Holidays – Page 18

Christmas Morning

January 11, 2022

The kids were up bright and early – but they had to wait until the first number was a 6 before coming into our room! They were there exactly at 6:00! Excitement was high!!

xmas morning

Santa delivered on just about everything – with a few surprises too!

xmas morning

It was so fun to watch while they checked everything out!

xmas morning

When Samantha noticed the Ms. Pac-Man Machine!

paceman

clapper

I think this was Maxwell’s favorite present despite his face here – his new Greenlight card!

greenlight

Samantha’s new dress up shoes!

dress up

Authentic 1980s Totally Hair Barbie!

barbie

Everyone had fun with Ms. Pac-Man!

paceman

We then opened the presents from each other. Maxwell was very proud of the gigantic present he wrapped for Dad…

present

which turned out to be a tiny chapstick! ha!

present

Robert and I provide our middle-ageness by getting each other Theragun products! Our aching bodies need help!!

xmas morn

Samantha wasn’t excited at all about her present from us…

lol

and that’s when she thought it was just LOL pajamas! Then she saw that she got tickets to see LOL Live on Stage!! Woohoo!

lol

The boys then opened one of our presents and they got tickets too! Tickets to see the Falcons play the next day in Atlanta!! Rise up!

falcons

They then watched a special video from Boban Marjanović, a player for the Dallas Mavericks telling them they’ve got tickets to see the Cavs play the Magic in Dallas in January!! Headed to the Big D!

dallas

It was a fantastic Christmas morning with lots of smiling, happy faces…like this one!

makeup

That’s Samantha with some of her new makeup out of her caboodle!!

Merry merry indeed!

Christmas Eve

January 10, 2022

We had a really great Christmas Eve with some pretty perfect weather! After much back and forth, I did convince Samantha to wear this precious dress and it made me so happy.

xmas eve

We stuck with the noon church service again this year and, given the rise in covid cases, we were glad to be the only ones sitting up in the balcony.

church

After church we had lunch up at the club and decided to sit outside to avoid covid. It was a beautiful day for it! We then got lots and lots of photos – many of which make me laugh pretty hard!!

xmas eve

Samantha was on fire with the silliness!

xmas eve

sky

xmas eve

I was being silly here but I love it. Just a picture of me doing the most! It wasn’t easy this Christmas season but I feel like I made some Christmas magic happen for the kids and I’m proud of it. So, cheers to me! Maxwell’s expression sums up everyone else’s feelings. ha!

We did manage to get some “normal” photos which aren’t nearly as fun!

xmas eve

I sure do love this crew and am so grateful we got to have a wonderful Christmas Eve together!

Van Gogh

January 6, 2022

The week before Christmas we went to see the Beyond Van Gogh exhibit in Birmingham and I thought it was really cool! The kids didn’t think it was quite as neat as I did, but I still think they enjoyed it and got something out of it. We went with some friends which makes everything more fun!

van gogh

Culture!

Cookie Party

December 30, 2021

We had planned to have our annual cookie decorating party on December 23rd and Samantha was SO excited. She’d been talking about it for weeks. She was the best helper making the cookies the day before!

I tried out a new recipe this year that doesn’t require you to chill the dough and it turned out perfect! I did leave out the almond extract.

Unfortunately, Covid came in and messed up our party plans. Boo! One of her friends tested positive and so the right thing to do was to cancel the party. No need to risk it! Samantha was super disappointed but we made the best of it and decorated cookies with brothers instead!