Cookie Decorating/Ornament Exchange Party

Every year (okay, the last two years) one of Daniel's friend's from preschool hosts a cookie decorating and ornament exchange party (well, by her mom anyway). It is such a fun party for the kids. They have a great basement where the kids can play and then they have a great set-up for decorating cookies. Each kid gets their own aluminum pan to decorate cookies with frosting and sprinklers. All without the mess. It stays in the pan. Genius!

The kids look forward to it every year. Then we end the party with an ornament exchange. Each kid brings one ornament (either purchased or made) and gets to take home an ornament brought by another kid. They always have a lot of fun.

Patrick especially liked the balloons. It was a great time. Thanks, Melissa!

Meeting Santa

Every year my MOPS group puts together a meet-in-greet with Santa at someone's house. This way we can meet Santa without waiting in line at the mall. Plus, we get to meet him in our Christmas pajamas. The boys loved it.

Well, most of the boys. Would you believe this is the first year we have had a "crying child meeting Santa" picture? It's super cute!

Getting Ready for Christmas

Christmas is a big deal around this house. Everyone gets into the spirit and helps decorate. We have a few trees and a lot of decorations. My favorite tree is our 12 foot tree we got when we first moved into this house. It looks really cool all lit up at night. If we ever move, Joe knows we have to find a place that will fit this tree. 

Even Patrick got to help decorate this one. He really likes climbing ladders.

Another tradition we have is taking the kids to the Hallmark store and letting them each pick out their own ornament. They get really into it and spend quite a bit of time searching for the perfect ornament. 

Daniel picked out the Griswold Family Roadster (since it was a car) and it played "Holiday Road" when you pushed a button (which Patrick would love to push. It was the first thing he did every morning).

Patrick picked out the groundhog from Caddyshack. I guess he really likes animals.

The boys got to help us decorate this tree. They each wanted to put up their own ornaments. 

Here is the finished tree.

And our stockings. So cute! 

I love the Christmas season.

Thanksgiving

We lucked out this year and were able to have Thanksgiving in Colorado. Which means, all the Weldons had to drive/fly out (Thanks guys!) here. They started arriving Tuesday with the Van Wyks flying into town first. Then, the rest of the gang drove out Tuesday afternoon, had a quick stop in Nebraska that evening, and showed up in town on Wednesday.

Jeni was in town, so of course we expected awesome pies. She was able to pre-make some Wednesday, with the help of a few kids.

On Thursday, we all headed over to Tom and Shelley's for a fun day of family and dinner.

Some of the men took the kids to the park while we got the meal ready.

We even had room for a kids table. They were all pretty well behaved during the meal. Everything tasted great.

And we had quite the pie spread.

After dinner I had the kids complete a craft I found on Pinterest.

Pretty cute, huh? They enjoyed it and it kept them busy for a while.

The men did some "Black Friday" shopping on Thursday, so the women went out Friday morning. We had signed the kids up for an ornament decorating class at Arts on Fire, so we dropped off the five older ones and headed to Target. Since shopping started Thursday night, Friday was pretty slow. There were not many people out. It was pretty nice. 

Then we all met up for a lunch at Crave. 

They have some interesting burgers. 

 
 Saturday was the day of the movie. It actually started Friday night with a group going to see the new Thor movie at the Alamo theater. It's a pretty cool theater where you can order drinks and food during the movie.

Then, the next morning Sandy, Adam, Kerry, and I went to see Catching Fire (it was amazing!). Afterwards, Sandy, Adam, and I hung out at the theater and waited for the kids to show up with Shelley to take them to see Frozen (equally amazing!). 

It was a weekend filled with fun and great family time. Most of the crew took off Sunday to drive home, with the exception of the Van Wyks who were scheduled to fly back Monday evening. This meant we had time to squeeze in a trip to Adam's favorite place to eat, Casa Bonita!

The kids love eating here but it is definitely a place we save for when Uncle Adam is in town. 

Thanks to the entire Weldon crew for making the trip out here for a wonderful Thanksgiving. 

If you want to see all the photos, head over to weldons.shutterfly.com. 

Meeting Demaryius Thomas

While watching TV I saw an ad for a meet 'n greet with Demaryius Thomas, wide receiver for the Denver Broncos, at a local furniture store near our house. Since he is Josh's favorite player, Dad and I figured out a way to make this happen for him (even with family in town).

After playing musical cars, Dad headed over to the furniture store to stand in line while I took Josh to an appointment. Dad had to wait in line for over an hour before we showed up (what a guy!). Then Josh and I waited in line with him for about another 45 minutes. 

Then it was our turn. We were worried Josh was going to be nervous and/or embarrassed when he got up to the table, but he was very excited. 

He got a high five....

a signed 8x10 photo (notice the jersey)...

and a photo.

Dad even got a signed photo. 

Pretty cool!

Daniel's 5th Birthday

The day was all about Daniel and what he wanted to do.

It started off with breakfast in bed. He requested a breakfast pancake sandwich. He even stayed in his room all morning until we brought him breakfast. He was so excited. 

Then he wanted to go to church.

We had spent the last few days making his cake. He really did most of the mixing and helped with some of the decorations. (Finished product at the end)

Then we headed over to Home Depot for his birthday party. (Yes, Home Depot). It was great! They had all the kids pick out a project they wanted to build and the kids put it together and colored it. 

The maximum kids you can have in the room is 25, so we invited 25. All but one RSVP'd yes. Yikes! I'm glad it wasn't at my house. No clean up!

This is his police truck cake. 

Happy 5th Birthday, Daniel!

Mother/Son Night

Every year at the boys' school, they host a Mother/Son night out. This year it was held at the school with different activities set up.

We made slime.

You had to do the slime dance to mix it up.

Josh didn't believe that. 

We shocked each other with static electricity.

Josh has pretty good hair for this.

They provided pizza for dinner and we got shaved ice for dessert.

Then they worked it all off with a little tennis.

It was a fun night with the big boys.