fancy christmas photo

 So, there's this thing where the Sunday before Christmas, moms dress up their kids in festive clothes, and try to take a nice photo of them in front of the Christmas tree.  This year, I tried to participate in this fun tradition.  However, my daughter thought it would be the perfect time to show everyone how hilarious she was, by falling backwards into her brothers laps-every time- I tried to take a picture.

 And apparently, she was right.  Her brothers thought it was pretty hilarious too!

 I may not have taken the perfect picture, but I did get to listen to my children laughing together, and that's pretty special too!

Maybe next year!

my mama heart

So, this happened and my mama heart almost burst because my daughter wanted to wear my high heels and dance around the house.  

pictures with santa 2015

 Taking my kids to see Santa is one of my favorite parts of the month of December.  The boys all take it so seriously every year, and they light up when they get a chance to tell the jolly guy what they want for Christmas that year.

 Krew has had his wish list memorized for weeks, so he had no problem telling Santa exactly what he wanted: A BB-8 remote control, dinosaur toy, and spinning Hulk.

 Kade asked for Madden '16,  and talking BB-8 plush.

Ky wanted Ultron for Disney Infinity

And Everly wanted to not have to sit on Santa's lap.  I'm sorry, but I think little kids crying on Santa's lap is almost as adorable as perfectly smiling children sitting on his lap.  And don't worry, we made her sit with him for all of 2.5 seconds, and she's fine now.

finding the perfect tree

One of my absolute most favorite family traditions is looking for and cutting down the most perfect Christmas tree to adorn our living room the entire month of December.  We always head out to the Christmas tree farm the weekend after Thanksgiving, regardless of the weather or the crowd levels, and this year was no exception.  The Saturday after Thanksgiving was quite cold, but the sunshine made for a beautiful outing.

 As soon as we got to the part of the tree farm that had the tallest trees, we spotted a perfect tree right away.  But, because we are human, and we have to wonder if the grass is greener on the other side, we made Kade stand watch at the first tree while we looked around a bit more.

 In the end, we decided that the first tree we spotted was the most perfect tree there, and began cutting it down!

Oh, how I hope that as my children grow up, they never forget the fun we had in the freezing cold, picking out our perfect Christmas tree year after year!

thanksgiving 2015

Wow, I'm behind on blogging!  So, I'm going to make this brief.  We had a wonderful Thanksgiving this year.  It was much smaller and quieter than the Thanksgivings I had growing up, but I'm slowly learning that there is more than one way to have a nice holiday!

We had the most delicious food ever!  We kept saying that sometimes on Thanksgiving, there is just so much food.  Well, there wasn't a ton of food (obviously there was more than enough to fill everyone up), but each dish was unbelievably delicious.

Oh, and Bart and I ended the day with a trip to Lambeau Field to watch the Packers play!  It made for a very fun holiday! (Even if the Packers lost.)

playing outside in november

November was one of the warmest Novembers in a long time.  (December was relatively warm too), so we were able to spend a lot more time playing outside than we usually do this time of year.  Which is good, because these little ones are so much happier when they aren't stuck inside all the time.  

 Is it just me, or does she look so grown up in this picture, and not like a 14 month old?  Right?

 Krew was so fun to play soccer with this particular day.  He was so serious about it, and look how he even sticks his tongue out with concentration.  So cute!  Although, when you live in a construction zone, one step back too far, and you might fall out of our yard, and then this is what you get:

It's still better than being stuck inside all the time, right?