christmas

christmas eve we had church and then some special friends over...

on christmas eve night the kids get to open a present from us... it's a new bible or special devotional book.... they get to take it with them and read it as they sleep under the christmas tree...

lucienne was just excited to have more small pieces of wrapping paper to try and sneak into her mouth...

 after the kids fell asleep i got their stockings ready...i left the end of the string by their bed and made a maze for them to follow to find the stockings...

 i couldn't believe come 7 a.m. i was the only one awake. finally arianna woke up and then ganz the cat actually sat by grayson's head and meowed until he woke up. :) we roused daddy and lucienne and started on the stocking treasure hunt. ari found hers pretty quickly.. but grayson was extremely particular about how he rolled his yarn up so it took QUITE awhile... ;)

 one of ari's favorite things in her stocking: a little notebook that has a calculator, pen and paper.. for some reason she calls it her 'sensor'..? she has already solved about half of the world's problems and written them down  in there...;)

 luci had a little book... and some fun baby food's and crackers. EXACTLY what she would want.. well except for small pieces of paper... that is what she would probably really want. :)

 every year growing up there was always an orange in the toe of our stocking... the tradition continues with my babies. grayson loves to line things up... i find all sorts of little lined up processionals all over the house. :)

 we opened our gifts from my family... they have all been so great about supporting our vision to keep the presents side of christmas pretty low key. and i know that is hard for a grandparent!!! :)

 nana sent a box of goodies the kids are digging into and discovering new and random things even a week later. cappy and emmy sent us shells to add to our growing collection. our auntie in africa sent us these musical instruments and grass dancing skirt... now our plays can take on an authentic tribal twist...:)

 slippers in her stocking...

 lucienne tries out her christmas biscuit....

 grayson and i made doughnuts. and realized that boy needs a boy friendly apron. asap. ;)

betty (my 1952 chambers stove) and i burned it up this year in the food department. i have been wanting to try some recipes from the BGSK blog. i made roasted fennel and asiago tartlettes and carmelized onion pizzettes with smoked mozzarella and arugula and olive oil poundcake trifle with raspberry compote and homemade whipped cream... there was other food of course but those were the shining stars in my book. ari is a girl after my own heart. when asked what her favorite part of christmas day was.. she said that it was always time to eat. you betcha. :)

 do you think i took a picture of these after i baked them? no. i ate them. immediately. :)

 this was delish-- but i made it up and don't have an exact recipe... it was basically frozen fruit--- cranberries, pineapple, mango, peach and a splash of orange liqueur pulse chopped in the food processor. is was tart and fresh and just like i like my cranberry relish. :)

 this poundcake recipe??? AMAZING. seriously. make it. sooo good.

i think they liked it. :)

this year we started a new tradition of playing a new game in the evening after dinner.

a blanket on the floor, a warm fire, connect 4 -- does it get better than that?? ;)  nate and i were into strategy... we realized half way through that the kids really just wanted to fill the whole board with their pieces. so we took turns. one real game then one fill as fast as you can game.. and we may have talked a little trash -- uh i mean we modeled good sportsmanship every chance we got. but it was hard because nate lost so much...  is so good at connect 4 i didn't get much chance to model my good loser skills. ;)

that night we capped off with kids going to bed and nate and i watching 'the family man'.. my romantic christmas movie pick. 'i choose us nate. i choose us. ' ;)


on sunday afternoon we headed to my in-laws for some family extravaganza time...


this is my cute baby. she is especially cute when she sticks her finger in her mouth like this. why? i have no idea. but she's scrumptious. and i would like to keep her this age for about another two years. but she's a terrible listener and just keeps growing.

we do a name draw present exchange... the kids get pretty excited about passing the presents out...

especially big ones that they have to be a team to carry. :)

snow! we hadn't seen this much snow yet in kearney so this was basically grayson's first time. it was reeeally cold... and he had bright pink snowpants... and he bit it face first on the mini jump.. but overall had a good time. :) their backyard is basically one big sledding hill.....

grandpa did a lot of chasing sleds down the hill...

and brushing kids off when they hit the snow at the bottom...

arianna really wanted to try it on her own this year.. but really did not have the hang of steering.

so grandpa pulled us out of the woods....

and just in case you think grandpa spent all his time chasing and rescuing and didn't get in a few runs on that child sized sled of his own... at the children's request-- he did. :)

at this point, grayson looking up the tall climb back to the top, huffed and puffed and said

"whew. long journey. "

basement cousin christmas craziness...

and then--- wii dance. i was a skeptic. i will be the first to admit. i was envisioning the ridiculous 'dance game' at the bowling alley arcade. but this?? well this was kind of fun. :) 

so i kicked nate's tail pretty bad on 'hey ya'.. that's really not a surprise. i think everyone was feeling bad for him because i can shake it like a polaroid picture and he... well-- he can try. ;) so--- family loyalties came into play and his sister picks the russian dancers song for our next head to head battle.
um-- yeah- of course he is going to win. these guys specialize in not moving their hips. and look at that game face he has on.. he knew he had me...  

so by the end i maybe just started freestyling.. to russian music.. it was awesome.

i got beat fair and square by gabrielle.. although it was close. and it was NOT her first time. but i lost. i can admit it. the wii dance queen crown went home with aunt gabby... until next year. :)

my favorite one.. daddy and ari doing walk like an egyptian. too good. and she beat him.. fair and square. :)

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