Holiday Hoopla

Can you believe it's almost Christmas?? I feel like the month of December has flown by! I guess that's the upside to being busy during the holiday season...we say "bye" to Lala, Poppi, and the Aunties at Thanksgiving and then blink and they're back for Christmas! :)

Drew recently got to spend an entire (!!) day with Grandma (and part of it with Grandpa too). It was heaven for him and heaven for me since it opened up some time for me to finish up the last of my Christmas shopping. In the evening, Collin also headed over to Grandma's house for a movie night and dinner, so I was even able to steal Nathan away and finish up the last of the Christmas shopping for the boys as well. I heard all about what a good time they had, but fortunately Kathleen snapped a few pictures for me as well.

 

Lunch after golf with Grandpa. Kathleen said Drew needed everything about lunch to be the exact same as Grandpa.  A note about the golf thing- this was the usual mommy and me golf clinic Drew's been doing for a while now, but this week it was grandpa who showed up to take him. Drew just about jumped out of his clothes when he found out that Grandpa would be going golfing with him instead of one of us this week. 

 That day also started a new tradition for Grandma and Drew (and Collin too when he's old enough). Gingerbread houses! It's hard to see, but I love that his tongue is sticking out of his mouth in concentration in this photo!

 The finished product! Drew had plenty of fun making this, but has had even more fun sneaking the candy off of it to eat throughout the day! It will be a fun tradition for both boys to continue in years to come. Thanks Grandma!!

We also did our annual trip with the Collings family to go walk Candy Cane Lane; a neighborhood not far from our house that is filled with Christmas lights. As usual, we froze our tails off and enjoyed seeing all the lights and decorations together.

Brayden and Drew

Brayden's little brother Jackson and little sister Carli

Carolers! Jenn and I were recently talking about how you never see carolers anymore and lo and behold, twice this week I've seen them! I loved that this group just stood outside one of the houses singing to all of us as we walked by!

Look at this guy...two coffees, two kids, one jogger. No problem. It's like he's a Daddy or something....

The whole lot of us.

A few of the houses have dressed up characters out in front. Drew loved Frosty....

 ....but was terrified of the Grinch! To his credit, that Grinch was pretty scary looking!

A fun night! So much fun in fact, that we walked it again a few nights later with another group of friends! 

We met this group of friends when we joined a Bible study group with our church a few years ago. I would have never guessed how well we would all click, but they've become some of our closest friends. In fact, this is how we met Drew's best buddy Noah. Anyway, this week we did a dinner and gift exchange with everyone and then bundled up to go walk Candy Cane Lane again.

Noah and Drew exchanging gifts. I don't know if they were more excited to open their own gifts, or "help" the other open and show what they had bought each other .

Collin and Nathan (Noah's little brother) eventually joined in the fun too

We tried to get Matthew (Kyle and Michelle's new baby) in for a group picture of all the kiddos, but it seems that the more kids you add to a picture, the less likely you are to get a good photo. ;)

Love these people!

Noah and Drew got to ride in the wagon down Candy Cane Lane. You should have seen Laura drive this thing! First of all, she doesn't pull it, she pushes it....with a coffee in one hand, and Nathan in the Ergo pack on her front. She's a super Momma. I think it's her secret power....and I think she is the only one out of all of us that could push the wagon and make it go straight!

On a totally different note, Christmas marks a year of blogging for me. I haven't been nearly as consistent as I said that I would, but I do feel like this blog has served it's purpose as a scrapbook of sorts for the boys. ...Now if only I could figure out how to print it in book format. Julie (yep, you dear cousin of mine!), I think you had mentioned you've done this before, so if that's true, send some of that blog world wisdom my way please! I'll owe you! For that matter, anyone else out there that knows how to do this, I could use your pearls of wisdom as well!

And finally, since the reality of me posting again before Christmas is slim....

MERRY, MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!