Christmas Memories

The Christmas Eve activities included---Lots of baking for the big meal that night. I think we (when I say we I really mean mainly Deanne) made 18 pies! That is almost 1 pie for every adult. I made 4 pecan pies. Yummy. Kids decorated cookies. I took some time to blog and scrapbook. Cousins played. Movie watching. Got ready of the Christmas Pageant, had our big dinner and then did Christmas carols with the "boom whackers." Lots of fast talking and fun. It didn't take long for Hadley to figure out that she wanted to be an angel with Natalie. We decorated her costume making various things out of foil. Chad and Braden were sheppards and Austin was a wiseman.

Yummy dinner thanks to Eric. Prime rib and ham and rolls and Yorkshire pudding and baked potato. It was all delicious!!! Yum-O!

Christmas Carols using "Boom Whackers" led by Aunt Carol.

Year of the Guns

The boys were in heaven when they opened up their gifts from grandad! They each got their own BB gun specially sized for each one. They spent the next 4 hours shooting outside even though it was dark and freezing outside. They stood in the garage and shot stuff out in the driveway. I finally made them stop at about 11 pm so we could go home. The guns are to stay there at Granddad's house and be used there. That is good. I remember when I was a kid we would shoot guns with my grandad and go burn the trash. Hadley got princess dress up clothes. She loved them! And mom....well she also got a gun too. I'm not sure how excited she is about that. Dad wants her to take classes etc...we'll see how that goes.

I love this picture of Hadley and my sweet sweet Grandmother. My Grandmother has got to be the sweetest and nicest person ever. She never complains or is negative about anything. I love her so much and am glad that my kids have gotten to know her and will remember her.

The Week Before Christmas.....

So.....I think a lot of our Christmas traditions revolve around yummy food. After church we made Christmas sugar cookies. The kids really got into the rolling out of the dough and cutting them out. Then they really got into the frosting--of course.We had Christmas parties at school. These are some pictures of Hadley and Colten. Their nickname at school is "The Mr. & Mrs." They are inseparable.

Vandergriff school parties started in the morning with a big Christmas sing-a-long. Then there were classroom parties later in the afternoon. Chad is with his friend Lauren. And Braden is giving the magnum look?

Chad's Kindergarten Play

Chad made his acting debut in the Kindergarten play. He got to be the snowman and actually wore the same snowman costume Austin wore when he was in 1st grade.

After Church on Sunday we made our ginger bread house. I think this is one of our best ones yet! So Braden

Thanksgiving Week

We had a great Thanksgiving week! The kids had the whole week off from school so we had some time to do some fun things. Sunday night we went to Mom's house for dinner and the Dumini's came over. That night the boys all spent the night including Emossi and Lavani. Good times.
On Monday Mark took the boys for a real overnight hiking adventure. They all had backpacks with sleeping bags etc. and then went to somewhere on the Buffalo River. They hiked in and set up camp. Everything was great until the rain at 1am. Chad was the first to wake up to discover he was sleeping in a pool of water. They had a great waterproof tent but the problem was the ground cover that they put down acted like their own little swimming pool. Their bags were soaked and they slept the remainder of the night without their bags. That morning they got up and toughed it out. They did more hiking (in mud) and found some beautiful waterfalls.
They all had a time of their life despite the rain.

We spent Thanksgiving day at Nana and Grandad's house. We had a ton of pies and 2 turkeys. Mark fried one of the turkeys. Yum. Adrianne and her family also were there.

These are some pictures of Hadley and Nana cooking together. Hadley is a great helper.

We also had our annual post Thanksgiving meal Bingo game. Grandad calls out the numbers and then when you get Bingo you get a prize.

Friday Mark took Braden and Austin to play paintball with a bunch of other people from church. I gladly stayed home with Hadley and Chad. It was fun to hear all of the battle stories when they got back. Braden had a few pretty good bruises that he was proud to show off.