas chart and adding something each day to our Advent calendar until we finally get to Jesus on the 25th.

Winter Wreath

I'm ba-a-ack....after being down and out with the flu for a good week (well actually a pretty awful week), I finally feel almost back to normal.

Before I got sick, we had a lovely Thanksgiving.  It was our year to be at my side for Thanksgiving, so we spent the day at mom and dad's.  We had a nice day.  The little ones are pretty much able to play by themselves, so it's nice to be able to catch up with the adults and play a rousing game of "Logo" and "Trivial Pursuit."

I also worked on a project that Cathy and I saw when we visited House of Holly this year and thankfully I finished the morning before my first night of sickness!

I kind of combined two ideas and I think it turned out pretty cute.  The wreath I saw at House of Holly (not quite so over the top as this one:  tulle christmas wreath).  I originally wanted to do a red, green, and white one but I couldn't find those colors at Michael's, so I went with a winter theme instead of Christmas. The letter could use some more twine, but an H is a hard letter to wrap! twine letter  I think the secret is to really USE that glue gun to get the twine to stay.