Gingerbread Gallery Walk

School has been out two days and the kids have thankfully been entering themselves!  They love a good game of Monopoly while mom is at the gym.  After school was out (for our friends in Union Co) we were finally able to head to the Ballantyne Resort to do our annual Gingerbread Gallery walk with the Marions.

We all enjoyed seeing the gingerbread creations!

Christmas a Little Early

After school was out for winter break today, we went to the annual bus stop party at the Jensen's house.  It was so much fun to catch up with the mommies and enjoy all of the yumminess!  The boys immediately started playing outside and had a blast.

While we were at the party the kids' Christmas present was delivered early.  Savannah was a bit clueless as to what was going on, but as soon as Preston got back from playing his eyes were as big as saucers when he came to the door . . . "ARE WE GETTING A BASKETBALL GOAL FOR CHRISTMAS?"  Why, yes, you are!

Merry Christmas Savannah and Preston!  I'm sure this gift will give for many years to come as they play ball in the driveway!

Preston's Class Holiday Party

As the class mom, I had to get everything ready for Preston's party on Monday.  It was quite the craziness with waiting until the last minute to get everything and then being called into sub all day Monday too.  But, I made it work!  The kids loved dressing each other up in toilet paper (snowmen), decorating cookies, making marshmallow sculptures, and hearing a story.

The kids had a blast and the teachers seemed to appreciate their all cash gifts (instead of cute gifts that I would normally purchase for them).  It's almost time for Christmas break!!

Christmas with The Bachmanns

We celebrated Christmas with Dave's family early this year.  Saturday morning was filled with kids bouncing off the walls waiting for the cousins to arrive . . . so I finally pulled out the hershey house for the kids to put together.

By early afternoon, everyone arrived and we were ready to dig into the presents.  

 We opened lots of gifts until it was time for dinner.  Then, we went right back to finish gifts!  

It was such a fun afternoon filled with lots of fun and laughter.

We all went to church Sunday and then Grammy and Papa treated us to First Watch for lunch.  It was delicious!!

Preston's pancake was almost as big as his head!

One last picture before everyone headed home.  What a fun weekend spent together.

"Snow" Not Funny

We were all prepared for the huge winter storm that was forecasted to dump a foot of snow on Charlotte . . . and we woke up to this! :(  Sunday morning was quite disappointing for two kiddos here who were dreaming of sledding with their friends down our front yard all day.  So we decided to make the best of our cold, rainy day and just get caught up on many projects around the house.  I got my run on the treadmill in, showered, and was checking Savannah's math homework when it happened - we lost power!  I was so not prepared with nothing charged and no food out and ready.  I mean seriously, there was nothing on the ground and it was just raining!

I kept thinking it would come back on anytime, but we waited 23 hours for power to be restored!  So our day was pretty cold and the only things we accomplished were wrapping gifts and addressing Christmas cards.  Ugh!  We went to Wendy's for dinner (after trying to go to Jersey Mike's and finding that they closed early) and called it an early night.

At bedtime we had the kids climb into our bed with their blankets and we played lots of card games.  They found pretty creative ways to wear their sources of light. :)  We made the best of a terribly cold situation and were super thankful when the power came back on this morning!!! 

Christmas Celebrations Begin

We were so excited to be able to get together with our sweet family (on mom's side) tonight!  Aunt Cherry invited us all to one of her favorite Italian restaurants and treated us with dinner and awesome gifts too.

The food was wonderful, but even better was being able to spend time with cousins we rarely get to see.  We laughed a LOT and truly enjoyed catching up with each other.  After we ordered, the kids dug into their gifts, which was quite the event.

 As you can tell, Preston was quite thrilled with his new sled!  It has a steering wheel and brakes too.

Our precious family!  So, so thankful for each of them and for the chance to get together tonight.

JMR Winter Band Concert

Tonight was the 7th Grade band concert.  Savannah, in her normal fashion, didn't want me to take a good picture . .  . but I did snap these two shots as she walked in.  I have to say that the band has made HUGE progress since last year.  It was so neat to hear them all come together and play some Christmas music.