'Twas the Night Before Christmas

A Fond Farewell

I saw this wonderful tradition posted by a friend on Facebook.  It was magical!

 A magical fee-faw!

This sweet kindergarten wanted to write a thank you note to Gingerbear afterward.  Such a good boy!

Cookies for Santa

Making and decorating cookies for a special someone's visit tonight!

Gingerbread Girls

Mimi and Sylvie made gingerbread cake people tonight- yumm!

Tacky.

It's how we (collectively) do Christmas in the VoW!  

‘Twas the night before the night before Christmas...

...when out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the couch to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

To my horror I saw such a tacky sight to behold
My yard littered with tacky ornaments of old
From the curb to my stoop was a sight of fright
What would all my neighbors think of this site!?!

Tom and Ivye chose our house with care,
They located the pile to attract the most stares,
They rang our doorbell, and said, "It's your date!"
It's December in The Village of Waxpool,
OUR YARD LOOKS JUST GREAT!!!

The night that Sylvi has been asking about for nearly a month is here!  WE finally have the tackiest decorated house in the VoW.  Funny thing is that in a preschooler's eyes, it's not tacky at all, it's WONDROUS!  The kids love it...and I admit, I kind of do too!

Sylvie asked if we could keep it up All the time.  I said it might be an HOA violation, but that we'd ask Mr. Fitz (our HOA pres, whose penguin is among this flock).  ;p   And yes- she is in this picture hugging the bear.  She made her rounds and hugged on each one...she's so funny and so excited for this!

Bring on the Tacky!

We're included in this super fun game this year in our neighborhood where tacky Christmas decorations are passed around from house to house and added to as they travel.  We are the last house; the Tighes are bringing them by today.  Finally, it's our chance to be tacky!  This is a highly anticipated event in our house.  Even Gingerbear is ready for the flock + friends' arrival.(We've been calling it the flock b/c Tracy started the whole thing with two tacky pink flamingos.)

Grateful

Brady worked on his thank you notes first thing this morning.  He truly is grateful for all his fun gifts and he did a great job writing these out- thoughtful comments and neat handwriting.  Awesome, dude!

The 2013 Winter OlympSIX!

We paired up again with Evan and added Jerel to the mix this year to triple the birthday party fun!  (Evan's birthday is Dec. 18; Brady's is Dec. 20; and Jerel's is Dec. 27.)  Interestingly, I didn't do as much planning and prep for this party as I did for the kindergarten Winter Party.  hmm....
Regardless, it was a Super Fun time!  We rented out the "big room" at Open Arms (for a steal- thanks for hooking us up Ms. Nikki!) and it was Perfect!  All the kids ever want to do is run around and play with their friends in "big room," so to tell them they had Three Hours to do so was Awesome!

Mimi and I made all the party-goers (and Brett and I) Olympic shirts the night before.  They came out cuter than I thought- with a sort of retro look.  We didn't get a great fam foto, but the tees are pretty awesome!

We had some organized games.  First the kids colored and grabbed stickers to decorate their bobsleds (cardboard boxes which sat on sleds) and decorated their gold medals.  Then we had bobsled races- Hilarious (and an awesome energy burn and fun time)!  Next we put tissue boxes on their feet and they did some speed-skating.  Then we quasi-luged using Mr. Leon's scooter boards.  SO fun!

 uh oh!  We have a speed-skater down!  Sorry Colton!

Then the competitors refueled (with the water bottles we gave them), mac n cheese, hotdogs, Olympic ring fruit- Susan had a tray of every color...so pretty and festive (and healthy)!

Despite the fact that today is the first day of winter, it's almost 70 degrees out!  Say what?!  So we also got some playground time too!  We sang to the birthday boys and had the awesome Olympic torch cupcakes that Kristin made outside.  Could not have ordered up a more perfect day and setting!!!

For these two shorties, it's all about the goodie bags.

Our Gold Medalists!