Lights, Cookies, Action!

When my Christmas break begins, I feel the need to cram as many Christmas oriented activities into my time off.  The past few years we've been able to take all of the kids to this crazy house in San Marcos that has a million lights.  We took them again this year, but we missed Santa and they were all kind of tired.

 

Kate and Owen already were dressed in their jammies and ready for bed.  Bailey was in her warm up suit and ready for a jog :)

Kate and Bailey always ready for a pose.

Bailey got used to having her cousins down almost every weekend since Thanksgiving.  We watched Kate and Owen a couple of weekends while Kyle and Sam went to scope out some other practices.  This morning she even asked me if Kate and Owen were at Grammy's house.  So when all the kids are together, what a better activity than to make some cookies.  My mom was brave enough to have them make cookies that can actually get messy...and messy they did get.

Here's the three of them--Owen, Kate, and Bailey--clean, cute, and looking innocent enough.

It wasn't until later in the day when their true colors came out.  All three of them were pretty messy, but I think Bailey enjoyed it the most.

On Christmas Eve, I got the kids these gingerbread kits to decorate.  This style of cookie making seemed a little more manageable for me.  Here are the three little bakers ready to decorate their gigantic cookies.

Owen got started right away and spared no time.  He knew when they were done, they could eat their handiwork.

Cute Kate was very meticulous and took the longest in her decorating.  You'll see at the end that her cookie was the most decorated one.

Here's my sweet, sugar obessesed Bailey.  She started out needing some help, but then jumped right in.  She also quickly learned that her decorations were deliciously edible.

Look at her extreme concentration, but how quickly it changes...

 

You really have to look closely at this picture to see the hilarious placement of her M&Ms.  This was with no help.  At this point Bailey was putting one on her cookie and asking to eat the next one.  After several of them, she just turned to me and asked if she could eat them all!  Her sole purpose in life is to seek out and consume sugar.

Kate and Sam are such the twins :)

  

Look at how detailed Kate's turned out.



We made them wait a while to actually eat their beautiful cookies.  I told them they could each eat one part of their cookie and they are all very smart; they chose the largest part--the head.  They had a cookie picnic by the Christmas tree.  Here they are posing with their gingerbread man cookie heads.

Kate and Owen both had a few bites and realized they weren't too delicious.

Bailey on the other hand, ate almost her entire thing.

I think it was a very succesful and not very messy, activity for the three of them.  I bought the kits at Trader Joes for .99 cents!  It filled almost the entire afternoon on Christmas Eve, so it was a hit!

A Coronado Christmas

Brian's family tradition is to go down to Coronado and visit the Hotel Del. They always have a beautiful Christmas tree on display and we can usually eat a yummy picnic on the beach in December. I just think it's fun to be able to eat lunch on the beach in December! All of the rain threw a wrench into our picnic plans this year, but we carried on with the Christmas tree pics and some warm hot chocolate.

Here's Roxann with Bailey and Emma--picture perfect!

The whole crew

This is about as good as the family pictures got that day, which is why I didn't send out any Christmas cards this year.  I just couldn't quite pick one where my face didn't look huge and pregnant.

Adam & Teryn

We tried a beach shot, but Bailey was definitely done with pictures by that point.

One big snuggly family on the cold beach.  My favorite shot of the day was the one right before this where the guy taking the picture cut Dan completely out.  I'm not quite sure why he did that, but he did manage to take one with everyone.

After the Hotel Del, we headed back up to home base to open our Christmas gift exchange gifts.  This was the one day that everyone could be together, so we celebrated Christmas a week early.  One person who did not mind that decision was Bailey.  She really understood opening presents this year.

She did make the best face I've ever seen for opening a package of socks.  This look of surprise and amazement is sincere; we did not practice how to look happy at home to open up socks :)

This is my favorite pic of the night.  She was truly this excited to open up every present.  This is a face of pure Christmas joy!

Here's cousin Emma posing with her baby doll.

One of Bailey's favorite things is to have tea parties, so she was in love with this tea party set from Aunt Nancy.



Miller Family Christmas Kickoff Party

The first weekend of December, we had our second annual Miller Family Christmas Kickoff Party.  Last year we had a gift exchange before Christmas, since we couldn't all be together on Christmas.  It was such a hit, that we decided to do it again this year.  Keri and CJ won't be with us on Christmas day, but they were able to come down at the beginning of December. 

We crammed a lot into the few days were here to maximize the amount of fun had by all.  On Saturday we had Toni's bridal shower.  It was tons of fun and Toni got a lot of great gifts. 

Here's all the girls in the family, plus Owen, at Toni's brial shower.

