A Day Off.....

When we have a day off it's sometimes hard to embrace whatever the kids want to do.  

I mean, to take a day off from the never-ending list of things "to-do"....sigh.  

However...that list will continue to be there....it will not go away.  

The kids wanting to spend time with us and actually doing things together....

I know this time will go away.

So...Annalise got to choose.  The Children's Museum....

We played.....

We danced.....

We did some cool Q-Tip art projects.....

And we played in the sand....a lot.....(I think the added glitter made it that much more appealing!)....

And after we'd spent a couple of hours at the Children's Museum, we decided to go for a little hike to the Sehome Arboretum.  It's been YEARS since I'd been over there....the girls thought the 

tower was pretty cool!

And after our hike up Sehome...the girls voted to hit Menchies (frozen yogurt).  It was a great day.  And I think I learned a valuable lesson.  The "to-do" list will never go away.  I need to put that aside more often and spend more FUN time with my family. Lesson learned.

Happy New Year!!

Happy 2013!  We headed to the Sutherland's for their annual New Year's Eve Happy Hour.

Loved hanging with everyone....and the kids had a blast playing wii dance and 

performing for all of us.

Then we headed home and celebrated the New Year with the EAST COAST!!! Oh yeah!!!

Here's to a HAPPY and HEALTHY 2013!!!!!

Christmas Part Two

It's been a long time since we've had a family picture taken!  In fact, it was before Elsa and Annalise arrived!  So....we seized the opportunity on Christmas Eve.  Some good friends of Grandma and Grandpa came over and took a picture for us.  Too bad Annalise was not in her happy place. 
Oh well...we do the best we can do! :)  9 out of 10 is pretty good!

 We had a great spaghetti dinner and then did our annual Christmas Caroling!

Then it was time to get ready for Santa's arrival....

Avery wrote the note....

Annalise prepared the goodies....

Avery says she heard some foot/hoofprints on the roof in the middle of the night.  

And lo and behold, when we woke up in the morning...Santa had visited!!

We waited for the cousins to arrive and then we dug into the stockings!

We opened lots of presents and snacked and played all day!

We were even treated to a magic show!

It was a great celebration with family!
Merry Christmas!!!