December activities

 December was a pretty crazy month for school activities, parties and field trips.

We met some of Kylah's friends from school for ice cream one Friday.

Norah got to eat lunch with her buddy Oliver one day at the parent table with Oliver's mom (are any of us surprised that she has a lot of friends who are boys at school???) :) She does also have some sweet little girls she plays with, but she definitely plays with those boys too!

Joey's class had a bowling field trip. It was probably the easiest field trip I've ever been on!

And our picture reminded me of a similar picture we took for his Christmas class party in Kindergarten.

Norah had a field trip on the Christmas train. We sang a lot of carols and ate cookies and hot chocolate.

We went to a Christmas musical that some of our friends' kids were in. It was an awesome production.

That's some of what we've been up to this month. And Christmas isn't even here yet!!

Office Christmas parties

 We hosted both Joe's office Christmas party and my office Christmas party this year. And we did it two nights in a row... Maybe a little crazy, but it turned out great! 

We managed to host almost 50 people for Joe's party and had plenty of room. So fun!

There was even a cookie decorating contest.

The next night we hosted my work and had a great time too. 

 There was even a photo booth for both parties. As you can imagine the kids had the most fun with that!

 We are so happy to be able to have a house big enough to host things like this! 

Tree cutting and mini Christmas

While my parents were still here we went to a local tree farm to cut down a tree. We have gotten real Christmas trees the past few years, but usually we just get them already cut at a local store. 

I found a tree farm less than 15 minutes from our house, so I was so excited!

They even had a hay ride that went throughout the tree farm.

It was pretty windy and chilly.

We walked all around and came back to this beauty. Since we have tall ceilings in our house we decided to get a nice tall one! :) Turns out the tree was also very wide!

Joey had the honors of cutting the tree.

We decorated the tree the same day, and put presents under the tree to have a mini Christmas the next morning with my parents.

The kids even got new matching pajamas to put on before bed.

And posed for a picture with Papa and Gramma in front of the tree.

And the next morning it was time to open presents.

We had such a great time with my parents and loved getting to celebrate TWO holidays with them! 

Thanksgiving 2016

We were quite excited about this Thanksgiving. WE STAYED HOME! We have not had a Thanksgiving in our own home since, well since ever. We have always done holidays with either my parents out of town or Joe's parents out of town. Now don't get me wrong...we have loved all of these holidays. But there is something about staying in your own home for a holiday once in a while that is pretty awesome. 

My parents came to visit us over Thanksgiving for a nice long weekend. It was perfect. 

Of course the kids hit up Gramma for games and gum the minute she walked in.

My dad got straight to doing what he does best...playing with the kids and getting them all riled up. :) 

Preparing for Thanksgiving dinner was really fun. Joe took care of a turkey on the Egg. My dad took care of the turkey and stuffing in the oven (homemade Italian sausage stuffing...fantastic!). And I did sides and rolls and desserts. It was perfect. We had a lot of little helpers in the kitchen. It was so fun to see my dad cooking with my kids and teaching them.

The girls had fun watching Joe prepare the turkey for the Egg.

Kylah was very into helping prepare dinner. She had a blast. 

And we all loved that this kitchen had so much room for everyone to be cooking and helping.

My mom doesn't like to cook, but she took on the very important role of washing dishes and keeping the kitchen cleaned. It was perfect. Every time I turned around all the dishes were washed and counters cleaned off. She even got the girls to help wash!

Joey was helping us as well, but for some reason I didn't get many pictures of him. I think he was also busy playing with his Nerf guns. We had to make a rule of no Nerf guns in the kitchen!

A few years ago my mom gave me my Grandma's china. I have never had a chance to use it (or store it...), so this was the perfect time to bring it out. I love how classic it is. I love knowing it was my Grandma's and she used it for special occasions like Thanksgiving too!

 The Adairs came for Thanksgiving too. And one of the perks of having your best friend living up the street from you is that a quick phone call to her has her coming down to your house with a large bin of decorating items and her decorating your table! It was perfect, and I loved it! (and she brought a ton of yummy food for dinner too!)

She pulled a "Joanna Gaines" and went out to our back yard and found all of these fun sprigs to put in the little vases. So fun!

Kylah finally got dressed for dinner and helped Papa make the gravy.

(You can see the potfiller in the background that our wonderful plumbers put in. I love it and use it all the time!)

I loved having my mom here.

Another view of the finished table. You can see the kids table in the background. It was great to be able to all be in the same room together.

In addition to my parents and the Adairs, we also had a friend from my church and her two kids join us.

The kids table full of kids. 

I wish I would have gotten a picture of the adult table with all of us around it.

And I wish I would have taken a picture of my plate full of all the delicious food we had! By that time we were so hungry and everything was just so yummy!

I have a lot to be thankful for this year.

Stay-cation

Joe's mom had been wanting our kids to be able to see the musical that her high school was performing (Seussical the Musical). We didn't think we were going to be able to make it because of church commitments and work. But all of a sudden I had a brilliant idea that the kids could still go even though Joe and I couldn't. So Saturday morning Joe met his mom halfway to Kansas City to drop the kids off. The kids were so excited to go stay with their grandparents and also have the added bonus of cousins being there too (Josh and Val and family). 

We enjoyed a nice quiet few days. Stay-cations are the best.

Coffee on the back porch wrapped in a blanket is pretty fabulous these days.

One of the nights we went on a double date with Dave and Meredith. We haven't done that in ages! We dressed up and went to an awesome restaurant.

We enjoyed walking around the downtown square which has been lighted for Christmas.

Meanwhile back in Kansas, the kids seemed to be having a great time!

They couldn't stop talking about the musical when they got home. And they got to take pictures afterwards with some of the cast!

Norah said one of her favorite parts of her trip was spending the night with her cousin Naomi. She loves it at Uncle Jake and Aunt Katie's house!

More visitors!

 Josh and Val and family came to visit this weekend. This was the first time Val had seen our house, and it was so fun to show her around. It was also so great to have a place big enough for all of our kids and their kids to play and roam (without us all being on top of each other.) 

It was Bella's birthday Friday night. I made her a cake earlier in the day and we had a few presents for her. We ate dinner at ChikFilA and then headed back home to have a little birthday celebration. 

The kids made a tunnel for the birthday girl to run through.

I think Bella was enjoying being sung to. 

We spent most of Saturday in our pajamas. The adults played a few games of Settlers while the kids spent hours and hours playing outside. Every time one of them would come in I would load them up with food to take out to all the kids. It worked like a charm!

Simeon wandered around the house while we played. Isn't he just adorable. I love that kid. 

We finally got around to showering...and putting clean sweatpants on. It was great.

Then Joe cooked a magnificent meal on the Egg. We have to treat our guests to yummy meals if they are going to come visit us!!

We are so enjoying having Josh and Val and their family close.

Halloween

The kids got to dress up for school on Halloween. Since we go to a Classical school, they had to dress up like a character from a book they had read. Joey was John from the book Chocolate Touch. Kylah was Fern from Charlotte's Web. Norah was Little Red Riding Hood (from Little Red Riding Hood.) :)

It was kind of warm that day, and Joey said his M&M's melted during recess outside and his shirt was covered in chocolate! Costume fail!

 We had a nice relaxing Halloween evening. Instead of trick-or-treating, we had dinner at the Adairs with the Dunns. 

The kids decorated pumpkins before dinner.

We had a chili feast, and then the kids watched a movie while the adults talked. And then the kids trick-or-treated around the house while the adults handed out candy we had all brought. 

It was perfect. We will definitely be doing that again!