Andrew lucked out with tickets to a Tool concert last Friday night in STL so the kids and I were home alone. Not wanting to be stuck at home on a super cold day, I decided to pack the kids up and take them to the Children's Museum Saturday morning. Annnddddd I really HAD to because you mention something to Tommy once, he will NOT forget it. "We're still going to the Children's Museum, right? Right??"
It was VERY cold that day. I decided I didn't want to lug my coat around so I left it in the car and just walked really fast from the parking garage to the museum. We made it to the elevator and took a breath. Phew. So cold.
We walk into the main atrium and lo and behold-- a Star Wars display!!! Tommy was sooooo excited! So was Charlotte, actually!
ERMAGERD! DARTH MAUL!!
We went to the Ninja Turtles exhibit for the first time. We have been meaning to go since it opened in September. It was really cool!
What's better than skateboarding!?!? Totally Tubular!
HIIIII-YAHHHH!!
The Pirates and Princesses Exhibit is not going to be open for another week. Totally egregious, dude! (Oh wait, that's more Bill and Ted than Ninja Turtles, ha!)
I didn't get any pictures of us going down the Chocolate Slide but I think that was my favorite part.
You can see what Charlotte's favorite part was. HORSIES!!!!!!
In each picture....
Her smile gets consecutively BIGGER!! Boy does she love those horsies!!
We would have stayed longer and played more but Mama got a migraine out of NOWHERE and we had to go home. It was rough. I haven't had a migraine since high school! What the heck?? I had a blind spot (medical term: aura, I think?) in my central vision and I wasn't sure I was going to be able to drive home. But I went outside once again without a coat and that helped a LOT. Cold usually does. My blind spot went away (I still felt like crap) but I was able to drive home. Phew! Ugh, kinda scary.
I felt so bad for the kids because they were soooo good that day but we saw everything we wanted and they both got a little something from the gift shop before we left. It was a great day! We'll have to go back before our membership is up at the end of February. We can't miss Pirates and Princesses! :)
We finally had Charlotte's hair cut for the first time. Officially, that is. The first cut was just me snipping off her ponytail. That doesn't count. So we took her to the Haircut Corner which is actually a Barbershop where we take Tommy. Probably should have taken her to a salon and did it up all fancy-like but we opted for this instead. Her hair is going to do nothing but grow so we'll have many more chances. :)
I didn't take an official before picture so you can just watch this video of her morning hair craziness. You can also watch the trampoline park video below. It is pretty crazy in that video too.
Here is Charlotte during the haircut. She was a CHAMP!! She let her spray it, cut it and use a hair dryer on it! Impressive! Girl is ready to be pampered!
I was a little unsure of how it was going to turn out because it looked a little Julie Andrews in the Sound of Music when she first cut it. But Charlotte can pull off any look. :)
I have yet to take a decent picture of her haircut but I promise it's super cute. She's gotten lots of compliments at school too.
This is a pretty good one of the back. She has the most beautiful color(s) of hair. I call it Jennifer Aniston color. It's awesome and she didn't pay thousands like Aniston probably did! Love those natural highlights! She's a lucky gal.
Don't you love the Daddy Daughter Dancing picture? I think I have a better one.
I wish I got more of Dada in this picture but the look on her face is priceless.
After Tommy had his birthday at the trampoline park, Cooper decided to have his fifth birthday there too! Yes! We get to go back! Tommy was excited!
The crew has a blast. Tommy is in blue, Charlotte is trying to keep up in the back and Cooper is in trampoline green! ;)
Charlotte was having trouble hanging with the big boys. But she had a GREAT time!
We all jumped in the foam pit again and came out covered in foam pieces, of course.
Hey it's the birthday boy!
Time to slide! WHEEEE!!!
Then it was birthday party time!
Everyone had delicious cupcakes. Tommy had oreos. He doesn't look happy but I promise you, he was keyed up about the oreos. I think he had about 17. HA!
Before we left, we had to pretend to play video games. Charlotte's still working on her grip.
Here's a quick video to show you the fun that was had. HI-larious!
It is such a heart warming thing to see Tommy develop friendships in his life and he picked an awesome friend in Cooper. He's a great kid. Happy birthday, Cooper!
Holy Moses! Sorry, Readers! You have nine posts to read. Good luck to you! But hey I got caught up all in one night. It's a new personal record. Nine posts in one night!
Anyway, we held Thornburg Christmas on New Year's Day. The first Thornburg Christmas got cancelled due to a little man being sick. Poor Wyatt Charles! But he was better for the second scheduled date.
