Our Home for the Holidays

We have been on 'vacation' for the last two weeks.  We are taking a break from school and apparently also blogging...Really, Ryan has had a lot of days off and we have been enjoying the holidays.  Thus, I have some catching up to do here. 

A few days before Christmas the kids and I cut out and baked the last Christmas cookie for this year, gingerbread men.  Every year the kids crack me up by running to the oven as the cookies bake calling their other siblings in a very panicked fashion to come and make sure the 'gingerbread men don't run away'.  I never had this much imagination...I'm glad they do. 

That night Ryan and I took on the task of decorating the 50 or so brown boys I had baked.  He took the first go at the frosting and created the poor man on the top left in the picture. 

I did the rest of the decorating.  Ryan says it was because of his cookie's costume.  I say it was because it took ten minutes to create the gingerbread's persona.  Either way, Ryan continued to inspire most of the characters that evening.  We had a blast and laughed harder than we had in a long time! Here are some of our crazy men.  Of course, we had to 'honor'(make fun of) Brett Favre (this is serious Packer country, people) and his injuries and make a Wisconsin Badger gingerbread man. 

On Christmas Eve, Ryan and I have made it a tradition that we celebrate Christmas with our kids all day.  There are no chores or laundry (believe me, I did extra the day before!).  The day is spent enjoying each other and taking lots of time to have fun.  We even decided to use paper plates for a lot of the day to cut down on the dishes.

The morning began with a yummy breakfast of cinnamon buns, prepped the night before.  Check out Nikki's Blog, once again, (my friend with yummy bread recipes) and click on her recipe tab for the details on this very nummy breakfast.

Did someone forget to tell S it was Christmas?  Or is it simply that she spent half the night awake, once again?

The girls thoroughly enjoy getting all dressed up, having their nails painted, curling their hair, etc.  So us girls had fun for about an hour while the boys played.  Then, of course, I had to take some pictures of them.

After games, puzzles, a relaxed lunch, and some naps we sat down to our candlelight Christmas dinner.  This year we had turkey, cheddar mashed potatoes (Z's request), Caesar salad (Ryan's favorite), Cranberry Jello (everybody's favorite), and Cherry Cheesecake (Also, Ryan's favorite).

After dinner we read and talked about the Christmas story from the Bible.  Then we begin gift giving.  The way we do it at our house is that we take turns giving a present to someone.  We want to emphasize the giving part of Christmas and that is one way we do it.  The gifts this year were highlighted with the girls receiving their first 'non-baby' doll and the boys receiving nerf guns (the real deal for Z and a foam ball blaster for M). Our house is now a war zone-another post is brewing on this one.

There were some other really fun moments caught on camera.  M found his new bowling game to be a blast and J thought a 'chicken' in her new pretend microwave was hilarious!

Somehow we managed to get all of the little people into bed only a tad past their bedtime.  It was a good thing as the next morning was an early one.  On Christmas morning we give each of the kids their stockings and an ornament to open that says something about them and the past year. M was still not awake, but did manage to find his new toy (no, he did not sleep with it!).

Then it was off to Grandma's house....over the hills and through the woods we went.

From our house to yours, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!