Stockings and Frozen

At Wises, we always open stockings.  Everyone puts an item in your stocking and then you have to guess who it's from.  We woke up and found adorable slippers outside our bedroom doors.

Sam really loves his shark slippers.  Henry had dinosaur slippers!  He thought they were hilarious.

I had my hands full, so didn't manage to snap many pics. Probably everyone is thankful for that since we were all in our jammies!

After stockings, I met my mom, sister, and Brad at Anchorman 2.  Dad would have loved it.  It was the dumbest movie I have ever seen.

After Anchorman 2, I hopped in the car and met the rest of the family for Frozen in Ames.  

Henry didn't want to wear shoes.

Christmas Day

Normally we aren't all together Christmas Day.  Dave's sister and her family usually drive down to Ames Christmas Eve, but they decided to wait and come Christmas Day this year.  That worked well for us, because it meant we could stay with my mom for breakfast.  Dani, Brad, and Linc came over in their jammies. Mom made a yummy cinnamon French toast casserole.  

Santa even came!  Henry left a note for him the night before.

Santa left some sleds and a bowling game along with the following note:

Breakfast was great.  

Dani pointed out the similarities between a pic of Lincoln the night before and one of her when she was little.   How cute is that?!

Dave had to go start cooking his dish for Christmas dinner, but the boys and I were able to relax and spend the afternoon with Mom.  It was nice to sit around and chat.  After loading up the car and the kids, we went to Ames to have family Christmas with the Wises.

We had a huge Christmas meal.  Henry decided nothing sounded that great to him for dinner, so Mammey made him pancakes.  Lucky boy.

The boys got to sit with Mammey and Pa at their own special table.

After dinner, we did gifts for the kids and then our adult gift exchange.  Dave ended up with this gem.

After our extended family left, we opened presents.  As you can see, we had a fun-filled day.  Henry was quite frank in telling us exactly how he felt about his gifts!  At one point he informed us all that he didn't like puzzles.  Then the next gift he opened he exclaimed, "I didn't want this either!"  It was mortifying and humorous all at the same time.  He's normally quite polite.  In fact the evening before, he randomly loudly said, "Aunt Dani, thank you for Christmas dinner."  

And off to bed we went!  I'd say it was a very Merry Christmas.

Christmas Eve

Mom didn't want to put up a tree this year.  Bah Humbug!  I brought Grandma Marilyn's tree up from my basement, drove it to Ankeny, and set it up in Mom's living room while she was at work.  The boys and I went to Target and bought ornaments and lights.  The tree included some of our favorite characters.  Mom loved the tree and cried when she saw it (I hope due to her love of the tree and that we decorated it as opposed to crying because it looked like two children and their sleep-deprived mother decorated it!)

After decorating the tree, I ran some errands and met Dave for church at 

St. Paul.  We always go to a candlelight service, but this year we went to an earlier one due to schedules.  I kept waiting for the lights to go off!  Funny what we get used to.  After the service we went back to Dani's for dinner and presents.  Thankfully my mom saved us a few bacon-wrapped water chestnuts!  They were amazing, and there were only six left when we arrived.  We had mini ham balls, taco dip, little smokies, chips, and cheesy potatoes.  Everything was delicious!

We enjoyed some festive drinks.  Peppermint schnapps, chocolate vodka, and cream over ice.  Pretty much we were all ready for bed by 7:15 ;)

Craft time with Aunt Dani.  I was impressed!!

We had a really nice evening.  I think everyone was kind of dreading 

Christmas Eve without Dad.  A change of scenery definitely helped.

We packed up and went back to sleep at Mom's new house.  Mom and I spent a while sitting by the tree, talking about how much we miss Dad and Grandma Bev.  This has been such a whirlwind of a year.  I never could have imagined all the changes we've experienced since July.   We both agreed the new house felt right. Christmas at McKinley drive without Dad would have been awful.  Thankful that things worked out for us to be somewhere fresh and new to begin this new chapter of our lives.  We're working on making this new place "home" for everyone.  So far we are off to a good start.

Bass Pro Shop - Jolly Holiday Lights

Monday the boys and I packed up and went to Ankeny to spend the day with Aunt D.  We grabbed a quick lunch and then went to see Santa at Bass Pro Shop.  Seriously, that place is awesome! I think we will be venturing back for bowling and dinner in the near future.  

Of course Sam fell asleep on the way there.

After that very brief nap, Sam wasn't too keen about having to sit on a strange man's lap.

After Santa, we wandered around to enjoy the rest of the store.

After our adventure, we went back to grandma's new house and waited for her to get off work. 

 We decided to grab some Mexican for dinner and then went to see Jolly Holiday Lights.  We all piled into the van, just like last year.   

FYI, if anyone ever asks you if your kid wants a treat from Starbucks, the answer is ALWAYS yes.  Henry had been asking for a cookie from Starbucks all day.  They were sold out, but my kids got a cake pop.  We had to go back to get another one for Linc because he was not happy about getting excluded from chocolate cake on a stick!


We got over to the exit for Jolly Holiday Lights, and we discovered the line to get in was CRAZY!  Thankfully someone was kind enough to let us into line, so we didn't have to give up on seeing the lights.  Despite some complaining from the back seat about how long the wait was (from Dani, not the kids - ha!), we got to the beginning of the lights after about 37 minutes of driving 2 mph.  Totally worth the wait.  The boys loved the lights.  Linc was especially excited about the basketball shooting snowman.

Next year we are going the first week to avoid the crowds.  It was a fun end to the day, though!