Christmas Break Wrap Up

Oh, so many pictures to share!  We had such a great time over Christmas, just spending time with my side of the family.  We're in a great season of life with everyone married and 2 grandkids.  These are fun years to be at my parents house, making memories and just enjoying time together.  I hate that we live so far apart, but I'm so grateful for this time we get each Christmas.  Anyway, you can guess that Ava and Carter had the time of their little lives with all those people to love on them all day long!  Here are some funny pictures from our great time away...

 On the night after Christmas, my brother-in-law's parents invited us all over for dinner and some hot tub action!  Gotta love a hot tub, next to a roaring fire, while looking out on loads of snow!  

 My crazy brother in law just had to do it!  Had to get in the snow before he got in the water :) 

I believe he regretted that a few seconds later when his feet were burning from the cold!

 Ava had a great time playing in the water.

 We had a delicious meal and then roasted marshmallows over the fire.  

Travis loved that as much as Ava :) 

 Aunt Stacie and Carter

Mom, Jennie and Jesse's Mom, Deb

 New cups were one of Ava's stocking stuffers...

 And she loved it!  

She also got those slippers and I could not get enough of her in them :) 

 Love my little girl!  At any given time this year, she had 1 if not 2 babies that she carried around with her.  She's definitely watching everything I do with Carter and then acting the same things out with her dolls.  So funny to watch her :) 

 Ava's giggles could be heard all over the house, all week!

Mostly because someone was always up for acting crazy to get this girl to smile!

We all got dressed up one night and went to our favorite restaurant...

 My parents...Love them!

 Stacie and Jesse...Love them too!

 Jennie and Dave...yep, you guessed it.  Love them also!

 Mom and the new love of her life, Oliver.

Me with the 3 loves of my life :) 

Still throws me when I see a picture of us and realize that we're a family of FOUR now!!  

 One of our absolute BEST memories of the whole break was this.  

I bought the Michael Jackson Experience wii game for Travis and it took us no time to realize that we LOVED it!  It's so hard to copy his dance moves, but so fun too.  And who doesn't love to sing along to all of his classics??

 However, it totally surprised us to realize how quickly Ava LOVED it too!!  

She broke out into spontaneous dancing every time the music came on.  

***Please ignore my rear end in all these pictures and enjoy our little dancer!***

 Thriller anyone???

 Throw em up Ava!  

MJ would be proud :) 

 This year we were addicted to the game, "Ticket to Ride."  Poor Ava always wanted to play with us, so we humored her for a little while and let her play too :) 

 She was very proud of herself.

 Have you played this game??  It's a fun one, especially if you like games that involve strategy.

 And while Ava was wild and crazy all week, Carter was quiet and snuggly.

 Aunt Stacie did her best to put him to sleep more times than not!

One of the best things we got to do, was to surprise my Aunt Kay at her prosthesis appt.  Shortly after Carter was born, Kay had to have a partial amputation due to infection following a prior surgery.  She has been in rehab ever since and over the break, she was fitted for her new prosthetic leg.  We got to watch her take her first steps and we were all very proud of her!  It's been a long, sad road for her and she's handled it very well.  We got to surprise her and have a little impromptu Christmas party.  The facility where she's rehabbing is full of the flu, so we couldn't take a chance and go see her.  But her appt. was just a few blocks from my parents house, so it worked out for us to visit her there.  It was a very special surprise and fun to watch her do better than anyone expected!  

Most of our days were spent eating, playing with the kids, playing games or laughing hysterically!  I enjoyed it so much, I'm having a really hard time getting back to some kind of schedule again.  There is something really wonderful about days on end of doing nothing...