Family Party

Each year with careful "early" planning somehow we get all my extended family in one spot at the same time!  8 different households but we always seem to pull it off!  My sister and her husband hosted us this year the weekend before Christmas and we had a great time.

 Ken, Corissa and Landon....

 Chris with Brock

 We had a beautiful day and enjoyed  some time outside as we gathered and had appetizers.  My Dad, Jen, Ken with Landon in front of him, Garrett, Bode and Ethan and Jen's friend Nick is there on the right. They always love seeing the fish pond.

 Auntie Amy with little Brock....

 Is this ever the winner of all Appetizers!  Alissa brought this bit of deliciousness.  Brie wrapped in a pastry and baked, oh my gosh, it has nuts in it and a bit of brown sugar...to die for, there was none left!

 Lots of photo's, sometimes it's so fun to turn and take a photo of the other side :-)

 My Mom and Dad...

 Chris, I and a not so happy Brock at the moment...

 Garrett...isn't he looking so grown up now!

 MaryBeth with Brock and Corissa

 Marcy, Alissa and Amy...

 Fun outside for the boys...

 Bode...

 Ethan...

 Mr. Brock in the swing...he found his thumb and thought that was pretty good!

 Great Grandpa with Cailyn...

 Landon...

 My sisters whole living room was full of pretty set tables for all.  We ate a wonderful dinner with everyone bringing great  sides to share with their ham.

 Alan and Aiden played Jenga...

 Amy had a game for the little kids while food was being put away, presents to open, White elephant and LCR for everyone to play.  Lots of laughs with the white elephants, Chris was the winner of the quarters this year in LCR, desserts to enjoy, what a fun evening.

 Everyone enjoyed our time together, a great way to begin the holiday celebrations!  Brock agrees! Little round eyes.....doesn't get any cuter does it!We've been noticing in some ornament photo's from years past how Brock looks so much like his cousin Ethan, and they in turn look just like their Uncle Jeremy, then tonight we were noticing how much little Noah looks so much like Aiden did at that age....You can tell they are all related!

Zoo lights - 1 strike, 2 strikes.....

Well we tried again to get everyone over to Zoo Lights tonight.  We tried a week or so ago, Ethan got sick, it was to cold out with icy wet weather for the baby so we postponed until tonight.   Off we go to meet for dinner at Jason's Deli, in comes the rain.....if all boys were big we'd have toughed it out but with baby in tow we nixed Zoo lights again and ended up at Chris and MB's hanging out for the evening.  Just as fun!  So here are Brock and I ....if you can see his warm little stocking hat it says Boob Man....

 So little boys and Papa had fun with Bode's race track.... he was so good to share...

 We decided to play a game....Brock feel asleep....

 This was so much fun!  Ticket To Ride!  I've heard a few have played it and now I'm thinking what fun!  I loved it!

 A christmas movie for everyone to enjoy while we tried to play the game...

 Bode liked playing with the trains!

 By the end of the game there are trains all over the map, it was a great one so if you are hunting a new game for adults this one was lots of fun!  Thanks for the fun evening Chris and MB at your house, best part of the holidays is the little moments you capture isn't it!  Since we have 360 days of sun in Az who would think we'd get rained out tonight but actually it was a blast and we will try another evening yet!

Ethan's Christmas Program

Such entertainment by little people!   The best of the season, in fact one of the best over all the years of preschool programs!  We got to be entertained one morning by Ethan and his friends!  They read books first while waiting for all the parents and grandparents to arrive.  Ethan came running to Papa to read his book...

 Here's Amy....Ms. Amy... teacher extraordinaire...our daughter!

 They sang some favorite songs and boy did they sing!  Several Christmas varieties, all of us were in stitches with how darn cute they all were!

 And the best part at the end when they gave their parents the ornament pictures they had created was them devouring their treats they saw over on the table!  Donuts, fishy's, juice boxes....just the best if you are 3 & 4! Aren't they all so cute!

 What a great holiday program!  Loved it!

