Merriest Christmas

We had one of our best Christmas' yet. No major sickness. No emotional breakdowns. Just a big celebration. The way it should be. We were blessed to have Grandma and Grandpa Rasmussen and Jared, Lindsay, and Trae come and play.

We started our Christmas Eve celebration/ Aaron's B-day party with a delicious meal. I think our traditional Christmas Eve meal is better than our Thanksgiving meal, and a lot less work cooking! After the meal we played games. Our balloon volleyball was pretty low key, but our "dodgeball" which Aaron renamed "hitball" was very entertaining. We had a stash of 100 play ball to throw at the kids trying to make it through an obstacle course without being hit. Then the adults got their turn. It was a lot of fun.

Then onto our traditional pajama present opening. Here's Whit and Grandma with their monkey jamies

Travis was pretty stoked to be "shield man". He headed straight to the dress-ups to accessorize :)

These two midgets are too cute. Had to sneak a pic of them in the bath. Oh, how we all missed Trae!

Travis giving Grandpa some snuggles

Lindsay and Jared showing off their pj's

Hailey decided to join in on the monkey pj theme

After some Delicious cheese cake it was off to bed for the kids. Whitney was pretty worried she wouldn't be able to fall asleep before santa came. I reassured her she would be fine. It was so fun to see their excitement for what was coming!

The next day we saw what santa brought! bikes for Whit and Trav - which we've actually been able to use the last couple days! I could explain all the pics. but really, here is just a picture fest of our morning.

This was really all Travis cared about. I didn't realize how much this meant to him until I watched him play for hours and hours these last couple days. For him, time stopped when he opened Lego Starwars

Here's a pic for my siblings. Here's mom and dad opening their chandelier from all the kids.

Dad got spoiled with a big gift for his man cave. A tv on the wall might dress up the room no? After all, it was his football coaching money that payed for a lot of Christmas. He deserves to be spoiled on his big day!

Hailey got some new additions to her kitchen. Her and Trae made some sweet food.

Aaron working the shake weight from Jared and Lindsay.

It was hard to rush the present opening a little. But we did go to church that day.

The day after Christmas was almost just as good. We just played with all our new toys and relaxed. So nice to just enjoy being with family. The boys got their fill of remote controlled toys and lego starwars while the girls did legos, kitchen, and coloring.

Getting great use out of their new bubble bath supply

Whitney declared that the paint in her art kit was for face painting. She painted herself a cat, then the next day the shop opened and Hailey became the cat, Travis a fierce lion, and Whitney a butterfly.

Hailey enjoying her new babies. She is quite obsessed with mother role playing. How do I get these daughters? She takes care of babies, cooks in the kitchen, runs to the store in her new car with her purse and phone. Only to be broken up by coloring, reading books, or "toesies" (ring around the rosies).

So there you have it. Our lovely Christmas. The kids are still playing - giving beast a newspaper cast since he broke his arm and leg. They also tapped some pens together for crutches. Brilliant. I tried not to think about how great our Christmas was because with my prego hormones I just wanted to cry. Cry because these moments go by so quickly. Cry because next Christmas my kids will be that much bigger. And Cry because I feel so blessed!

Merry Christmas. It's been one event filled excited year! Here's to another one!

my work is done

So yes, this post is about the kids room... and I finally have some pics I will allow to show you ... but first, what did my kids do the day before Christmas Eve?

Threw a surfer party of course hope they still love the concept of surfing when they are old enough to do it!

So here is the product of my months of labor. This project has kept me busy! I loved it, but at the same time I'm ready to relax and just chill with my kids. So here the mostly final look - minus the baseboards and closet.

view from the doorway entrance.

When they do move into the room there will be two twin beds and a white dresser on this wall.

Dryerase board and their cork boards to show their artwork. I'm excited about how this turned out!

Just another view.

And there you have it. I really enjoyed painting the sun, castle, hills and clouds. Even after I tapped, mudded, textured, and Aaron painted. But like I said it was a lot of work doing it in the few moments of free time (Hailey's nap time) that I had. I think having a fun room to send my kids to will ease my transition of sending my kids downstairs to sleep!

Merry Christmas!

gingerbread mansion

We have been crazy busy this month. At least I feel like I have. But I think today was a turning point. I finished my portion of Whitney and Travis' new room. I painted clouds, sun, castle, hills, ect... and now all that's left is a few finish work items . . . for Aaron :)

One of our traditions is decorating gingerbread houses, but this year we went bigger.

Hailey ate candy, and played in the kitchen. She's obsessed! She can't get enough of painting and play kitchen/food. Sunday we pulled out the graham crackers and started construction.

It was going to be a castle. But turned more into a massive cottage.

Then Monday, the decorating began

The boring back, mostly decorated at the end with all the leftover candy.

The finished product.

Whitney, Travis, and surprisingly Aaron were pretty into it this year. It was fun to see Whitney's creativity and Travis do more than eat the candy! But now that it's been a couple weeks the candy remaining is sparse. It's almost demolition time :)