Uncle Andrew was excited to snuggle with baby Wyatt.
Everyone was actually! He's the snuggliest!! He's getting so big!
We tried to get a picture of the grandparents with the grandkids but Charlotte stopped that from happening. She wanted to be by Mama or Dada. So instead, we did a three generations picture. It turned out really nice! My favorite part is definitely the light saber though. We had an awesome Christmas with our traditional Outback meal which was deeeeelish. Christmas with family is always too short. Seriously, Tommy is right. Why can't Christmas be everyday? ;-)
The Neals got a babysitter and so did we so it was time to party. We weren't sure what to do but I heard about a new bar on campus that was supposed to be a little nicer so we decided to try it out.
It was great... at first. We had strong drinks and ordered dinner. It
was just fun to be together since our lives have us so busy that it's
hard to get together for good conversation. Well the conversation was
so good that we realized too late that it was taking forever for our
food to come. When the food finally did come, it was cold! The server
seemed totally frazzled. Travis said, "Are you freaking out right
now?" She said, "You got me. I'm totally freaking out." We were like,
uh yikes. That's not good. Then a LOT of time went by. We were done
with our cold food. Our drinks were gone. Our server was nowhere to be
found. We waved down another server and asked her, jokingly, if our
server had left. She said, "Um, actually yes. She got in a fight with
the bartender and walked out." Well, that explains a few things. She took over for us and got our drinks and found out what we ordered. It was a mess there that night. We had fun because we always have fun. But wow, what a disaster!
But we weren't going to let it spoil our NYE Party!! Those "glasses" are supposed to say 2016 but they kind of look like they say 2006. Which is appropriate because that's the year we both got married! Happy New/Old Year!
Group picture of us still waiting on our food!
Did I mention they had karaoke and girls in total sequined dresses? The sequin dress girls sang a lot of Shania Twain and Dixie Chicks. Andrew and Travis sang a lot of 80s/90s like Safety Dance, Bad Medicine, and Sledgehammer. They were big hits! Once Andrew sang Sledgehammer, everyone was on the floor. Probably because the median age was 40ish. The youngins' didn't stance a chance.
Katie and I took a picture of us dancing on the highest surface for the Vegas crew. They were totes jelly!
Even though the bar totally failed us, we still had an awesome time on New Years Eve!! Happy 2016!
A minute and a half of Charlotte's favorite songs. I have no idea of what some of them are. She was definitely stalling because she didn't want to eat dinner.
Someone wanna run around with me? If not, I'm going to continue to run around in circles!!!!
After awhile, Christmas gets to the best of us. Then the fighting begins. I love how Tommy sees us starting to laugh at them pointing at each other and crying out each other names and he gets over whatever he's mad or sad about and starts goofing off again.
These little stinkers.
Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house...
Not a creature was stirring not even a mouse. What a wonderfully lazy day we had watching movies.
The massive amount of cards with family pictures were hung on each side of our archway with care. I do love our Christmas cards every year. Displaying them is the best part.
The children were nestled all snug in their beds. Can you believe they slept in until 7:30 that morning? It was a Christmas miracle!
With visions of "It's a Wonderful Life" danced on our TV and "sugarplums" clinked in our drink glasses. I sobbed. Again. Andrew hadn't ever seen the beginning where he saved his brother and kept the druggist from poisoning that kid. Nor had he seen the stars/constellations/angels talking in the beginning either. It cracked him up a bit.
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter.... Just kidding. Tommy got up and snuck into our room and whispered quietly, "Have I slept long enough for Santa to come?" I told him he did great. We got Charlotte up and the kids came downstairs to see their loot. They were so calm. They are still learning about this whole Santa thing. Tommy is still in disbelief I think.
Charlotte settled her brains for a long Christmas morning nap. She LOVED her Mimi presents.
When what do their wondering eyes should appear?? Not only presents but full stockings too! Look what we got, Mama!
I just realized that Charlotte grabbed a pair of my underwear from the laundry and put them on and she's still wearing them in this picture. I sent this picture to my mom. Note: Always check your pictures before you send them. Yikes.
The moon on the breast of the new fallen snow... would not bother either one of us in our new coats!! We'll be so warm... and we'll be matching!!! :)
Don't shake when you laugh, like a bowl full of jelly. You might knock a piece off the Hamsterolle game. That game was a very cool round Jenga competition. My side of the family came over that afternoon for food, presents, and fun.
