New York New Years!

Cassidy and Liberty loved the party favors. I loved their jammies. These are long johns from the Cracker Barrel. My mom got them for Malachi and Naomi when they were those sizes. Libby's has ruffles on the bum. I was digging out a bunch of boy clothes for my sister while she was here and found them. So glad I did, they are great.
Our kids are usually in bed early so keeping them awake til midnight would be a stretch. So we decided to celebrate a New York New Years. So we let the kids stay up til 9 and celebrated New Years with them on t.v.

Darren helping the kids pull the popping party favors to celebrate New Years. We did this about 7pm so they could enjoy it then relax and watch a movie, that way if they fell asleep they didn't miss out on the fun.

The kids all cuddled up as we watched Night at the Museum 2, which by the way was hilarious!!!

The 2 little ones couldn't make it to 9pm.

We had such a busy Christmas with family in town staying with us and hosting both Christmas Eve with the Drago Family and Christmas with the Tollefson family both at our house that we decided to take it easy New Years Eve. We just had our family over that morning for Liberty's birthday so we were ready to jammie it up and have a movie night to ring in the new year.

Liberty Turns One!

My little New Years Eve baby. I say if you are going to have a December birthday, what a fun day to have it. She gets a party every year. We just did a family party this year. She missed her nap so by the time she had ate she was so tired she fell asleep in her chair for the first time.

Ice Skating!

Naomi loves the movie "Twice upon a Christmas" a Disney one with Minnie Mouse and Daisy Duck ice skating. She pretend ice skates in the house constantly. So my girl friend Beth calls us and wants to go ice skating with our families. The girls were thrilled when I told them.
Kyle and Beth Kuzma with Darren and I.

Need I say more than the sign? We had a number of spills. While I was helping Malachi skate he lost his balance. I was able to help him stay on his feet for the most part, but one time his skate caught mine and we went down, down hard. We ended up taking out two other skaters that were coming by us. It was pretty funny. No one was hurt (til the morning).

Naomi and Malachi edged around the outside rail of the rink for balance. I took Cassidy around the rink. I skated and she just glided along. After a few turns I would have her take a break with Darren and I would take Naomi around a few times then Malachi. Needless to say I was a little tired at the end of the night.

Me skating Cass around.

Darren didn't want to skate so he hung out on the side with Liberty, which worked out good.

After lots of fun we headed off to find some hot chocolate.

The kids waiting patiently for the dads to bring the cars around. What a great night!

Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs... And Losing Your Wallet!

We went with our friends the Clarkes to see Cloudy with a chance of meatballs. I rather enjoyed it and thought it had a Madagascar-esk humor to it. We had a great time and after the movie headed home. When Darren got home he realized his wallet was missing. It had fallen out at the theatre. We called them right away and they said there was none to be found. We went back down there and searched the theatre. Gone! So we figure after we went back home that someone probably took the cash and ditched the wallet. No credit cards were used so that was good. The irony in it all is 2 weeks prior I lost a wallet full of gift cards. I even had my name and number in there, but no one contacted me. I'm sure someone found it and said "Merry Christmas self, free money!" So as a new year resolution we are going to be more mindful of our money in more ways than one.

All Tuckered Out!

The kids have been so busy playing with Christmas toys, spending time with family, enjoying daddy being off work that when nap time came today to 2 little ones went down. They cuddled up to daddy in our bed and had a long winters nap.

Christmas was AWESOME!

Libby loved anything and everything she opened. It was so fun to see her on her first Christmas!
Malachi can die a happy man. He now owns his new favorite soccer game!

Naomi had a friend over to swim this summer and she had a brown puppy like this. They swim in the pool it's pretty cool. So since then that's what she's wanted and the waiting if finally over. She loves it!

Cassidy is our dress up queen right now. If anyone knows us they know we LOVE costumes. Cassidy especially loves purses and dress up shoes. She was one happy chick.

This was really cute. Liberty and our nephew Cameron are 1 1/2 months apart in age. Liberty is yet to confuse Darren with his twin Derek. However Cameron keep wanting Darren to hold him. Liberty wasn't getting why???

Can I say this was the best gift yet! Santa brought this giant horse which my kids can't get enough of. Naomi got it and played on it 3 days straight. No need to entertain.

Christmas morning!

Cassi was fun this year. She understood opening up presents and that there was stuff inside.

Malachi and Naomi opening their stockings.

Libby loves babies, isn't that cute how babies love babies!

Spreed the Love!

My siblings and I buy gifts for our nieces and nephews at Christmas. Well I feel like they get so much on Christmas Eve with the Drago side and Christmas day with the Tollefson side that when they get a package in the mail from my brothers I let them open it. This way they get to enjoy the gift instead of opening it with all the other gifts they get. My brother Seth and his wife Ari sent these really cute pajamas. My kids LOVE pj's so tonight we put them on and they are all sleeping with visions of sugar plums in their heads.

Christmas Caroling!

Naomi loves Santa.

Cassidy is growing fonder of Santa. She actually got close enough to touch him.

We go Christmas Caroling every year around our neighborhood. This year we had a special treat. Santa came and gave the kids goodies. It was a blast. The last house we did was the best. They even got their cameras out and took pictures of us! What a fun time.

Santa's Reindeer

Naomi cracks me up. She orchestrates Santa's sleigh by putting Reindeer antlers on and a Santa hat on Cassidy's head. She gets her jump rope and away they go. Naomi's the Reindeer and Cassidy's Santa. Well Malachi sees how much fun their having and demotes Cassidy to Reindeer and hijacks the sleigh as the new Santa.

Family Photos 2009