christmas with cousins

We all started arriving at Grandpa and Grandma's and the kids always have so much fun digging through all the presents to see who had their name (the cousins all draw names- there are 9 of them!)

The kids couldn't wait to play Watch your mouth with their cousins!

This game is just so funny!

Kerigan picked cards she could read and she would just giggle and try so hard to say the phrases!

We always get pizza and everybody brings snacks!

We always bribe them for a picture before opening presents!  Ha!  We were missing one cousin, Kennedy, she was sick.

They were all waiting and listening to grandma to get instructions.  Usually we go around, youngest to oldest.

Abby had Kerigan's name.  She loved the Trolls theme!

Abby also gave her Shopkins so they had fun playing together!  Abby is one year older than Kerigan and the past few times together they have really bonded and gotten to be good friends.

She loved that her jammies came with a sleep mask!

This picture cracked us all up.  Santa and a soldier!  Ha!  I guess I didn't get a picture of Andrew with his gifts but he got Skylanders from Jack!

They love to have a sleepover and fall asleep watching movies by the Christmas tree.

Kennedy was feeling better the next day so her dad brought her.  Kerigan was happy because she had her name and wanted to watch her open her present.

Then the next day we always join Craig's mom's side of the family for a huge Christmas get together.  The kids all have fun playing with their second cousins too!  This year these beads were all the rage.

Craig's grandma is just the sweetest lady.  She never forgets anyone's birthday and always remembers us at Christmas.  She is the heart of this family and we all love her to pieces!

The next day the kids always just relax and hang out in their jammies and play with their gifts.

Kerigan loves Kenzie- the littlest cousin!

After breakfast the girls got dressed in their matching shirts from grandma!

Group picture with Grandpa and Grandma minus Jack and Brooke who had already left.

This weekend always marks the beginning of the holiday season- one of our favorite times of the year!

thanksgiving fun

Over the river and through the ocean woods... Ha!  This girl's got her fin on and she's ready for Thanksgiving break!  Usually we have Thanksgiving at our house, but since we live farther away now, and we had to head to Craig's family the day after, we decided to leave a little early and spend a couple nights with Ga Ga and Papa for Thanksgiving this year.  

I had a little talk with them because Papa loves this tradition of getting the turkey prepared the night before with the kids and last year they got in a huge fight about who's turn it was and they couldn't reach it, etc... so this is what they did when I warned them about not fighting!  Ha!

#dontletthemfoolyou

Eeewwwwwww! (says Kerigan!)

This year went much better than last!  #peptalkshelp

They're thinking, are we really going to eat this thing!?

Then Ga Ga had this neat idea- she bought a special tree for her basement just for the kids to decorate with all of our old ornaments, mostly mine when I was little, and ones given to us by my grandma.

It was so fun to look through the box of each one and it brought back so many memories!  The kids loved it too.

Love these memories!

On Thanksgiving Day we went to Moana- it was so fun and a great movie!

This is the cutest little story- Papa, Ga Ga and Andrew have this special thing about rocks.  They all love them.  Ga Ga has collected rocks her whole life from every vacation she's been on.  They have gotten Andrew into this and he has had his eye on this rock at the park across the street at their house forever.

He always works so hard to try to get it out and he never can.  He and Papa have worked on it for over a year every time he comes over.

So finally we decided to get the shovel, get Daddy out there and dig the sucker out!  Can you tell how excited Andrew is??  Ha!

He could not have been more thrilled.

We figured this was probably not something we were supposed to do- but oh well!  We filled the hole back up!  We didn't realize quite how big or heavy it was, but we managed to get it back to the van and it's now gracing our landscaping.  Andrew will never forget where that rock came from! #pleasedontturnusin

When we got back from the movie, the turkey was ready!

The kids always say a Thanksgiving prayer.  I wish I had recordings of them over the years, they are always so sweet and they thank Jesus for everything!

Sweet girl, she was so proud of her prayer.

Ga Ga's silly girl!

Andrew loves the wishbone!

Then this fun game happened.

We laughed and laughed until our tummies hurt.

All of us got in on the fun!

How many grandma's do you know that would participate in such silliness!?  We have the best!

Sweet girl- she barely fit the mouth piece in her little mouth, but she rocked it!

We couldn't forget Daddy!  Craig is super sarcastic and makes a lot of subtle jokes, then mainly just watches us laugh at them.  It takes a lot to get him to really crack up.  This did it!  He was laughing so hard he couldn't even say the phrase!

This little series of Andrew listening and laughing at Ga Ga crack me up!

He thinks Ga Ga is pretty hilarious.  Ha!  

And that wraps up our Thanksgiving!  The next day we headed to Craig's family to kickoff Christmas!  Update coming soon!