Christmas Break 2014 Recap - The Lazy Edition

I still can't figure out why 2 weeks goes by so quickly!!  Christmas break ended up being a nice balance of spending time with friends and family, enjoying all of our new stuff, and being completely and totally lazy.  I definitely spent more time in PJs or sweatpants than I did in real clothes over the course of the 2 week break, and I consider that to be the sign of a good vacation.

The day after Christmas (Friday), the boys spent a huge chunk of time in the morning enjoying their new toys, and I spent a huge chunk of time in this position:

Oh yes.  Those are new slippers. New PJs. New blanket that is like a little slice of heaven covering your body.  Those are my kids in the distant background, playing and not fighting.  That's coffee in my hand.  Basically, this is a picture of pure, mama bliss, my friends.  Soak.it.up.

 

The boys loved checking out all of their new toys, and it was even warm enough to test out roller blades and roller skates in the driveway that afternoon! In pajamas...obviously.

On Monday, Nana and PopPop headed home and the kids were stuck with just me once again :) I went from knowing nothing about Beyblades (one of the most coveted items on Jake's Santa wish list) to being an expert by the end of the day.  #boymama

We enjoyed some new Wii games, including Ninja Turtles (which I don't really understand how to play, but Jake loves it) and Toy Story Mania (which the whole family loves):

Jake taught me how to play chess....maybe "tried" to teach me is a better way of putting it.

 

we played a lot of Go Fish:

We read some books....

Watched some movies:

Popcorn and a movie at 10am?  Sure, why not?  it's Christmas break!

The kids spent a lot of time breaking in their new markers and colored pencils:

Gracie did a whole lot of this:

And of course, there was lots of time for snuggles:

My new mug from Anthropologie!!  Thanks, mom!

Liam often asks to "hold hands in the house" <3 comment-3--="">

One night, the kids begged and begged to have a sleepover in Liam's room.  We figured it's break, why not let them try?  They LOVED it.  And actually did it a few more times over break :)

Jake the bed hog

That's it for part 1...you can probably see why I titled this recap the lazy edition.  I promise, we really did leave the house over break.  Not much, but we did.  Until next time, Happy New Year!

Christmas 2014

ahhh, Christmas...my favorite time of the whole year and the time that flies by like nothing else.  We had a wonderful Christmas this year....I have to say, it might have been one of my favorites with the boys so far because I feel like it's the first year that both of them really got it.  I mean, Jake caught on years ago, but Liam was still a little confused by the whole thing last year...this year?  That kid was a pro!  He was so excited the entire month of December, so Christmas morning with both of them was a blast!! 

As always, I was the biggest child and was awake about 15 minutes before either kid woke up.  Liam woke up shortly before 6 (which is kind of sleeping in for him) and Jake was up right after. 

 Once I made my way down the stairs and got my coffee (of course) and the camera in place, we unleashed the beasts. 

SANTA CAME!!!

 I don't think I mentioned it on here, but Santa spent an excessive amount of time early in December trying to track down some Paw Patrol items.  Liam is obsessed with Paw Patrol right now, and you may remember from an earlier post that Liam had 3 things on his list this year: Paw Patrol toys, something steelers, and a little sister he could name Elsa.  Well, I really needed to deliver on items 1 & 2 because #3 was not happening!! 

Who knew little dog figures would prove to be so hard to find?  I had half of my family and some friends searching for me...thankfully, my mom was able to snag some and my MIL found the other one I needed.  PHEW.  It was the first year that I've really been that parent, scrambling to find the hot toy!  But....it was all worth it in the end, because look at this reaction....priceless.

Santa also brought a game table for the boys...it has football, air hockey, basketball, ping pong and archery...it's been a hit!

They both got a lot of great gifts...thank you so much to everyone for your generosity!!

Just when you thought Christmas sweaters couldn't get any uglier, these two took it to a new level with a gift from my mom and dad:

And Gracie got a new (not so ugly) Christmas sweater:

Somewhere in the middle of the present opening extravaganza, a slight Christmas crisis took place.  It's no secret that I hate cooking....but I like to think I've mastered the art of cooking a turkey.  I mean, it's a turkey....right? 

I decided to put the bird in the pan face down for the first hour, to try and make it juicier (it really does work, just for reference!) so after the hour, the timer is beeping, but there are also a bunch of people talking, music playing, and toys making noise....so I'm sitting there asking what the beeping is.  Someone points out that it's my timer, so I run into the kitchen and turn off the timer.  Or, at least I think that's all I turn off.  I flip the bird, stuff him back in, reset the timer and walk away.

Fast forward to an hour later, I open the oven to do some basting.  hmm....nothing to baste, oh well...shut the oven door.  Fast forward to an HOUR after that (so 2 hours total) and my mom goes to check on him and notices that the oven isn't hot.  Say what??  After a few minutes of confusion, we piece together that I must have turned off both the timer AND the oven when I went to flip him over.  Ooops.  So, um, yeah...the turkey was now 2 hours behind on cooking.  I didn't want to crank up the heat for fear of this happening:

Fortunately, no one seemed to be too angry (at least not that they shared verbally, aside from the mandatory teasing about it the rest of the night)....thank goodness for appetizers!!

Having to wait for dinner gave the boys a chance to force everyone to play with their new toys:

And it gave us time to take some goofy selfies:

Then, it was finally time to EAT!

The food was delicious, even though it was 2 hours later than promised :)  And more importantly, we had so many of our family there with us to celebrate (although we really missed Amy and Ben!!)  After Liam said the blessing before we ate, I almost teared up looking around the table and seeing everyone together.  I feel very lucky that both sides of our family are there to join us on Christmas Day.

I hope you had a very Merry Christmas, too!!

I'm here!!

Wow, I feel like I have to much I want to talk about on here, but I don't even know where to start!!  Christmas came and went, as did Christmas break (*sad face*)....too fast as always and we definitely enjoyed break, but it is always nice to get back into a routine.

I don't have time right now to do posts on all of the fun stuff we've done over the past 2 weeks, but I do hope that everyone had a very happy holiday season and that your new year has started off well for you.  I have some posts coming up about our break recaps, my annual book review from 2014, wedding pictures, and even some stuff about a new wellness challenge I'm taking part in. Until then, stay warm and make the most of the new year!!

image courtesy of wordsonimages.com