Her eyes, how they twinkled! Her storm trooper mask, how merry! Charlotte loves this trooper mask that got that day. She can play along with Darth Tommy now! :)
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow and his beard on his chin was as blonde as the snow. Ha! Uncle Adam got snowboard and wakeboard gear, but of course. The beard is actually a ski mask from me and the towel/Gandolf-looking drapery, is a wakeboard towel.
A wink of their eyes and a twist of their heads, we knew that we had EVERYTHING to dread. Andrew and Isabel had an on-going OMG EWW THAT'S TOTES GRODY conversation. It was like modern day valley girl and it hurt our ears so much. But it was also hilarious. Andrew was on point on Christmas day. Who am I kidding? He's always on point comically.
He spoke not a word but went straight to his work. He jammed all the jams and turned with a jerk.... when he noticed Andrew had been... I don't even know how to describe it... It's not imitation. But it is funny. What a nut. Here's a video for your viewing enjoyment.
After midnight when everyone was finally heading home, we heard them exclaim ere they drove out of sight, "Happy Christmas to all, Thank the Lord for teenagers who can drive us home!"
Adam and Emily spent the night though. They didn't need teenagers. This is the last picture I took that night. Adam is wearing his BeardSki and Andrew is wearing the Bane ski mask. GOOD TIMES! What a great Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. I agree with Tommy's comment, "Can it be Christmas everyday?"
We took the kids to meet Santa for the first time ever. Is that bad?? I'm not a huge fan of pictures of screaming kids with Santa. They are kind of funny but I didn't feel like fighting lines and crowds to meet a guy that my kids were going to scream when they met him. So now that they had enough Disney character practice and understood and knew who Santa was, we decided to give it a try.
The kids did great! They told him what they wanted for Christmas. Well Charlotte didn't speak until I came to pick her back up. I said, "Did you tell him what you wanted for Christmas?" She all the sudden looked at Santa and said, "MIMI PRESENTS!" She wanted something Minnie Mouse I guess. "Santa" needed to go to the store because there were no Mimi presents in his bag just yet. ;-) Tommy said he wanted an Ewok and Luke Skywalker. Yep, lots more shopping to do. When he said that, I realized he wanted the Playskool version of those two things and not the stuffed Ewok that "Santa" had purchased for him already. Whoops! Good thing we went, huh?
Here's the picture of the kids with Santa! No screaming! Yay!
The kids did so well that they got shark gummies from the candy store which they ate like baby birds. Hehee!
I want to start a new tradition every year and get a picture by our Christmas tree as a family. But it has to be a timed selfie. I set the timer 3 times and it took 10 pictures each time. We didn't have any Christmas clothes on for this but we were running out of time and I wanted a picture no matter what we were wearing because we gotta capture that moment in time! :-) So these are my favorite pictures from those sets. What were we doing??? I have no clue.
I really hoped that I didn't have to do Elf on the Shelf this year. But Tommy found his Elf on the Shelf book and acted like he should totally show up the next morning. Aaahhhh!! There is so much to do during the month of December with Tommy's birthday and Christmas. But I pulled myself together and dug him out of hiding. I asked Tommy what he wanted to name him. He said, "Johnny," very matter of fact-ly. I have no idea where he had even heard that name before. Really threw me off guard. Too funny. But I'm glad he found the book. I forgot about the magic of Christmas. The kids looked forward to finding Johnny every day. We only forgot to move him once. But that day he moved while they were at school. Right into a bathtub (bowl) of bubbles (marshmallows). We didn't take pictures of all the cute ideas we came up with (there weren't many). But Johnny rode a dinosaur and hung from the ceiling fan. He also fell off of the ceiling fan face first before the kids got home and the kids were very confused. Duct tape was not strong enough I guess. Anyway, Johnny got bandaged up and had a sling.
He also stayed in his spot since he had a ouchie on his arm. But he made sure to have some balloons for Tommy's birthday. The kids were more concerned that he didn't move. I'm like "HE HAS BALLOONS! Isn't that enough for you people?" Haha!!
Uncle Adam forgot his glasses when he stayed at our house one weekend so we made sure to use his glasses as a prop one day.
Also, Spiderman got in on the action and slung a web around him.
Johnny also convinced the kids to bag up some toys that they don't play with anymore so they could donate them to kids who don't have toys. They picked out two garbage bags full of toys for other kids. So that was nice!
On the last day, Christmas Eve, Johnny showed up on the fireplace with a note that said he could be hugged today before he goes away until next year. The kids really loved that. Thanks, Pinterest, for that idea!
So whoever that evil genius is that created elf on the shelf and made millions of dollars, my kids thank you. My To Do list doesn't thank you but they do. Merry Christmas Johnny! Until next year! ;-)
