Christmas and the End of 2011

Like I said in my last post, we were very thankful that the boys slept well and didn't wake us up at 4 am. We waited for everyone to wake up and come downstairs before we let the boys dig in to the pile of presents. James was in Pokemon heaven. He got a jumbo card and lots of packs of cards, Pokemon books, a new Super Hero Squad game for his DS, a mini pillow pet, and Captain America on BluRay. John received a Puss in Boots book, a mini pillow pet, a Diego DS game, Rio and Kung Fu Panda 2, and a Scentsy Warmer for his room. Jude received a Tag Junior along with some books for it, Cars 2, a mini pillow pet and a Scentsy Warmer for his room. Jonah received a mini pillow pet, a musical instrument set and a shape sorter. All of the boys received money from Muddy and some wonderful presents from Mimi and Poppa Mike - a remote controlled star wars vehicle, a knight costume, a bulldozer, and a pillow pet blanket. Brian also got some of the things on his wish list - a cool map, tie downs for his truck, a 4 GB flash drive, Green Lantern and X:Men First class.

Once all the gifts were unwrapped, the mess was cleaned up and everyone was dressed, we headed up to my parents house for more presents and yummy food. We arrived just as the monkey bread was coming out of the oven and the turkey bacon was cooking. Much to James' displeasure, we waited to open gifts until everyone had eaten breakfast. The boys had another round of wonderful gifts. James got more Pokemon stuff and John got a fantastic arts and crafts box. I can't wait to see all the wonderful art projects he's going to create. Jude got a little 4x4 ride on toy that he hardly got off of the whole day. Jonah got some great books and toys to play with at Gammie and Poppa's house. We spent the afternoon lazing about watching movies and playing with new toys while the wonderful stand up roast cooked in the oven. We had an early Christmas dinner and then did more relaxing before heading home for the day.

We had a wonderful Christmas and were extremely thankful for all of the rain we received over the long weekend. We desperately needed it.

The last week of 2011 has been spent recovering from the nasty cold we've all been fighting since before Christmas. Lots of cold and cough medicine for the boys and Allegra-D for Brian and I. It's now Wednesday and we're finally feeling better. We haven't been doing much other than hanging out and being lazy. We've run a few errands here and there. The boys spent their Christmas money at Target the other day and I finally made it to the grocery store. James and I went to see Arthur Christmas. It was a really cute little film and I'm glad we saw it before it left the theaters. Today we got a visit from the Weatherwaxes. The kids had a great time playing together at the park and Brian and Jay had a good time catching up. Tomorrow we're meeting up with the Keaslers for some fun at Gattitown and then Friday we're headed out to the land for the long weekend. We've never taken Jude and Jonah with us so it will definitely be a new experience for us. Hopefully they will sleep ok at night. We don't have any plans to get anything done so it will be more relaxing and letting the boys run around outside. The end of 2011 should be lots of fun for our four boys.