Sunday was the day of our family party.  Brian cooked us all a fabulous feast including--crab dip, lamb, scallops, shrimp, some fancy salad, and yummy vegetables.  After dinner we had the gift exchange.  For the gift exchange, everyone brings a $30 gift that can be for a boy or a girl--a serious gift.  My family is slightly competitive, so the pressure is on to get a good gift to impress all with such a tiny budget.  It's really fun to see how much bang for your buck you can get for the exchange.  I think that everyone was super happy with what they chose, but the most awesome gift of the night was the Shake Weight.  We all had to try it out to prove our strenth.  Two years in a row now, the original gift that I select--warm, cozy blanket and something else--was stolen from me by my sisters!  All I have to say is that next year, I better get to keep the warm and cozy blanket!!

After all the presents were opened, we played some fun Minute to Win It games.  Here are some pictures of just a couple of the games we played.  Our family is a little competitive and intense, so game time brings out the best in all of us--really it does.

Here is the beautiful dinner table.

Thanks to Chef Boy R. B (rian) for cooking such a delicious feast.

Ty, Brittany, Keri, and CJ all displaying their extreme devotion to DC.

The kids waiting to open their presents and with their crazy Christmas glasses.

Party goers just taking a break in between the presents.

CJ and Keri AKA the blanket thief.

Toni--the master game planner who thought of our fun Christmas Minute to Win It games to end the night.  She was so organized and even bought yummy prizes for the winners.

I love this action shot of Bailey in mid jump trying to get her red Rudolph nose to attach to hers.

These are some lovely action shots of the cookie face game.  We had to get the gingerbread man into our mouth from our forehead, without using our hands.  It made for some beautiful pictures !

I'm not quite sure what to call this game, but it was really fun to watch.  You had to get one ornament ball from the string on one side of the room to the string on the other side only using your super powered suction.

It was a wonderful party and I'm already planning for next year!!

Happy Birthday!

December is obviously a wonderful month because of Christmas, but in our family it's twice as nice!  The month of December is the birthday month of my Grandma Mosher and my sister Toni, and now CJ too.  Yesterday, we drove up to visit Grandma for her 85th birthday.  It was a long, rainy drive, but it was well worth it.  We drove up to Arcadia and took Grandma out for lunch for her birthday.  We went out to lunch at Mimi's Cafe and then went back to the house to hang out for a bit before the drive back.  We all love Grandma Mosher and are so thankful for what a wonderful Grandma she is! 

I have so many fun memories with Grandma and Grandpa all growing up.  It's also really fun now to see her has Great Grandma Mosher with Bailey.  Bailey was completely obsessed with Grandma Mosher the entire visit.  She wanted to sit by her, show her everything, and had to hold her hand all the time.  You could tell that Bailey wanted to really impress her because she even went poops in the potty for Grandma.  She told me she had to go, so I went to show her to the bathroom, but she said, "No Grandma Mosher needs to take me!"  The ultimate sign of love--going to the bathroom in the potty.

Happy Birthday to the best Grandma ever!!

Oh Christmas Tree!

We got a whopper this year!  I'm not quite sure what we were thinking, but we about doubled the size of tree that we normally get.  As we were unbinding it, I was certain we were going to reenact a scene from Christmas Vacation.  Despite it's grandeur size, I think we pulled it off!  The corner is totally consumed by Christmas tree, but I love it!

Here's Bailey and Papa at the tree lot.  My dad was trying to convince her to pick his tall and skinny tree, but we went with the big and fat one.

Bailey's favorite thing was running through the "forest" and hiding.

Her favorite one was the beautiful pink flocked tree at the entrance.  By this point on our adventure, she, of course, has her mouth filled with candy--very typical Bailey.

This was the almost Griswold moment that we had.  I thought for sure that the tree's branches were going to burst out of the netting and break our sliding glass door.

She's ready for the finishing touch--the star!

Tada!!  She could almost reach the top.  We only broke three ornaments in the process of decorating our tree this year--two incurred irreparable damage (one by Bailey and one by me) and the third is still waiting to be glued back together.  A very successful evening by most standards.  Every day Bailey wants to rearrange her decorations and make sure that we have some candy canes on the tree.  I know that if I put more than one candy cane on the tree, they will slowly disappear and end up in Bailey's stomach.  This child would live on candy canes if allowed.  Happy tree decorating to all!

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

I have a lot to post, but I just wanted to get this picture up.  My sister Keri, and CJ, and Ty came down last weekend for our family Christmas party.  It was tons of fun, but I must save that for when I'm not about to fall asleep.  One day me, Toni, Keri, and Bailey got to hang out and have fun.  We went out to breakfast and ate delicious food then enjoyed some Christmas shopping.  Bailey wanted to wear a tutu for the day and, more importantly, her legging warmers (her fabulous way of saying leg warmers).  She was so proud because she put them on herself.  She's getting so grown up everyday!  More pics and family fun to come once my field hockey banquet is over tomorrow.