ETC holiday party

Just had to show you a couple photo's from my ETC holiday party.  What a wonderful group of people to be surrounded by.  They keep me on my toes being around such a wonderful group of talented people, sometimes I look back over the last few years there and think, holy cow what am I doing there! It's amazing to be around so many wonderful people that are so creatively talented!  They always have such a nice gathering for us ( we employees and teachers) so here are just a few of the cute decorations.... the classroom always gets tranformed into such a fun holiday party room!  Table centerpieces...

 Wonderful desserts to choose from...

 Aren't these darling table wear holders....I'm sure Amy T. had her fingers on these!

 We had bread bowls and about 4 soups to choose from..... We exchanged gifts with our secret santa, played a fun little game to choose a gift card from the owner....

 Then the white elephant drawings began... Lots of laughs and good times!

5 little boys and ME

All behind here getting thru the holidays but hopefully will start a few posts to catch up!  Here are photo's from my evening with 5 of my 6 grandboys.  What a blast!  I left my Thursday club holiday get together in time to get to Chris and MB's house to greet them all and shoo the big people out the door....we will be FINE!  

They had them all fed, jammied up, Amy brought popcorn for them all, a movie was started and what a fun evening!  Everyone cuddled in and watched the movie, then Ethan got hungry so we popped the popcorn.  Got #1 down and to sleep, little Brock.  Everyone unwound, pretty soon Ethan was in my lap, out in 60 seconds, layed him on the couch off to my side,  Finally I talked Bode into going in to his bed, he was gone in about 3 minutes ( it was almost 10:00! poor parents the next day!)

Garrett was out next, finally 15 minutes before they all arrived home, Aiden feel asleep too, 3rd time thru the movie by then!  And guess who's up, Mr. Brock, course I think that's his normal time then before midnight to wake up for a bit of a snack!  So Brock and I greeted the 4, they'd have a great holiday work party and I'm sure I had more fun then all!  Aren't they all so cute!

Noah

Found a photo we took of Noah and I while I was in Mississippi this month.  He's just such a darling child!  I've been missing him! I must admit that now the minute face time connects and Noah sees me he has a grin so I"m thrilled he's recognizing me!  He's so busy doing what you do when you are 18 months, and I"m glad he and Bode weigh about the same so I was totally used to hauling that weight around!  I must admit he and I got away with all kinds of things while Mommy was at work but we sure did have some fun Grammy time!   Ken comes home this week, every day he's got a list of packing boxes for their move, raking leaves, filling nail holes, replacing tiles, all sorts of things to keep him busy and guess what I started at home already for when he comes home....another list!  We'll be back to see you Noah when it's time for your big move from Mississippi and I'm sure you and I will get in to all kinds of fun then too!

Little "B's"

Lucky me got to come play with little Brock and Bode one night...Mom and Dad got shoooooed out the door to enjoy dinner with friends.  So we had fun playing for a bit, I did get a darling photo of Mr. Brock who is starting to sit so good, he topples over but his back is so much stronger than a week ago already. And you can tell by the bib....drool master! 5 months can you believe it!

 But most my photo's looked like this.....

 or this..... a baby in one arm, chasing the 2 year old, trying to man handle the camera, you know how it goes....so we are lucky we got the first one....

 and one with most of Bode on it, whew!  everyone is asleep.shhhhhhhhhhh! I get to have time to blog a few photos!  Good practice as I"m getting all 5 of my grandsons here on one night this week while they all go to a holiday work party!  All I asked for are prefed/jammied up and a movie, we'll be great!

Gingerbread houses

So the 3 little boys and I had such fun.  We had donuts and hot chocolate then started on their creations, all kinds of creative ideas came out!  Garrett getting started on his.

 Ethan with his chocolate santa coming out of the roof of his house.....out the chimney he said!

 Aiden was in to the design of the ground on his...he had curbing and all kinds of things going since they've just redone their yard, he's definitely been watching!

 Garrett wins the prize for most details! No surprise there!

 We had time to play some games and build some tinkertoys before it was time to go.

 Great catching up with them and hearing all the details of what is going on. I heard all about what their
"elf" had been doing at their house too!  Changing out their stockings with their own socks!

 Garrett sang one of the songs he's singing in his school program for me, pretty soon we all were singing .  Sure was fun !