Weldon Christmas

Our first stop was Des Moines to spend some time with the Weldons. There was a lot of hanging out with cousins.

I'm not sure who came up with this activity, but it was a hit the entire week.

Of course, when at Grandma's, you must dress up.

One afternoon we got to have lunch with Grandpa Linden and Verdelle. We had a very nice dinner and some great conversation. We are so lucky everyone is willing to make trips to see us while we are in town.

We brought out a Lego Ferrari to occupy the boys (of all generations). They had a blast putting it together. And it did occupy a lot of time.

Grandma's lap is the best!

One morning we had breakfast at the baseball field. It was a really neat restaurant that overlooked the entire field at Principal Park. And it had great food. 

And of course, there were presents!

Cousins are your first friends.

For Christmas Eve, we went to the Van Wyk's church for a kid-friendly service. When we entered the church, each kid got to pick out a character to play. They picked out an angel, sheep, donkey, and wiseman. 

It was a fun little service. 

Then we headed back to Grandma and Grandpa's for our last night in Iowa. 

We hopped in the car Christmas Day and headed to Kansas to visit with the Strutts. 

Merry Christmas, Weldons! Thanks for the hospitality. It was so nice to spend so much time with everyone.

Christmas Morning

Santa always visits our house early (we have some pull) so we can have Christmas Morning at home before we head out of town. The night before we let the boys open some movies we got for them. I think they liked them.

Then we set out the Rice Krispie Treat Train and milk for Santa and headed off to bed.

In the morning we came downstairs to see what Santa had left for us. 

We all must have been very good this year. 

We also had the kids open up the presents we got for them.

After a yummy breakfast, we left all our fun new toys and jumped in the car for Iowa.

School Holiday Parties

The day before Winter Break the school always hosts Holiday Parties for the kids and parents are invited. We get to go watch them do different activities put on by the room parents. I went to Daniel's first and watched him decorate a gingerbread cookie and write a card to someone in the hospital.

Then, I left Daniel to eat some snacks and headed over to Josh's classroom. I walked in on them having a paper plate fight. Yikes! They also did this fun activity where they drew a picture on a plate on the top of their head. It was fun to watch and kept the kids entertained.

You may have noticed there were no pictures of my mini-me at the parties. That's because he was at school and I got to join him for his own party. 

We enjoyed being read a Christmas story and then got to decorate cookies, and then eat them. It was fun getting to see Patrick in his own class. That's something I don't get to do very often.

Happy Holidays and yay winter break!

Snow Day #2/Krispie Treat Train

We woke up this morning to about 12 inches of snow and a message from the school saying it was closed. Yay Snow Day!

The boys loved playing in the snow while I watched from the warm house.

Dad was out of town so I did have to shovel the driveway myself. At least I got my workout in today.

The snow day also gave us a good opportunity to make our Annual Christmas Krispie Treat Train.

The boys love decorating it themselves.

I hope Santa likes it.

Meeting Santa

The Broncos Bunch had a family photo event this year. It included getting your picture taken on the field at Sports Authority Field and visiting Santa. We dressed everyone up in their Orange and Blue and headed downtown to the field. It was rush hour so it took us about an hour to get there and I was nervous the line would take just as long. But, once we walked in we noticed there was no line. It was amazing. We walked right up to their display on the field for our picture and then headed straight over to Santa. The boys loved it. They each got to tell Santa what they wanted for Christmas. 

Daniel definitely had the longest list
 and we had to  cut him off

Merry Christmas from The Weldons!