food, family, snow, and presents = christmas

{this is mostly just for me to remember everything, so it's kinda long!}
The story of the week here in Oregon was....SNOW!

A cute diaper-bum and new snow boots.
She wasn't too sure about the whole get-up
There was a lot of 4-wheeler riding going on! Not a very good pic, but Carter borrowed Clay's goggles for the ride.
Getting buried in the snow. Whenever he came in from outside, Carter did not want to take off his snow clothes because he knew it meant he couldn't go back out. After some bribing, usually with treats, he would eventually give in.
The overhang out my parents' kitchen window. As said previously, the snow cancelled almost everything! I've had Addie's Christmas dress for church since last year's clearance sale, and have been dying to get her into it. Wouldn't you know that church was cancelled because of the roads! She did eventually get to wear it. And although she may have looked like a dream, she acted like a cranky, spoiled little brat all day long! Hence, no picture of the dress because of the "crabby addie" day.
Addie lovin' her yogos and stroller from Santa
Carter checkin' out the goods first thing Christmas morning. I was super excited for Christmas morning this year, just waiting to see the kids reactions. Carter was so into it this year, and Addie got the picture pretty well too. Whenever she would see a santa - in real life, on billboards, cartoons, candy wrappers, anything - she would shout "sata" and make sure we all knew she saw him.

This book was also a great tradition we added this year! It is a MUST HAVE for all families with kids! The package includes this darling vintage-y elf and a story book that explains how the tradtion works. There's a space in the book to name your elf. We named ours Skippy. And Skippy provided great bribe material - he's always somewhere in the house, watching all the naughty and nice kids for Santa. We reminded Carter of this quite often, and he is a total believer in elves now! (btw, you can get the set a lot cheaper at Hallmark stores!)

My yummy stuffed mushrooms - my parents, sister, and I pretty much downed all of them, along with some other hors d'oeuvres! Yeah, I've probably gained about 5 lbs in just a week!
Possibly my favorite picture ever - Ads with great-grandma and grandpa

It was a felt christmas for me this year, meaning that I made quite a few things out of felt...fun little projects. I forgot to take a picture of some finger puppets I made for one of our nephews, but here are some "hair pretties" (as they're known at our house) for our niece. I think I'll have to repeat some for Addie now!


We had a great time with both of our families. Crazy, but great! And aren't the best/most memorable holidays always the craziest ones?!