Christmas Day at PapaMom and Papa's.





It was a Pillow Pets Christmas!!!

Make It, Bake It, Sew It or Grow It 2010

I love this new tradition we started. This was our second year for MI,BI,SI,GI.

The Breakdown:

Uncle Bill had Nana and made her a new Bird House...more like a Bird Condo

Nana had Cheryl {again} and made her some meals and froze them.

*Meat Pie

*Stuffed Peppers

* Chili

* Corn and Barley Soup

Cheryl had Meghan and made her two different wreaths, one for the spring and one made out of pages from a landscape book.

Meghan had Jessica and made her a new scarf, some lavender lotion and danishes

Jessica had Emily and made her homemade cleaning products

*Laundry Soap

*Fabric softner sheet

* Stain remover

Emily had Tony and made a great basket full of homemade pasta, pasta sauce, ravioli, cheese, crackers, and wine.

Tony had Carolyn and made her two cutting boards from maple and walnut. (Those Cutco knoves will love them)

Carolyn had Gary and Billy had Lindsey and combined our gift this year. Billy made me a Bag O' game board complete with a shamrock on the front. Carolyn sewed green and white bean bags for Gary to play with the board. They also had shamrocks sewn of the front and a bonus smaller version for the kids.

Gary had Phil and made him a basket of BBQ items. Spice rubs for chicken, pork and steak along with his 21 Pepper sauce. He also got some homemade pickles, hot pepper rings and raspberry jelly.

Phil had Steve and made him three different kinds of fresh salsa. Mild all the way to Hot!

Lindsey had Bill {again} and made him drink holders to use outside when he plays Bag O'.

Steve had Billy and made him a gong for his yard, complete with stand.

Christmas Morning

What a great Christmas morning! The boys woke up to letters from Santa and lots of toys. The living room still looks like it blew up....wrapping paper and toys everywhere.

Sugar Cookie Houses??

I had some extra best sugar cookie dough in the fridge so the boys and I thought that we would try to make gingerbread sugar cookie houses.  They came out great!!  We get impatient waiting for the royal icing to dry and hold all the pieces together, so this year we used a little hot glue.  We never eat them anyway, right?  The boys had to wait for Gary to get home from work so we could all do it together {I think they asked every 10 minutes when Dad was coming home}.  

Owen's House

Aiden's House

Christmas Tree 2010

Christmas Countdown

It's not the Christmas season if you don't have have a Christmas Countdown Chain! The boys and I glued links together one afternoon and hung them in the bay window. Aiden is sure to rip one every morning, while Owen's may be a few days behind. Aiden quickly counts how many days he has left on his chain and corrects Owen's for him. Next year I think we'll have to do a Birthday Chain as well.

Aiden's 2010 Holiday Concert

Last night was Aiden's school concert, he was so excited to sing.  The class has been practicing since November but Aiden wouldn't tell me what songs they were singing.  All three of the Lion Rooms sang songs together then each class sang a song with their class.  Aiden's class sang Up on A Housetop complete with arm gestures. 

Merry Christmas Take Two

Aiden must have been a good boy this year because Santa left a ton of gifts under the tree for him.





After opening gifts it was time to get ready and head to Grandma & Grandpa's for breakfast. Grandpa made us all a great breakfast and then it was time for gifts again.

Uncle Matt played the fishing game with Aiden while we waited for the fun to begin...


Aunt Angie and Uncle Tim got Aiden a huge firetruck...

I wonder who is having more fun with the firetruck? Aiden sits back and watches as Uncle Tim and Uncle Matt play with his firetruck...


It was Chloe's first Christmas, I think she enjoyed herself...



They had me practicing for what's to come in a few months...


Finally who wouldn't love this face...

Merry Christmas Take One

We headed to Aunt Jessica's new house to open presents with Papa, Papamom, Aunt Jessica, Uncle Tony, David and Kyle. We tried the one present, one child at a time but finally gave up and let them just go at it.







And who knew getting Mom some pretty bowls would make her cry...


I think this is one of the first pictures of all of us....