Christmas!

The thing that really interested the kids this year was watching Santa on Norad. It really came in handy while cooking dinner. Lorelei swore she saw Fudge (our elf ) blink his eyes three times this year. Santa and fudge were able to help us potty train Lorelei! She was very close to not receiving any presents. They also spotted rudolph's red nose in the sky right before they went to bed.

 Christmas Morning was a little rough. We all came down with a new and improved cold. Natalie did not want to open any of her presents. It made her cry each time we tried. We gave up and opened them for her and then put her back to bed to get some rest.

 Riley asked for a calculator. There is a first for everything!

The kids loved all of their gifts and everything that comes with Christmas!

Castle Rock really gets into lights. It's really fun to drive through the town. They also have a star lighting every year on the top of Castle Rock. It happens a week after Thanksgiving with a firework show.

 Sunday Before Christmas pictures!

Uncle Sam wants you! Just kidding, Brandon was trying to get the kids to watch the camera.

 My parents this year got to spend two weeks in Germany and Austria. They got Brandon and I this Gem. I love it!!!!

We love spending Christmas with our bunch of crazy's!

The kids after Christmas thought it would be fun to turn our tree into a person just like a snow man. It was really cute and helped us celebrate the New Year! The kids stayed up until 8:30 and we watched the Sydney and Hong Kong New Year Fireworks on Youtube. Hong Kong won the show of the year hands down! 

Denver Zoo Lights!

The Denver Zoo lights were so much fun! It was the longest and largest one we have been to. Luckily we went on a warm night of 40 degrees keeping the kids warmer longer. They lasted through almost the whole zoo.

For some reason I loved the flamingos and how they reflected in the water!

Poor Natalie was confined to the stroller. The zoo had so many people and we did not want to loose her.

The Asian area was one of our favorites! They had the best lights. Brandon and I fell in love with these RGB LED lights. Sadly they are only commercial at this point and are very expensive. Maybe there is a DIY way to make them. I guess we now need to become electricians...

The lights on the right in the above picture are the ones we want for our tree. You have to see them in person to really understand why we love them.

The next cool area was an under the sea theme!

 We watched an Ice sculptor who was having a hard time keeping his art pieces from fogging due to the warmth.  

Who knew that Hippo's could fly?

We also got to be ingested by one!

We didn't get to see many real animals, but we had a blast with the fake ones! 

Snow Galore!

Here are a couple of random Photo's taken in November. I did take a picture of us as a family for thanksgiving, but my settings were off and I lost all of  the photo's. I was very bummed later when I went to download them and they were gone. Instead I have Natalie playing in a basket and all three of my Kiddo's together! 

This year is making up for the lack of snow from last year. Each storm has brought almost a foot of snow!

Below both measurements were taken on the same day, but two hours apart.Thank Heavens school closed.

 

 Brandon and Riley decided it would be fun to fall in the snow.