Christmas!

I am happy to be back in the blogging world again! The holidays always make for a busy time, but it's even harder with a toddler! So needless to say, blogging was put on the back burner for the month of December! I have so much to blog about, and sooner or later I will post about everything else going on in our lives, but until then here's our Christmas post.

We made sure to finish all of our Christmas shopping a little earlier this year so we didn't have to go to the crazy stores on Christmas Eve! We were out late on Thursday but got most of our wrapping done that night too. We also baked that night! Yes, "WE" baked! Every Christmas I want to bake and I made sure this year I stuck to it. Kenny helped me and it was a lot of fun! We made peanut butter cookies, chocolate chip cookies, fudge and another recipe (courtesy of Katie;) ) with pretzels, rolos and pecans! They taste like the candy bar, Take 5, which in my opinion is the best candy bar because it's the PERFECT blend of sweet and salty! Mmmm! We made a lot, but this is all we kept for ourselves.I made this for Jake and Katie. It was delicious and its the easiest ever! I got white chocolate morsels and melted them in the microwave. Then I got peppermint candy and crushed them up in a bag and strained it over the bowl of white chocolate so the really little peices fell through. I stirred it up, then poured it out on to a baking sheet lined with wax paper, pressed the bigger peppermint pieces into the chocolate and let it sit for about an hour. After it was hard, I broke it into pieces and bagged it up for them! The night we took it over to them, Peyton played with all of their gifts under the tree. She is her mother's child...look how neat and lined up they are :)On Christmas Eve day, before we went to visit my grandma in the hospital, we went over to Nonni's and visited with her and Uncle Tim for a little bit. She was having fun playing in the yard! She picked a little lime off the tree and liked throwing it around.We also went to Kennys parents' that night to carry on the tradition that Kenny's parent's started when their boys were young. Every Christmas Eve we get new pajamas. Every year they say we are getting too old for it, but it's really one of the things we look forward to! Here's Kenny opening his.Santa came to town!Peyton checking out a new toy Santa brought! Looking at this picture makes me a little sad...it makes me realize how fast she is growing and thinking just a year ago she could care less what a present was. She got the hang of opening presents, but didn't care too much after the first rip. She liked handing the presents out to anyone near her:) She's such a sweetheart. Trying to teach her how to ride her quad! She got a little scared of it and wanted nothing to do with it after she went to get on and accidentally hit the button and it took off! She didn't get hurt and it only goes a mile and half anyway.Daddy and Peyton Christmas morning!

After we opened our gifts at home that morning, we got ready and headed to my parents for breakfast and more presents before going to the hospital for my grandma. Here's a baby she got from my parents.After we left my grandma's we went to Kenny's parents' for dinner and gifts! She's making sure Paige isn't going too far with her new baby. She LOVES this baby! It came with a lot of accessories to and Peyton loves using them especially the stroller! One night when we were getting ready to eat Peyton put her baby in her high chair. When I put Peyton up in it she freaked out and wanted her baby to eat with her. So I sat her baby in the chair too and Peyton started to feed her own food to the baby. It's amazing the stuff they learn from us! Paige telling P to ride her quad.She would push hers into a wall, table, and in this case the bush, probably hoping she wouldn't have to ride it ever again! She wanted to play, but I wanted a picture of us! It was the only one with all three of us that day and I was determined to take it!I guess I could have cleaned her face before I took this picture, my goodness she was dirty! Peyton was spoiled of course! And we had such a great time with our families that day. We couldn't have asked for anything more!