Christmas Day Celebrations

Christmas Day we spent opening presents from Doe-Doe (my sister) and then off to my Dad's sisters house for the Lawson family celebration.

Cute hat from Doe-Doe

My sister gets the kids an ornament every year just from her. This is her and Braden with his

And Kaylee and Doe-Doe with hers

The girls on the Lawson side (minus Meagan)

Our girls

Opening presents from Poppy....He failed to see the importance of name tags so Braden had opened Meagan's make-up!

Hugs and thank-yous for Poppy!

The babies of the families!

Snuggies from Aunt HoneyThe girls got a diaper bag FULL of real baby goodies...complete with this bib that says "Mommy says I'm a Doll!" LOL!It had been a long day, but his new snuggie and Aunt Honey's bed made it all better!

Santa Came!!

Santa was very good to the kids this year! They all seemed to get just exactly what they wanted!

Kaylee's pile

Braden's pile

"It's time to come out!" Notice Macie is the only one that is really awake

And there off!!

What was Santa thinking?

Santa wasn't quite as nice to Meagan! He hid this laptop under a pile of clothes!! Sneaky!

Loves his new bike!!

Her pink Mongoose!

He just realized Poppy was there

Her very own hairdryer

Macie got a lot of new furniture for her American Girl doll....that stuff is precious!

Christmas Eve

This year we spent Christmas in Texas. We alternate where we are for Christmas Day every year and this was the year to be in Texas. I have lots of pics so I am going to have to post them in sections! We spent Christmas Eve with my Mom and had a good time watching the kids getting ready for Santa. We love spending the holidays with my sister and her family, the kids have a great time making memories.

They "posed" this pic themselves!

Getting ready to open presents from Mimi

Our kids are definitely broken into 2 catagories. Kaylee and Meagan are both much calmer and have pretty mellow personalities.....and then we have Macie and Braden...well needless to say they aren't so mellow!

Emily printed one of the many awesome pics she took of the kids @ Thanksgiving and we gave them to all the family.

Brother-in-Laws being silly!

We took this picture for the first time 4 years ago and have taken one every year since. It only took 8 this time to get a decent one! But they had a great time taking all the "bad" ones!

My Beautiful nieces!

Having a good time

Dale reading the story of Jesus' birth to the kids before bed.

Cookies and milk for Santa. Then it was putting out the carrots for the reindeer and then off to bed!

Our Family Making Memories!

Last night we opened our presents together. (We have Dale's company party tonight and then leave for Texas tomorrow, so the kids lucked out!) We all had a great time! It is well worth all the time and energy we put in when we get to see their excitement over what they get....well Braden's anyway! Kaylee is so nonshalant with everything that she almost gets embarrassed when she opens; therefore, she shows very little emotion. Now Braden on the other hand, is VERY animated with his emotion...good or bad! Dale has had many talks with him already this year about controlling his actions when he opens a present and it is not exactly what he wants, so this year he is going WAY overboard with excitement with EVERY gift! He had to come give each of us a hug with EVERY present he opened!

This is one of her favs....can't you just feel the emotion!!
(and go figure...a $4 trash can!)

Oh we have a smile on the CUTE sign a friend made for me!

And look @ this reaction!! But this is the item Dale and I (and my sis and cousin) waited for 5 hours @ Wal-Mart on Black Friday for so we LOVED his reaction!!

And the famous guitar...but look at the look on Kaylee's face...all she said was "really mom?" And their big present together (Band Hero)...I LOVE that the camera got both of their expressions perfectly! She was excited about this one!

We always love watching the kids open their gifts from us, but also watching their reactions when we open the gifts they bought us. Kaylee got both of us a cute ornament and Braden got Daddy a Superman coffee mug...oh and thanks to Daddy he got me a zebra umbrella too! Dale really surprised me this year! He has always hated my love of shoes and purses and has always refused to buy them for me and this year he bought me BOTH!! I got a pair of black boots and the Coach purse I have been wanting since my birthday! Oh and he gets to pick out his own (because I wasn't going to dare pick it out) new golf bag and a pair of sunglasses!

We had a great time together and look forward to leaving tomorrow for Texas and celebrating this Christmas season with my family.

Christmas Has Begun!!

We started our Christmas this year celebrating with the Heisler side of the family on Sunday. This year we did things a lil different. The adults did not exchange gifts. We just had the kids play Dirty Santa. They enjoyed this alot! It was fun to watch them "fight" for the things they wanted, and was really funny to see what they each fought for!

Kids getting ready for their game!

After everyone left we enjoyed exchanging gifts with Dale's mom. Here are the kids with their gifts from Nana. Kaylee got a zebra and hot pink purse and Braden got a toy farm set....along with other things, but those are their favs! We had a great time with Dale's side of the family! And the kids always enjoy giving Nana her present and her birthday presents too!!

Some Christmas Fun @ School!

This was a very busy week at school! We had our Christmas program on Tuesday and then parties today! They did a great job on the program. Braden had a GREAT time and Kaylee made do! She HATES being in front of people, but toughed it out. She actually was asked to have a speaking part and turned it down!! Braden on the other hand had to express EVERY action with LOTS of emotion! Unfortunately I had to use my small camera and did not get great pics and was not able to capture any of his animated moments....oh well!

See him in the middle in the red sweater

See her in the middle in the silver headband....
Can't you see the excitement!!

They were both all smiles when it was over!

Kaylee at her Christmas party @ school....sporting her new shirt I made her!

Braden at his class party

As you can tell, I put a new picture at the top of the page. I have not yet figured out how to make it smaller, so if anyone knows please share!! Over Thanksgiving break my sister took LOTS of pics of all 4 of our children for her new business she is starting up. At the end of the day I decided to have her shoot a few of all 4 of us for our Christmas card. She ended up with quite a few good ones, but this was my favorite so it is the winner!! I used this one along with a pic of the kids with Mickey and Minnie in DisneyWorld. They turned out very cute!!