More from our sledding trip

Sadie...

Emery...

Zac...

And Riley. :)

A Very Snowy Christmas

A few days before Christmas, we made these awesome contact paper nativity scenes.  I love how they turned out and I think we will make some next year too.  They are still hanging up in our window in our front room.

On Christmas Eve, we always get to open the presents that the elves brought us on the elf chart all month.  They start on December 1st and the kids have to be very patient and wait for 24 whole days to open them. 

 Riley enjoyed the evening in her diaper and after we opened all of the gifts, we got in our pjs and drove around to see Christmas lights.  We got home and went straight to bed. The kids surprised us and slept in until almost 7!  That doesn't happen very often!

 We checked out our stockings and ate some candy and oranges.

 

 Riley loved pulling thing after thing out of her stocking.  She got fishies, teddy grahams, and oranges in her stocking.  They kept her occupied for a good while.

 They each got a new item of clothing.  Zac wore his angry bird shirt for the next 3 days until I made him put it in the dirty clothes bucket.  ha ha.

When we woke up that morning, we looked outside and there was about 6 inches of snow on the ground.  When we were done opening presents and eating breakfast, we all dressed up in our snow clothes and went out to shovel the driveway.  Turns out it was a premature shovel job since we had to go out again later to shovel the other couple of inches that it snowed after we shoveled the first time.  It was fun.  Later in the day we went sledding at a nearby hill my friend told me about.  It was perfect!  They had a big hill and smaller hills for our little kids.  It was tons of fun.

 While Rob was shoveling, he put all of the snow in a big pile so the kids could play on the hill.  It turned out to be really big!

 Sledding!

 Zac loved taking Riley down with him.  She had fun.

 This cutie was hilarious.  Whenever she went down the hill, she would scream "YIKES!!"  

 Sadie and Zac were brave and went down the big hill with Rob while Riley and I waited in the car and Emery played on the playground. She was really brave and I saw her and Zac wipe out a few times, but that didn't slow them down at all. 

 Our cute little cupcake.

 She spent most of the time in this swing.  When I tried to take her out, she would just yell at me.  ha ha

 ON the way home.  Thumbs up from the kids!  We will definitely have to do it again.

 The pile that Rob made was taller than Sadie!

 THis was actually a few days before Christmas.  The kids and Rob built a little fort for them to hid behind while Rob threw snowballs at them.  I thought it was adorable seeing them crouching behind it.

 Sadie sneaking up on Rob to get him right in the bum!

 

Back to Christmas day.  I really enjoy shoveling snow.  It is pretty fun for me.  But when my neighbor came over and helped out with his snowblower during the second shoveling session, it made me consider saving up for one.  :) Those things are efficient!

Such a cutie!

She doesn't last long out in the snow, but she sure is cute!

Sadie laid on her tummy and ate snow for a while.  Ha ha.

Emery is so cute!

And Rob needs a picture too.  ha ha!  He was the best with the kids at the sledding hill.  He would give them a big push so they would go really fast.  He is such a fun dad. 

And this picture is from a week or so before Christmas.  Sadie made this snowman all by herself!  I was really impressed!  I came home from grocery shopping and saw it.  And look how pretty she is. I can't believe how big she is getting!

We are so grateful for the opportunity to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.  It is fun to see the kids learning new things about the birth of our Savior and see their testimonies grow.  I hope we can keep the spirit of Christmas alive in our home all year long. 

Sunday before Christmas pictures

 I snapped these pictures before Church the Sunday before Christmas.  We weren't dressed very festive, but I thought they all looked so cute I had to take a picture.  And Riley's cheese face makes me laugh. 

I sure love these guys!

Elves at Gardner Village

Of course we had to hit up Gardner Village again this year to do the elf scavenger hunt.  The difference between this year and last year is that this year it was FREEZING, and last year I think the kids were running around without jackets on.  ha ha.  We took the train to Gardner Village, which is just two stops from where we got on.  There was a homeless guy on the train near us that looked like Santa.  Riley kept staring at him from her stroller so he started talking to Rob and pulled out a little teddy bear from his pocket and gave it to Riley.  Pretty fun. 

We got to Gardner Village and started finding the elves right away.  They are pretty cute and clever. 

The elf in this display was getting his beard trimmer.  I wish I had taken a picture of the sign in the back.  It told of the different beard styles he could get.  It was pretty funny.  

Of course, I had Rob take a picture in my favorite spot.  The flag wall.

This is my favorite display.  The kiss contest.  The kids are making their best kissing faces and the elves are making hershy's kisses.

There is a big bell that the kids can ring, and it is really loud.  Fortunately, the kids aren't strong enough to ring it very loud.

We stopped in at the bakery because we were cold.  So naturally, we had to buy some goodies to eat.

These elves are sewing santa hats. 

Sadie took this picture for us.  What you can't see is the Elf hiding in the arch above us holding mistletoe.  Oh well.  I still like the picture! :)

When we found all of the elves, we turned in our paper at the candy store and the kids got to pick out a piece of salt water taffy.  We watched the little machine that pulls the taffy for quite a while.  It is so fun to watch!

Since we only got to ride two stops on the train on the way there, we took a longer ride on the way back. We actually went all the way to the end of the line and then rode it back to our stop.  Riley loved it.

Zac loved it too, but was getting tired.

And I got to sit by Sadie.

I had some pretzels and handed them out to these little birdies.

Here we are waiting in the cold for the train.  Poor Rob.  We all had hats and gloves, but he had to suffer through without. 

Snow!

 We finally started getting snow!  I was so excited to get snow this year since we hardly got any snow last year!  The kids were really excited too.  Zac loves to play in the snow and will stay out there as long as I let him. 

 Riley likes the snow until she gets cold.  Like most babies I bet.  :)  She sat in this spot for about 30 minutes just eating the snow while I shoveled the driveway.  

 I thought this was a lot of snow, but we woke up on Christmas morning to a lot more than this!  I'll post about that later.  

 I love the rosy cheeks and red nose.

 I don't know what Emery was doing here, but she sure was having fun.  

 Zac and his friends built this snow mountain thing.  They stuck a bunch of icicles in it too.

 Emery and Zac adding to their snow mountain.  

Love these cuties!  I just need to get me some snow pants now so I can stay out in the snow as long as they can!  :)