Thanksgiving 2016 + My Favorite Weekend

Thanksgiving was a great one this year. We started our day off with going to see Moana as a family. Let me tell you, that movie is so so good!!

Later in the day we headed over to my Aunt & Uncles. They always have the best food! The apps and wine were flowing and the kids were having fun running a muck around the house. Thanksgiving dinner was so yummy and I was so happy not to be sick this year and actually be able to taste the food!

Friday morning we headed out to chop down our Christmas tree! This was the first year the weather was actually decent and the kids weren't crying saying they couldn't feel their hands and legs LOL

Typical Brayden face!

Usually someone is crying for whatever reason and this year was no different. Avery was crying because Rick walked towards another spot with Brayden to search for a tree, Ella was crying because she couldn't keep up with Brayden and then repeat.

on the hunt!

 It took us a while this year to find "the" tree - the lot seemed to not have very many good trees. We may be going somewhere different next year.

Ella and Brayden helped saw the tree and when it was ready to be pushed over, Brayden caught it.

 Avery was hilarious, she HAD to help carry the tree which meant we had to walk really slow and if she let go of it she would cry until we let her grab back on.

See, she's crying here because she didn't want to take a pic, she wanted to help carry the tree

Inside we had donuts and hot chocolate and saw Santa! (and overpaid for an ok picture)

Avery is not a fan again this year :)

Friday night we went to our towns tree lighting. It was our first time going and it was just OK. Not sure if we'll keep this up but it was fun to just be out and seeing some lights.

Saturday, Rick and I spent alot of time going through bins and organizing everything that's going back down to the basement (which is almost done!) Then later in the day we headed to my in laws to celebrate Thanksgiving.

 Sunday morning our elf, Twinkles showed up! He brought the kids an ornament and chocolate sticks. They were so excited!!

I spent the morning decorating the house and once Avery woke up from her nap we decorated our tree and the playroom tree

 

 

 Avery's favorite thing to do was put the hooks on the ornaments instead of actually hanging them. Of course she was supervised while using the hooks :)

     

Once we were done with the tree, we settled in to watch Home Alone and eat some yummy reindeer chow we made earlier in the day

We were all so exhausted by the end of the night and Monday morning came so quick, not to mention we didn't sleep well because it was raining and our dog was freaking out half the night. To top that off Brayden woke up with pink eye in both eyes so he had to stay home. Thankfully we already had drops so he only had to miss school yesterday and is back today.

I hope you all had the best holiday and weekend!


*linking up with Our Pretty Little Girls for Tuesday Talk

My favorite weekend {Christmas tree chop down + decorating}

My favorite weekend of all year has to be the weekend after Thanksgiving.  We started our own tradition 3 years ago of chopping down our Christmas tree the day after Thanksgiving and then decorating the tree and the house on that Saturday.

This year, the weather wasn't so great for the tree chop down but it was definitely better than last year where it was probably in the teens.  This year it was just cold, a little rainy, and a lot muddy.


Despite the nasty weather, we still took our sweet time picking out our tree.  This year we were smart and I had Avery in my ergo carrier and didn't bring a stroller (strollers + tree farms do not mix!)



The hubby and Brayden just got done cutting the tree down - Hubby does the sawing and Brayden helps push it over.

Poor Ella fell in the mud about 2 minutes into looking for a tree so girlfriend was not happy and the drizzling rain wasn't helping either.  She kept crying saying "I want to go home!" Sorry Ella, no chance, we are busy making memories over here :) LOL

    

After the tree was chopped, we got it shaken and baled and netted and the hubs strapped it to the top of our car.  We then headed in to the barn to get some hot cocoa and donuts :)

Santa was there and Brayden really wanted to go see him so we did.  He literally just stared at him while Santa talked.  I swear he was thinking "whoa, this is the real Santa" - in my opinion he really was the real Santa :)

Ella said she wanted to see him too because she had to tell him she wanted that Frozen Ice Castle and a pink ipad (she is so funny) but the first time up she cried hysterically and ran away.  Then as we were all ready to go she said she was ready to go see him and that she "wouldn't cry this time"


She was so cute on his lap! She told him all about the ice castle but forgot to mention the pink ipad :)

The next day we went to see the Good Dinosaur in the morning with the big kids and later at night we started decorating the house and the tree.  We had the Christmas music playing and the kids were having so much fun dancing around and acting all sorts of crazy.

It's a miracle, they are all looking!

Avery was SO into all of the decorating.  She couldn't keep her little hands off the lights and the ornaments :)

Brayden was my big helper decorating the tree with the ornaments. It was me and him until almost 10pm while everyone else was fast asleep.

Then I looked at what he was doing with all of the bulbs and noticed that he put them all together and hung them on the tree light strand instead of the tree, LOL

We woke up the hubs (who fell asleep with Ella) so he could lift Brayden up to put the angel on

The next day the kids decorated their little playroom tree but Avery wanted no part in that, she wanted to walk around with her light saber

There is nothing cuter than kids decorating a tree!

Brayen wrote his very first letter to Santa all by himself! In the years past, the hubby always typed up letters from the kids to Santa, but our boy is getting so big he can now write his own :)

While Ella rested upstairs, Brayden and I decorated a door as a snowman. I got the kit from Target for $7, so worth it if you ask me!

That sums up my most favorite weekend! Only wish I wasn't so sick but I still managed to enjoy it.