Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Christmas 2014

We stayed in Austin for Christmas this year and celebrated in our new home.  We were sick most of the time, it was like the plague at our house (colds & pink eye) but we managed to make it memorable.  We started off the holidays by checking out Lakeway's Trail of Lights.




Here are the kids opening up their Christmas books from Aunt Natalie.  Frozen theme (of course) for Zoe and Thomas the Train for Maddox.
We had a ton of fun making sugar and chocolate chip cookies on Christmas Eve - we also made rice krispy treats but they turned out be inedible...I'm clearly not a chef.





The kids were super excited to open one present during Christmas Eve...they chose the packages that Grandpa Joseph sent :)
A cake making play doh set for Z and a drum set for Maddox.
  This was the best picture I could get of the two of them leaving cookies and milk out for Santa.  These two rarely sit still!
Our neighbor, Len, made us a homemade chocolate creme pie and it was SO good.  I love the southern hospitality!
After many questions about Santa (How will he fit through the fireplace?  Will the reindeer make a lot of noise?  Did he get my letter? Who was Santa when Santa was a boy?), the kids finally went to bed while we wrapped for the next couple of hours. Christmas morning was adorable.  Zoe couldn't believe it.  "He really did come!!"
Sleepy faces
Going through her stocking






 The kids weren't the only ones to get spoiled...Maya and Jagger also got their own presents. They lasted about 13 minutes.



Jagger trying to figure out if this was a real dog.

The hot wheels track was a hit and kept them busy for a good hour straight!
Zoe painting the new toy cars with Francis.
These two...
Mimene and Fanfan arrived on Christmas Day and we put them straight to work on decorating cookies.  Can you believe this was the first time they had ever done this?!
Then we ventured out to the greenbelt for a nice walk.


 Fanfan had bedtime duty and read the new 3D Christmas book to the kids...Maddox is officially obsessed with it.
 The next day we went to swim lessons and painted some pottery at Color Me Mine.
Maddox picked a train and pretty much mixed all his colors together
Mimene made Zoe a Hello Kitty jewelry box for Z
Francis made a car for Maddox
Zoe made the cutest spotted dog
Totally focused


I was sick the whole week  :( 
Jagger begging for food.  Not so subtle.

 Love from Mimene and Fanfan...



Despite all of us being sick the whole time it was a fun, mellow Christmas!!  Thanks to Mimene and Fanfan for coming all the way to Texas to celebrate with us!