Sleepover

Remarkably, they DID sleep!

Blow Out the Candles!

Take a biiiig breath, and blow out all those candles Wonder Daddy!

Look behind him- you see a little girl who is about to be VERY disappointed she wasn't close enough to the brownie pan. She's ready!!

(Yes, we took the wailing two-year-old into the kitchen to blow out a candle- I never noticed what she was doing behind her dad until I saw the photo!)

(You were expecting cake?? Pizza and brownies were his dream birthday dinner this year. Easy man to please :)

She Says She's Pregnant

It was a pretty quick gestation, I found her like this after her nap!

What do you get the man who only wants brownies out of this life?

Brownies.

More brownies.

Another box of brownies.

Annnnd.....for good measure, if all other ideas fail....brownies.

We got to the point that Mimi was shrieking "CAKE!!" before the lid even came off the box.

We celebrated his birthday with donuts for breakfast, and took everyone to Red Robin for dinner. WOW, yummy!

Happy birthday to the best dad, the best husband, the best friend, and the best guy I've ever known. We love you!

Pretty, Pretty Princesses

Ernie was in charge of our FHE activity this week- doesn't it look like everyone had fun?? :)

Abominable Has a Bad Morning

Mimi in 2010

Little Meemers isn'tso little any more....and she has HAIR now!

Ernie in 2010

One picture a month for 2010...look how this girl is growing!

Christmas Day and Beyond

Daddy loved the card E made for him

M and the hat Mommy made for her

Mommy remembered to pass the camera off for a minute

Ernie LOOOVED the magnifying glass she got!! She actually sleeps with it. Score one for Mommy, eh? Now maybe she'll stop trying to drag my OTT-lite to the dinner table to use the magnifying glass.

After stockings and breakfast, we all got dressed and ready for the day. We had a nice Skype with Nana and Grandpa, and they watched us open their presents. We opened the rest of our presents after the call, and drove over to my husband's grandparents to open presents with them (half the fun of Christmas is watching little kids open their presents, right??) We came home, ate lunch, and went down for NAPS.

At 3:15 my sister called to say she was putting her kids in the car- would I be at Mom and Dad's soon? Umm...no. Daddy and Ernie were still asleep. They STAYED asleep till almost 4! (Mimi and I read a huge stack of books while we waited, and ate our way through most of a bag of caramel corn. Yum.) We bustled up to Mom and Dad's to open presents from them, loaded everything in the car, and went over to my sister's to open presents from them (see where this is going??). Wonder Daddy and Grandma walked with the big girls, it was nice to see a spring in their step and blush in their little cheeks when they came in the door. After my sister's, we loaded everyone in the cars once again and came back to our house for the last round of presents, and leftovers from the night before. It was nice having the presents spread out (because there was not even CLOSE to an order or rhythm of the opening with two toddlers and lots of people). I guess the only hard part was that when the kids were at their own house, there was nothing for them to open.

We had a wonderful, BUSY, Christmas day, and I felt so blessed to have so much family around (here and online!)

The day after Christmas was church and family dinner to send my brother off in style- he left this morning for grad school in Utah. *sniff*

Today (Monday), Daddy got started on projects around the house, the kids and I went through their clothes to weed out everything too small and too summery, and E took a four hour nap. (M and I watched "Rudolph", "Frosty the Snowman," and most of "Santa Clause is Coming to Town" waiting for her!) We had to wake her up at 4:15 so we could leave for the outlet malls! Daddy scored some shirts, we found our favorite pants for E at a bargain price and snapped up every color we could find in her (new) size, and ate hamburgers for dinner. A very, VERY good Monday!

Christmas Stockings

Waiting for Daddy to see if Santa came

Brushing teeth before checking to see if Santa came

THE BONGO DRUMS!! It's all she asked Santa for :)

A real Wonka bar. She was floored :)

Christmas morning we set E's alarm for 7:30, and made her promise not to turn her light on before 6:30. Turns out, we were worried for nothing! Both girls slept past 7, and I was a happy camper.

After we congregated in our bedroom, Daddy went down the hall (through the curtain we'd hung up the night before) to check and see if Santa made it to our house, and he DID! We all held hands and walked down the hall, and then kept holding hands in a circle and sang "Jingle Bells" while walking around the coffee table- it was pretty funny to see E's head whipping around trying to spy out what was in her stocking as she kept passing it. (As I understand it, this is tradition in my husband's family? Because Christmas morning in my house normally involved my brother's getting up around 4 or 5, rifling through everyone's stockings, and then jumping on our bed around 6 to say "GUESS WHAT SANTA BROUGHT YOU!!!!" I don't remember when we actually went downstairs :)

Santa brought each girl a drum and a little recorder (junky, so sad), and some candy and oranges. (Well, M got a banana. Santa knows her well.) Daddy got a big world globe, and Mommy totally must have been a good girl this year because I got Godiva chocolate-covered caramels and both of Mark Bittman's "How to Cook Everything" cookbooks (the original, plus the vegetarian edition.) Everyone got cereal too- the kids love getting sugar cereal, and I love not needing to cook breakfast on Christmas. It's perfect!!