it's beginning to look a lot like christmas

These pictures were all from November.  We were so excited because we had warning of a big blizzard that was supposed to come middle of the month.  We were so excited!

First we had to get some shopping done!  Ha!  Ashley had given the kids a little assignment where they all had to find places in town that started with certain letters.  Kerigan picked Kmart for "K."

Then Angie and I thought we better hit up Hobby Lobby... you know, because decorations are the most important thing to be prepared with in a blizzard!

Then we got out the tree.  And watched Christmas movies.  And yes that's an 8 foot ladder.  I know.  I have to admit, this is the 2nd year for our 12 ft tree and more than once I asked myself what in the world I was thinking!

But a little of this made it better!

The Friday before the big blizzard (because of course it was over a weekend, so no school would be missed.  I think Mother Nature must've wanted to make everybody mad!  Ha!) We went to Kerigan's school for her Thanksgiving Feast.  She was so happy and proud to have mommy and daddy both there.

It started snowing in the afternoon.  My class and I were anxiously watching it out the windows... we couldn't wait to get home!  I picked the kids up and whipped up some chili.  Because you just have to have chili during a blizzard, right?

Then the kids got out their Christmas tree and decorations in the basement.

They had a great time watching Home Alone and hanging their special ornaments!

I spent most of my evening upstairs decorating the 12 footer...

With some help from Belle, of course!

So I can't decorate without watching A Christmas Story.  It's my all time favorite movie and I know every line by heart.  I just watch it over and over when I'm decorating!

And an after shot...finally relaxed on the couch with the Hallmark channel and some hot chocolate.  Bliss!  I think it took me 3 1/2 hours from start to finish.  And that's just the tree.

These two.  Ha!  I love it- all cozy on the couch with Christmas movies in the background.

We woke up to this!

The kids were so thrilled and happy!

They could not get outside fast enough... I think we held them off until 8am!

Andrew would hardly stop for me to take a picture!

I'll never forget the first time I brought her out to play in the snow...

She was not a fan.

Ha!  And right about now I'm wishing for all the snow we had back then!  This was in 2012.

This snow was all melted the next day!

They love coming in and having hot chocolate!

That night it was super cold out so our town's Holiday Stroll didn't bring out as many people. 

They still had the parade and lit the trees!  We were too cold to do the carriage ride, which was a bummer!  We also missed seeing Santa.  But we got to see him plenty more times this season- coming soon!

After the parade we met some friends at our favorite local pizza place downtown.

The kids were well entertained so us grown ups could have some social time!  Ha!

The Holiday Stroll always marks the beginning of the season.  It gets us in the mood for Christmas!  I love getting my decorations up early so I have time to enjoy them!  I actually got them up later than I wanted to this year.  The season just goes by too quickly.

Thanksgiving up next!

more life lately

I'm still so behind and need to get caught up before Christmas!  So here we go!

This is my nephew's sweet daughter, Lucy.  She and Kerigan are 3 months apart and Lucy's mom started a food business a while back.  She hosted a practice class for kids and invited us!  It was so much fun!

This kids just had a blast!

She already had the dough made up and the kids got to roll it and cut out!

Then decorate!

Andrew gets really into this now that he can do most everything by himself.

Since we were close to Ga Ga's, we stopped to spend the night before heading to Craig's parents house the next morning for a funeral.

Ga Ga and Papa have a new park right across the street from their house!

The kids have already had so much fun playing there, and for many more years to come!

You can see the whole park right from their house.  Prime location for these two!

That night mom and I took Andrew to the Peanuts movie.  But they didn't have a poster of it so he wanted to stand by the Good Dinosaur one.  Ha!  He was wanting to see this too so he was thrilled.

Attempt at a selfie after the movie!

The next morning we got up and headed to Craig's parents house for an unexpected visit.  Craig's Grandma Huegel passed away- she was a few days away from her 95th birthday!  An amazing lady.

They had a room downstairs at the funeral home where the kids hung out for a lot of the day, but it got to be long so we took them for a walk and they loved playing in the leaves!

The Huegel cousins (just missing 2 littler ones who didn't come on the walk)

Andrew could not have been any happier to get a bonus trip to be with his cousins a couple of weeks before our trip for Thanksgiving!  Even under the circumstances, it was nice to see everyone and spend some extra time.

So one area my kids are deprived (and there aren't many! Ha!) is that they never get to play in leaves.  We all live in new construction (both sets of grandparents and us!) so there are no big, old trees with fun leaves to jump in. 

So they definitely jump at the chance anytime they see them to play in them!

They all had a blast!

These are all of Craig's cousins on the Huegel side.  He has a ton on both sides!

These are all their kids!  Our kids are the oldest because Craig's dad is the oldest of his siblings and we all got married and had kids first!

We had to take Monday off from school, and when we got home there were tornado warnings!  So we were all hiding in our basement storage room.  With Belle of course.

Our neighbors texted me this picture they took of our house from across the street!  The rainbow was amazing!  I love this picture of our house!

In other news, Kerigan finished up swimming lessons.  We decided to alternate sessions for her, so she does them twice a week for 6 weeks, then takes 6 weeks off.  We have an awesome YMCA and both kids have loved taking lessons throughout the year.  It's kind of nice it gives us the summer off and this way they keep up with it year round.

She loves building with her legos.

Andrew is learning about autobiographies at school and he had to write about himself.  These were notes he had to fill out first and he brought this home.  I thought it was so sweet that we have been on a lot of family vacations in his life- including Disney 3 times.  And the best vacation he's ever had is seeing Nash- his baby cousin in South Carolina.  We have taken a road trip there the past couple of summers to visit and Andrew has loved it.  We can't wait to see Nash and Mary again at Christmas!

I think that's a start of catching me up!  More to come soon...