Shopping and Birthday Partyin’

On Black Friday we got the kids up early (T and I figured it was the FIRST time we had ever purposely woken A up before 8am) and headed to town for some Black Friday shopping. We got to Toys’ R Us at 7:30am and I was surprised at how un-crowded it was!  It was pretty much like a regular shopping day and they still had the one item we were hoping to get…a big Lego set.

The girls had to sit with Pooh before we left.

We hit several stores before meeting up with Noni and Aunt J who took the girls back to the house for the rest of the day.  The rest of us hit store after store, finally finding the crowds at about 11am.  We had lunch and kept right on going.  We finally finished our shopping around 3.  We weren’t really looking for anything in particular (for us it’s more of a fun family experience), but we found lots of good deals, and unintentionally finished just about all our Christmas shopping!

We met back up with Noni, Papa, Mama, Aunt J and the girls to see a children’s play.  The kids did a good job, but none of us really cared for the play itself.  You win some you lose some right?  After the play we had a nice dinner out and then we had to say our goodbyes to Aunt J who was leaving the next day. :/ 

Fortunately we still had two more days of cousin fun to distract the girls from Aunt J’s leaving.  We headed back to Grandma’s for another late night. 

We woke up Saturday to Grandpa’s birthday!  Thanksgiving was so late this year that we got to spend it all together which was really fun! 

Auntie Nae had come up with a really neat craft for us to do (our holiday tradition) and Grandma had gotten several together for the kids so we spent the day crafting up a storm.

I’ll have to post a picture of the finished product later.

During afternoon nap/quiet time the kids watched a movie, which Boo quickly abandoned so she got to go with the ladies to visit a fun shop in honor of small business Saturday.

After our brief shopping trip it was back to the house to make Grandpa’s birthday dinner and cake.

I didn’t hear what everyone was laughing about, but they were all laughing pretty hard as we were singing Happy Birthday to Grandpa. :)

Peanut was hamming it up during dinner.

And was promptly joined by her sister.

Who she thinks is quite amusing.

Peanut really enjoyed Grandpa’s red velvet birthday cake!

Unfortunately we woke up the next morning to two sick kiddos, K and cousin S.  They spent a not-so-fun morning while we got all packed up and said our goodbyes, but despite all that we had a wonderful time spending the holiday with lots of family!  We are truly blessed!

Thanksgiving

Several times on the drive to Grandma and Grandpa’s the girls were arguing/discussing/compromising over where they were going to sleep.  Little did we know, Grandma and Grandpa had a BIG surprise for them!  I was upstairs and all I heard was squealing and screaming.  Bug came dashing upstairs just to pull me towards them saying, “Come see!!! You have to come see!”

When I got there I tried to take a picture of her excitement but this is all I got…

This is what they were so excited about…

TRIPLE bunk beds for the girl cousins!  They were SOOOO excited!

What a fun surprise!  And they were thrilled that they got to sleep in the same room as cousin S for the first time.

They had a hard time settling down for bed, and then instead of sleeping in they got up EXTRA early the next day.  Thankfully they were having so much fun with their cousins that they didn’t have time to be grumpy.

We spent a fun, relaxing day visiting, crafting, cooking, and baking.  Boo Bear, who loves to cook, wanted to help us with everything.  Here she is helping Daddy make an apple pie.  Grandma told us that this was the apron Daddy used to wear to help cook when he was a little boy!

The kiddos went from Legos, to dress up, to Polly Pockets (the originals that were Auntie Nae’s when she was little).

They just had a blast!

They were also good at making messes!  I just had to get a picture of the “girl’s dorm” and this was only after 24 hours! :)

And the living room…it was a landmine of Legos, Pollys, and micro machines.  You had to be really careful where you walked!

Usually we eat the big Thanksgiving dinner around 1 or 2, but this year we waited till 6.  I don’t know if we were all just extra hungry or what but every dish tasted amazing!  It was so good.  Peanut agreed.  She was using both hands to shove it in as quickly as possible! 

Yum!

Wordless Wednesday

Out On The Town

On Wednesday we woke up and got out of the house pretty quick.  We were on the hunt to see some eagles.  Apparently every year they come down to a specific part of a nearby lake and there are hundreds of them.  For some reason this year they have yet to come down and the article we read said there were only 3 that had been spotted.  We decided to take a chance and lo and behold we actually found two of them!  We figured we were pretty good eagle spotters if we could find two of the three on a huge lake! :)

Noni spotted the first one.  He was huge although he hardly shows up in this picture.  He was sitting on top of a post.

Here’s a close up.  He still looks small but in real life he looked huge!

After we saw the eagles we headed to the nearby town to do some shopping.  We found a really neat toy store that the girls could have stayed in all day!  Peanut was having a ball wandering around pulling things off the shelves.

We had to stop for a photo op in the sleigh!

And of course we had to stop at this enticing store.  The girls got gumballs and lip gloss that looked like a peppermint lollipop.

Boo took a quick rest while Noni and Aunt J were looking in a neat card/novelty shop.

We did some window shopping and had to get Mama and Aunt J with this cute little moose!

Then we walked around the boardwalk even though it was pretty chilly.

It was a nice view.

Peanut had missed her morning nap so she fell asleep while Noni carried her around.

After our chilly walk we found a little Mexican restaurant where we could get warm.  All our girls love Mexican food.  So much so that I caught Peanut doing this towards the end of the meal. :)

Hee hee.

We did some more shopping and finally made it back to Noni’s by 4:30 where we only waited 45 minutes before T picked us up to head out to the farm to celebrate Thanksgiving with the family out there!  Pictures of that on Thursday!

A Visit

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving week!  We got a special visit from Auntie J all the way from Florida!!!  The girls were so excited they were skipping/hopping and singing “I’m so happy Aunt J*** is coming! I’m so happy Aunt J*** is coming!” It was really cute how excited they were!

Aunt J brought them a present that they were thrilled about…a princess tent!  I was trying to get a picture of Bug through the little window and Peanut realized the camera was out. :)

Boo Bear wanted a picture too.

We took Aunt J shopping at the downtown mall and got to see all the pretty Christmas decorations.

The girls saw Santa throwing candy to kids so Noni and Aunt J took them downstairs to get some.

Mama, Aunt J, and Noni went into a souvenir shop that was right across from a toy store so the girls and I veered off.  They didn’t make it past the first five feet which was filled with books.  They plopped down and each (even Peanut!) grabbed a book and sat there reading.

I finally told them there were a lot of cool toys and didn’t they want to look around? :)

By then it was time for lunch so we headed across the street to Red Robin where K took pictures of everyone while we waited for the food to come.  These are only the ones that are in focus enough to see. :)

We spent the night at Noni’s so we could spend extra time with Aunt J before heading down to Grandma and Grandpa’s for the holiday.  Boo Bear wanted a picture of her as a “sweeping bah-wel--weina”.

No idea what Bug is doing here. :)

Aunt J was called upon to read bedtime books.

We are so glad Auntie J came to visit!