Christmas Eve at Nini and Papa's

This is the 2nd year we have spent Christmas Eve at my parents.  It has definitely made Christmas Day less stressful.  We headed over for dinner around 5:00.

Mom made lasagna and of course Red Velvet cake - one of my favorites.

Of course Brody was ready to open presents but first things first - mom read the Christmas story.  This was quite interesting because Trevor was not really interested and kept talking but mom kept trying and finished - not sure if the boys got anything out of it but we tried.

 The boys and PoPo

Now, off to open presents.  Brody's favorite gift I think was his box of costumes and the Storm Trooper gun.  He said it was just what he wanted.

Trevor on the other hand was just enjoying opening presents.  He received some clothes, a cash register, and an ol' school spiny thing.  Yeah, I'm not so sure of the actual name.  One of those things where you sit on it and spin around.

They both received a tent and sleeping bags.  Brody wants to go camping so bad, but mommy and daddy aren't so big on camping so maybe they'll be able to just use them in the playroom.

Mom was pretty excited about her new Nook Tablet.  She was really wanting something to just read books on but we thought the Tablet would work great for her and she was shocked that she would be able to check Facebook and surf the web.

Jason and I received new bikes from my parents so now we can ride with Brody.  Here's Jason with his new pillow pet - Jaxson well maybe it will be for the boys.

Camera fun

So, lately I've been trying to practice with my camera to try and get better pictures especially at Christmas - you know not using the flash so you can see the actual lights on the tree.  Well, I don't think it's going to well but I keep trying - I like to say I don't have the right lens - not sure Jason will buy that one or not.

Anyway, here's some practicing I was doing on Christmas Eve

Baking fun

One thing I love to do is bake and especially at Christmas, so I spent one whole day doing it.  I had made my list of everything I wanted to make thanks a lot to Pinterest and the rest to some old faithfuls that I make every year.

Santa hats

Trevor came into the kitchen and saw this ball of dough and thought it was "poo poo" - yeah I have the child that LOVES to say those words.

Here's the finished product from the ball above - upside down gingerbread men as reindeer.

Here's my helper while I was baking.

Then it was time for the cut out sugar cookies.  I let them pick out which ones they wanted to use since they would be decorating some of them.

My little helpers

So, I decided to just let all of my controlness let loose and just let the boys decorate some cookies.  Don't worry about all of the sprinkles on the floor or how the cookies actually looked - they had a blast as you can see below.

Straight to the tub they went

Can you tell which ones they did???

Brody wanted an S & C for Santa Claus

and a J for Jesus.

Christmas at the Zoo

The Thursday before Christmas my mom and I took the boys to the zoo for a couple of hours.  They love to go - especially Trevor and it helps that we have an annual pass.

Brody requests a picture with this turtle everytime we go to the zoo.

Nini the science teacher enjoying explaining to the boys about all of the animals.

Not my favorite exhibit AT ALL

This was the sweetest thing - baby anteater riding on its' mom's back.

My sweet boys

Playing in the play area - they love this area.

Thought the ostrich was quite interesting - we watched it take off running across its area and then doing  this.

Girls Night Out

The Tuesday before Christmas a few of us girls decided we needed a Girls Night Out.  There were 5 of us and 4 of us have 2 boys each so we have a lot to talk about and really needed this break.  We decided to go to the Melting Pot - a fondue restaurant.  We knew our husbands wouldn't want to go so we took advantage of going and having lots of fun.

We had 3 courses and enjoyed all of it.  The best part was of course dessert - fruit, marshmallows, cheesecake all dipped in chocolate - YUMMY!!

After about 2 hours at dinner we headed out to do some last minute shopping.  It was a great time and we all really enjoyed ourselves and can't wait until the next time.  Thanks to the dad's who took care of the boys while we had some girl time.

Sunday best

The Sunday before Christmas I decided to try and utilize the time the boys were in their Sunday best and get some pictures.

After church we headed out to the beach to Jason's moms for lunch.  They made a Paula Dean main course - quite pretty.

Our spread

All the boys playing on "their" phones.