Christmas Time

Merry Christmas Eve!!  We were so glad to have Kevin and Deborah with us for Christmas this year.  They jumped right in to all the Christmas festivities we had planned, and made our Christmas celebration at home more memorable.  

Grammy Deb keeps up the tradition of new pjs to wear for Christmas morning!  The girls' pajamas had a matching set for their doll.

Merry Christmas morning!!  The kids get to open their stockings first thing!  One of our fun traditions is to give them a "coupon book" in their stocking, which includes coupons for staying up late, skipping one chore, adding one item to the grocery list, etc.  

Christmas morning breakfast of cinnamon rolls and plenty of coffee.  The kids took turns reading the Christmas story from one of our kid Bibles.

This may be the result of a certain set of parents asking me to wrap a certain set of gifts!

His smile says it all: pure joy to receive a toaster oven this year! =)

She is a pretty amazing sister!

Rooke gave the girls their own lego building boards.  A thought gift, to be sure, with hints of exasperation from them always asking to borrow his!

The girls sporting their new scarves and hats!

You know it's Christmas time in our house when I can't stop working the puzzle!

With Grammy Deb and G-Daddy in town, we took a trip to the zoo.  We enjoyed a delicious lunch at Duke's Counter, then ended up with an afternoon of very active animals - including the pandas!

Gretchen Turns Nine!

Look at this happy, beautiful birthday girl with bedhead and a smile!  We love our Gretchen Ruth!  We celebrated her ninth birthday with a fun at-home friend party, as well as a special family outing on her real day.

The kids are old enough to take initiative in purchasing gifts for their siblings.  Rooke and Bridgette wanted to get Gretchen a "flippy shirt," which she loves and wears all the time!

We had some very special birthday guests!  More on Grammy Deb and G-Daddy's visit later . . . they were good sports to play Gretchen's new game called Mustache Smash!

We all went to see the new Mary Poppins Returns movie!

And Grethen chose to have MOD Pizza for her birthday dinner.  The staff sang to her and delivered some special dessert pizzas!

Gretchen's dear friend and neighbor came over early to help set up for the birthday party.  The girls decorated gingerbread houses, played games, ate pizza and cake, and laughed SO LOUD all night long!

So many sweet friendships around this table:

We also shared in the celebrating with Steve and Vallerie, who gifted Gretchen a couple cookbooks that she has already put to good use in our kitchen!

December Beginnings

I'll be sad the year that we unpack the nativity set and no one wants to play with it

I introduced the kids to The Sound of Music - to say it was a hit would be an understatement!

Christmas reading - this year, I wrapped a book for each day in December.  Some were our books, but most were from the library!  We had fun opening and reading a new book each day.

The kids' collective favorite Christmas Countdown activity this year: seeing the Grinch in the theater!

While I accompanied a children's Christmas program rehearsal, the kids worked on math  

One of my favorite Christmas Countdown activities we've done for several years now: 

The making of our most favorite Christmas treat: Peppermint Pretzels!

"All I want for Christmas are my two front teeth!!"

Our neighbor gave the kids this gingerbread train kit that was fun to finish as a family

What do you when your washing machine breaks down on Friday morning (Friday is laundry day in our house, so there was a week's worth of dirty clothes piled up!)?  Wake up early on Saturday morning, grab doughnuts, and beat the crowds to the laundromat 

The morning was a fun memory, except for the part when Bridgette slammed her finger in the sliding door of the van.  Hard.  She's super tough, but this one was really bad.  Thankfully, a bag of frozen peas not only helped the swelling and pain, but provided her with one of her favorite snacks (for real!)

A friend and I led put together a children's choir for our church's Christmas carols service.  What do you do when 50 children need to rehearse, but your church meets in a school gym and you don't have your own space?  Have choir practice in the Payne's living room!

 

Field trip to the Natural History Museum as we've been learning about different types of rocks . . .

. . .  and Ryan got to go with us! 

After checking out the rocks, we headed to the Botanical Gardens for the Christmas train display.  

The trains were fun to see, but I think the best part of the visit was our in-depth hands-on lesson about tree cones! 

Thank you, Stranger, for offering to take this photo for us.  It's a new favorite =)

Thanksgiving!

Puzzles during the holidays.  Always.

Kaye K and Gretchen hanging out near some of the appetizer snacks

Bridgette showed Gramma one of our family photo books

Duets with my mom!  

The table is set mostly thanks to Gretchen and Bridgette

Thankful for family

Brothers!  Let's eat!

Our 2018 Thanksgiving Tree

Day-after-Thanksgiving sight-seeing

Now let's get ready for Christmas!  My mom is the queen of lights.