Christmas pajama party

I'm linking up with a few other mommys for a Christmas Pajama Party!!

By now you know my love for holiday apparel. It doesn't stop with the festive shirts, dresses, socks and bows.  Collins has plenty of holiday pajamas as well. I think my love is wearing off on Derek because yesterday he mentioned matching pajamas for all 3 of us! He might have been joking but you don't put those ideas in my head. Hope he enjoys his Christmas Eve pajamas! 😉

Christmas pajamas are my all time fav. How could I resist the little reindeer feet pajamas or the ones with a tutu?!

Collins' First Christmas

**WARNING picture overload**

We headed to Galva on the 22nd and stayed until Christmas morning. We went to 2 birthday parties,  2 Christmas's, introduced Collins to lots of people and had a great time spending time with family.

Hazel and Collins chatting

 

 

Daddy multi-tasking

Christmas number 1 on Christmas Eve

Her gift from Santa

The spoiling began...

Derek's cousin made all the kids a pillow with their initial

We came home and Elsie had done this. Guess she was hungry

Starting our Christmas Eve tradition of pajamas and a movie

 She was exhausted by this point

 

Santa came for Collins and the dogs

Collins loot. Santa decided last minute to fill a stocking for her

Christmas morning

 Someone didn't want to wake up

 

We left Galva about 9:45am to head back to KC because we were hosting Christmas with my family that day.
 

Papa's girl

 Papa is great at getting her to sleep

 

Waiting patiently to open presents

Our first Christmas as a family of 3

Kisses from daddy

 

The day after Christmas we went bowling. Nana Jana, Amber and Tara had to work but the rest of us had a great time. The kids bowl better then I do.

 

Uncle Tony helping them bowl

Strike!!!

Little one slept and I made sure everyone cleaned their hands before touching her :)

 

Lastly, we had our 4th Christmas on Saturday with my dad's side of the family

Grandma opening her gift from us

Dad desperately needed a coffee maker. The clock on his didn't work and the only way he knew how to set it was a light turned on at midnight so he would count to five for 5am.

Showing Aiden my piano skills. The whole 1 song I know how to play



Majority of the Longs. We missed Amy and her family and my aunt, uncle and 2 cousins

 

Guess only a few of us got the be silly memo

With her great grandparents

He got scared if anyone else wore it but he loved wearing it himself

 Our family always gathers in the kitchen

 

 

There is no greater gift than this one...

Christmas Eve and Christmas Part 1

I was so mad when I realized an hour into our trip that I forgot my camera! Phone pics till have to due this year.

We headed to Galva on the 23rd after Derek got off work. We arrived in town just in time to go to dinner with his parents and then just watched a Christmas movie that was on TV and headed to bed.

The girls talked me into letting them have their presents early

Our yummy drink for Christmas Eve

We realized on Christmas Eve we hadn’t gotten our nephew Peyton a birthday present since his birthday is the 28th and we won’t make it back for his party. So we braved Wal-Mart and got him a birthday present. That afternoon we went to Derek’s grandparents where a bunch of his family got together for appetizers and presents! I mostly held Paizley and stuffed my face. My 2 favorite things! We got some shirts and gift certificates from his grandparents. So sweet of them!

snuggles with Paizley

We woke up bright and early Christmas day and waited for Derek’s sister and her family to come over. Let’s  just say grandma Lorson REALLY likes to buy for Christmas. We were all spoiled with lots of gifts. Derek and I raked in more clothes and gift cards. Just what we wanted! We were sad to have to leave after opening presents but we still had to go to Manhattan for Christmas with my side! Stay tuned for Christmas at the Long’s.

The Smith Family: Jaime, Hazel, Peyton, Halle, Bryon and Paizley

Our favorite present this year…Paizley!!

Attempted a picture with our nieces and nephews before we left but Halle was NOT happy we took her away from her new Barbie camper. I don’t blame her. It was awesome.

Enjoy these outtakes that crack me up.  Getting 4 kids to look at the camera is impossible!

Betty Crocker

Once a year I put my apron on and try to be Betty Crocker. And every year I say, NEVER AGAIN!! I don’t get how people like to bake. You make numerous trips to the grocery store just to get the ingredients. God forbid you remember every ingredient the first trip! Then you spend hours melting, mixing, baking yadda yadda yadda. Then you have to decorate the cookies because nobody likes a cookie without frosting and sprinkles. Don’t think I get all creative and do Santa’s and snowmen and all that. I attempted that the other weekend at my aunt’s and lets just say my snowman looked like clump of white frosting. Then your done decorating and your like phew, finally done! Not so much. You gotta spend another hour cleaning up your kitchen that looks like a tornado just went through it. So yes, the stuff tastes and looks good but is it really worth spending 5 hours making it all when you can just buy it? I don’t think so.

But enough of my complaining. Here are the wonderful goodies I made this year.

• Chex mix is still in the oven as I type this. Man that stuff makes your house smell good.

Recipe found here. I switch the ingredients up a bit though

• Holly Candy. Thanks mom for making a late night trip to Walgreens for me to get red hots.

Recipe found here

• Sugar cookies. Store bought dough of course. Thanks mom and Aiden for decorating them.

Recipe found here

• Puppy chow. So easy yet so messy.

Recipe found here

So Betty Crocker and Amy, move on over. Sarah is the new baking queen (only in December though).