New Years Eve

We did pretty much nothing today!!  The highlight of the day was watching Clemson win the Orange Bowl and they are now going on to the National Championship game!!  What a way to ring in the new year!:)

Bowling

This morning the kids and I ventured to the bowling alley for something a little different to do! It was such great fun the first game I opted for a second game, but I should have stopped after 1 because little man started losing interest at about the 3rd frame during the second game!

Losing interest and blowing his shirt up with the air thing
that dries the sweat off your fingers.

Other Happenings

One day while running many, many errands we stopped for a
treat!

Waiting in line to get our ham from Honey Baked Ham... the
wait was nearly as bad as it was last year!

Play date for S with Shelby Kate!

So sweet!

C got a circuit board for Christmas and they had fun making
it light up and make noises!

The kids were in a camp at the Children's Museum today
so that I could get about a thousand things done - that's my
new car in the background!

Christmas in Atlanta

This year we are starting what we hope will become a tradition!  The day after Christmas we drove to Atlanta and we had a Kesler Family "reunion" with our family and my dad's sister's family at my cousin, Kim's house!  We haven't all been together since my wedding!!!!  That was over 11 years ago!  It was so much fun to see everyone and we all enjoyed every minute of it!  The kids got along so well despite the age and gender differences!  

The girls

The boys

All the adults with Joey's new selfie stick:)  It was hysterical!!

Sweet cousins all dressed up!

But it wasn't long before they were dressed in more of
their everyday! 

Must be genetic!!

After we left Kim's house, we went to Uncle Bobby's new house!  This was our first time getting to see it and it is so nice!!!  We did some more present opening there as well!:)

We've been car shopping for a few months now, but knew that Atlanta had a much better selection than Greenville does.  We got down to Atlanta early, before going to Kim's house, and checked out a couple of dealerships that had some cars we were interested in.  We didn't make any decisions before lunch at Kim's, but M negotiated while we were there for lunch and we bought a car that we went and picked up after leaving Uncle Bobby's house!  It was a very long day and we were out late, but we came away with a new car so it was worth it!:)

This set up was a life saver at 8pm when the kids are completely
exhausted!  M and I reclined on the leather couches there and watched
football on the big screen while we waited - it was actually pretty
relaxing:)  We are apparently not the only one's that were car
shopping the day after Christmas - the dealerships were packed!!!

Sunday morning we spent some time hanging out at Grandpa and Gigi's house!!

The bridesmaid dress I wore in my cousin Kim's wedding:)
Probably about 14 years ago!

All while C made himself a fort and was shooting!

We left Grandpa and Gigi's and met M's cousin Elizabeth and her family at a play place for a couple of hours!  They are not able to come to Christmas lunch anymore because it is just too much with two little ones.  So, we were glad for the chance to see them even if it was a few days after Christmas!

Advent and Jesse Tree

We did the advent activities again this year as we've done the past several years!  It was a hit and the kids loved opening up each day and seeing what was going on that day!  Here is a list of what we did in addition to things that were already planned like choir performance, kindergarten programs, office parties, etc.

Decorate tree
Color a Christmas picture
Shop for toys for Toys for Tots/Christmas Store
Breakfast with Santa
Write letters to Santa
Make a Christmas craft
Decorate Gingerbread men
Special treat
Ride the Polar Express(which got rained out...boo!!)
Go Ice Skating(which got cancelled because it was too warm...boo!!)
Make and take neighbors Christmas goodies
Have a play date
Make reindeer food
Drive around looking at Christmas lights
Decorate gingerbread houses
Hollywild
Roper Mountain Holiday lights
Read The Night Before Christmas

Also, last year I got a new book by Ann Voskamp(she is an incredible Christian writer that writes in a way I've never read before) for our Jesse Tree.  We haven't done the Jesse Tree in a couple of years, but we brought it back out and enjoyed our daily reading and the hanging of each ornament!

Christmas Day

Christmas morning was so fun with the kids!  S was the first up and went to get C(who was a bit slower!!) and they came down super excited!!  M and I had woken up a little earlier so I was able to get the lights on the tree and the camera ready for action!!

The kids' main gift this year are beta fish!  S's is blue so she named it Cinderella, we aren't telling her that it's a male fish!  HA!  C's is red and he named it SeaDog.  

S also received Monopoly like she'd asked for, earrings, books, crafts and a lot of little stuff.  C got an Indian costume as he'd asked for, a very large Darth Vador that he's had his eye on, Nerf guns, Nerf crossbow and lots of other stuff as well!

After we'd finished opening all the gifts and cleaned up our mess, we went over to Elliott and Lara's house for Christmas lunch with the Poole side of the family!  It was absolutely crazy there with the three boys!  On our way home we stopped in at Grandmamma and Granddaddy's house for one last present opening session:)

Merry Christmas!!!

Christmas Eve

On Christmas Eve we really don't have any plans and are able to be VERY lazy the whole day!!!

Opening Christmas jammies from Gigi and Grandpa:)

"Making" cookies for Santa - the break and bake variety:)

We put out reindeer food so that Santa and his gang could find
our house!

Took a walk through the neighborhood while the kids
raced ahead on their bikes!

Did a little fishing - but didn't catch anything!:(

We ate dinner in the dining room which we never let the kids do!
It was fun and fancy, but when they were still hungry and popcorn
was all we really had, we made them and their greasy hands come into
the kitchen!  Notice we covered C's chair with a sheet, but he still
managed to make a mess!!

Reading The Night Before Christmas

Santa's set up with cookies and hot chocolate!