Christmas with the Hicks

On the Sunday before Christmas, all 4 of us were involved in the church service. Courtney was an angel and Dan and I were Joseph and Mary. Ryan was a curious little baby Jesus. They both also did great with helping with the children's moment and prayers!

After church, we went to Lee's Summit to Steve and Leslie's for lunch, presents and cookie making!
Last week when Courtney spent the night, Leslie taught her how to do a few parts of "Little Drummer Boy". Courtney did a great job and loves helping her play!

Courtney loved playing with her cousin Reese!

Boys in their sweaters!

Christmas with the McClain's

On Saturday, December 23, we had our Christmas with Terry and Jody & Dave and Bethany's family. We let the little kids open presents, then made the yearly trip to GoJo's then came back for more presents and games!

Someone was excited to get her first LaLaLoopsy!

Courtney loves to try the chopsticks!

I'm so proud of her for trying and liking their soup! I haven't even tried it!

Countdown 1

Christmas eve is finally here! 32 days of counting down really made the anticipation for this day very exciting for Courtney! I'm not sure if I can do 32 next year...maybe 25. We'll see after a year's break. 

Today we made elf donuts and cookies for Santa and his elves. We also sprinkled reindeer food on the front year! Courtney had fun making the donuts. I made a simple icing of powdered sugar and water and then we speared Cheerios with toothpicks and then dipped them in icing and sprinkles. I have saved paper clip boxes since August (the beginning of school) for this project! They were the perfect size for teensy donuts!

The spread of goodies for all our overnight guests!

Sprinkling reindeer food on the lawn. She is VERY concerned they won't be able to see it. We came with all kinds of things to tell her including that Rudolph's nose would make it bright enough to see. She replied that Rudolph wasn't real!! I'm not sue why that came out of her mouth, but maybe just because an animal with a light up nose isn't real Santa is a person. He can be real. Hopefully that is how it will be for many more years. 

Countdown 2

Today we went to church and had Christmas at Steve and Leslie's. Our whole family was a part of the service today! Courtney was an angel and Dan, Ryan and I were Joseph, Mary and baby Jesus. After church we went to Steve and Leslie's to have dinner, open presents and Steve's tradition of decorating sugar cookies.

Countdown 3

Dan made Courtney Christmas tree waffles for breakfast! My treat of the day was getting to sleep in! Yay! He did a great job and they were super cute!

Countdown 4

New Christmas book!

Countdown 5

We had a snow day today!! Courtney was excited to play in the snow. We even let Ryan sit in it for a little bit but I was pretty cold and windy!

Since we were going to be home I switched up the order of our daily surprise and it was Christmas movie and popcorn day!