I love bringing the kids to Missouri around Christmas. I have SO many fond memories of going to Grandma's houses on Christmas. Filling the living rooms, all the kids on the floor and adults standing around while we all open our presents. Then playing for hours with my family. I LOVED being the one of the oldest cousins and getting to hold all the babies when they were born and take the little kids downstairs/upstairs to play. And now that I have babies of my own, I love that the babies I used to hold get to hold my babies, even if it is only a couple times a year! I wish that Nick could join us, but usually it works out better if he can't, because when he comes we are under a time crunch with him and work. I should have pushed for him to be a teacher when we met in college, then we would have the same breaks! But..... Nick a teacher..... yeah right! Oh well, the kids look forward to our trips to Missouri, and I am surprised, but they remember and talk about things that happen there years afterward!
We enjoyed opening presents at Grandma Meyers and really enjoyed the weather. There was snow on the ground, but it warmed up one of the days we were there, so we got to make a SNOWMAN! The kids had a blast!
Another highlight was BOWLING! Grandma Meyer had to go to her bowling xmas party the afternoon we were there, so she invited us to come along to bowl. The kids had a blast! They have played the Bowling game on Wii, but hadn't been to a real bowling alley since they were 2. THey had such a great time! Watching their celebrations after they would get a strike or spare was so funny!
After the bowling alley, we stopped to see Greg at the John Deere implement. You would have thought we were in heaven for the boys. Greg took them in the back and let them climb on all the equipment. While Cole really liked it, Cane was amazed. This kid LOVES tractors. Everyone he see he compares to Chad's tractors. He studies his tractor books and can identify a seed hopper, sprayer, skid steer, plow, hay bailer, etc. For the rest of the trip he kept asking to go to Greg's house because Greg told him to come over next time to ride the tractors.
Of course the calendars went over well. I spend A LOT of time on them, so it is fun to see people's reaction when looking at them. It make all the time and effort worth it. My kids love to look at them, I think it helps them remember all their family in Missouri.
Another high light of our trip to Missouri were the basketball games. Unfortunately I have no pictures. However, the night was full of excitement. Cole and Claire had a lot of fun sitting with family in the stands. We got to see Stephanie, Allison, and Tyler play, which was exciting for me since I had never seen my cousins play basketball. The girls game had its ups and downs but it ended sky high! Allison, my cousin, hit the game winning shot at the buzzer! I was so excited for her. It is exciting when family comes to watch and you do something extraordinary rather than something embarrassing, at least that is always how I felt when family came to watch me play when I was younger. Tyler did a wonderful job also and they won their game by quite a bit. The kids enjoy going to games, but they had much more fun being silly with their cousins and chasing them around on the floor after the game!
Next....
Since we always traveled to Missouri around the holidays, we never really had set traditions that we did every year on the exact same day at the exact same time. Nick's family is much more set in their traditions. His family does Christmas day, this year we tried something new. His family came to our house for Christmas Eve dinner. It was wonderful! It was nice to be able to spend more time with family.
Bethany (Tim's long-time girlfriend) wasn't sure if she would see us Christmas morning at Grandma McCumbers, so she brought the kids gifts to our house that night.
Christmas Eve during the day we let the kids open their presents from Nick and I instead of waiting until Christmas morning. We try to get to Nick's parents by 10, so I hate that the kids only have a few hours to play with their toys before rushing off to another xmas! So we all gather around the tree Christmas Eve afternoon and open and play with our new toys!
Cane's favorite toy was the little four wheeler you see here, not the big race car (he liked it too, but carried that four wheeler everywhere), unfortunately it was Cole's toy!
Claire really enjoyed her make-up and love making me look beautiful!
Cole got his remote controlled helicopter, and has gotten quite good at flying it around the house!
But one of the big highlights were rollerskates for Claire. Jerry and Pat gave the kids they blue ones awhile ago and they fought over them non stop! Now, they each have their own, and I have been invited to attend MANY skating "shows" in the basement every since. Works out nice down there, they have there own little skating track and they are pretty good!
And here it is....Christmas Day.....the busiest day of the year!
Santa of course came with lots a great toys!
Then on to Grandma/Grandpa McCumber's!
The theme at Grandma McCumbers seemed to be creativity and arts and crafts! The kids LOVE any type of arts and crafts, and they got tons here!
Cane enjoyed his bowling set he got, especially after bowling in Missouri!
On to the 3rd Christmas of the Day...... Grandma/Grandpa McQuinn's!
Graham is obviously very excited for presents!
This was the highlight at grandma McQuinns! An Easy Bake oven. Claire wanted one sooooo bad and you could see as we went through the gifts at each of the Christmas the slight disappointment when she realized she wasn't getting one at each of the different places. When she finally got one at her last Christmas, she couldn't wait to try it!
Nick was loving his baby time. For those of you who don't know, Nick is a baby man. He would have 3 more babies if we had the money. He LOVES the baby stage!
Cane loving his John Deere hat from Chad. Cane asked to go home with Chad about 10 times while we were there and I really think he would have if we would have let him. And I think Chad would have enjoyed it just as much.
This year Marcie, mom, Graham, and I had a wonderful weekend shopping trip the weekend before Christmas. We found great sales, shopped ALL day long, and snuggled Graham who LOVED his first Christmas shopping trip! We all love this weekend, a perfect girl day!
Nick got a GPS from my parents, because we all know how awful he is with directions, especially in a big city!
While there wasn't too much excitement about this at the time, this spring there will be lots of excitement when the kids set up their basketball hoop!
At 12:00 on Christmas night, I realized I had no pictures of Nick and I at all during the Christmas celebrations, this is it, unfortunately, we both look exactly how we feel, like it is 12:00!
Wow, that is a lot of partying! Unfortunately, the next three days I was terribly sick, but at least I made it through Christmas!
Of course the trip wouldn't be complete if they didn't get to at least sit on some tractors!
Chad only made this mistake once, he didn't lay down on the floor again after this. Cane was all over him, in this picture Chad is a snowmobile that he is riding.
Cane has a hard time with me giving so much attention to another baby. He is not a fan of me holding Graham. Almost every time I would get Graham this weekend, he would come over and want me to hold him. Good thing he is the last baby at my house!
Nick and I are the Godparents, but Nick has been crazy busy at work these past three weeks. He is a supervisor for a painting company. A new company took over after Christmas and they decided to bring in new equipment. Sounds good, but it is not working properly which means they are very far behind. The company paints parts for John Deere tractors, and when the parts don't get painted, the production line at John Deere is affected, so they have been working long hours. In fact, he hasn't had a single day off since Christmas. He spent New Years Eve and New Years Day at work. Needless to say, he was unable to make it this weekend, so my dad filled in for him. The baptism went well, Graham was a perfect little angel and he only let out a little cry when he was awoken with water being pored on his head. I was much more concerned with how my children would act, and since both Grandpa and Mom were up in front, Cane had to be with us!
See how excited Graham was! Or Simba (from the Lion King) as we now call him.
This is Chad's baptism outfit, Chad's mom thought it would be way too big, so Marcie got him his own for the Baptism. Sally brought it over to the dinner at Marcie's after the Baptism and they tried it on, it actually fit pretty well. You can't see the best part of the outfit, it has a little bow tie!
