Todd, Catherine, and Family

Living in the Sand

For several years now, our family has been spending the week between Christmas and New Years at the dunes. This year, it was no different. Our kids love to go there and ride, ride, ride. They ride all.day.long. They can't seem to get enough. We have good friends that join us, so the kids also look forward to spending a few days with them. We enjoyed a lot of quad riding, campfire chats, card games, and just plain hanging out. Catherine was "anti-social" for a couple of days while she read "The Lost Symbol" by Dan Brown. Todd had brought it for himself to read. But, when Catherine started, she couldn't stop. It was a good read!

Sierra in her gear.

Sierra enjoying a gatorade after a good ride with the girls.

Lance and Todd brought their cycles this time. (a lot more work in the sand vs. riding a quad but they seemed to really like it).

Sometimes, instead of riding their quads, the girls would hop into the McLaws' Rhino and go for a ride with their music blaring. good times. good memories.

When the boys needed a break from quad riding, they enjoyed playing their ds'. ...such serious concentration.

Most nights, the big kids stayed out late and played. In fact, we couldn't figure out how Lance was even surviving off such little sleep. I mean that boy stayed up till at least 2 am...if not 5 am! They tp'd other trailers and did who.knows.what.else. But, they had fun and kept out of trouble. Unfortunately, the last night it caught up with Lance. We found Jayden and him asleep by the campfire.

Last minute, we decided to stay another night and boy were we glad we did. We enjoyed another night with our friends, the Goodfellows. We got in a bit more riding, played card games, and just had a great time together.

Checking for sand in his hot chocolate?

I just happened to have my camera out to catch Todd playing on his quad, doing a wheely.

Even our dog Cash learned to love the dunes. Someone was always willing to play catch with him.

Although, sometimes he didn't want to give it back:). I think he likes to play keep away just as much as likes to play catch. On the way home, our motorhomes got stuck in the sand and we also had a flat tire. So, we didn't get home till 2 am! But, it was well worth it. It was a great time, as always, at the dunes... living in the sand.

Playing a Game of Catch

...with a parachute man.

On Christmas day, I caught the boys playing a game of catch. Lance was up on the roof of the guest house throwing out the army dude. Zane would try to catch the guy as the parachute brought him down.

Unfortunately, he was too slow sometimes. Our poor army dude suffered a couple of broken legs.

Loyalty

Sierra can't have a merry Christmas herself, unless she makes sure that all the four legged creatures in the family have one also. And so she made goodies for the horses and dog, and then bought some for the cat. Leave it to Sierra to be so thoughtful about her friends.

Merry Christmas!

We told our early bird kids that they couldn't get up before 7am. So, 7:00 sharp they were coming down the stairs. We had to tell them to slow down and wait as we woke Weston up for the big morning. He quickly warmed up as he saw all the presents and was told that it was finally the day that he could open them up!

Zane has been dying for a guitar. And, he specifically wanted a red one...not the plain ol' brown one for some reason. He was pretty excited to see this sitting by the tree.

Sierra got a couple of new saddles (well, new to her:)... but a lot nicer than what she had). One for English and one for Gaming.

Lance got some new cycle pants and clothes.

From Papa and Gma in CA, the kids were pretty excited to open up a Wii. Overall, the kids got what they wanted. We're not sure if they bribed Santa or just tricked him into putting them on his good list:). We had a wonderful time visiting with family throughout the day. It was truly a "Merry" Christmas.

Twas the Night Before Christmas

On Christmas Eve, we always gather together for good food, family togetherness, a talent show put on by the grandkids, hearing and acting out the nativity story, and opening up presents from Grandpa and Grandma. After enjoying a delicious dinner, we sat down for the nativity play. This year, Sierra and Todd were our narrators.

Zane played an innkeeper. A very cute one, if I may say so myself.

All of the children participated... at least for a few seconds.

Lance, being the oldest and only boy for many years, always gets to be Joseph. Although he pointed out the that girls sometimes play shepherds or wisemen so they should also be able to also play Joseph. We'll have to see what happens next year.

Jordan, Paige, and Madison played three of the most beautiful wisemen ever:).

Our angels this year: Kennedy, Grace, Kathleen, and Rachel (and McKenna not in the pic).

Shepherds were Wes, Jonathan, and Conover. Don't ya love the sheep?!

Tim was another innkeeper... a very tired innkeeper. gotta love it. After the play, the fun of opening presents began.

Sweet Mother made these absolutely adorable aprons for all of her daughters! (Mary and Danielle were at their in-laws this year) Thanks Mom!

The big girls in the family got some cute scarves and money to go shopping with. Woohoo!

The younger boys were pretty excited about remote controlled Lightning McQueens! Somehow I didn't get a pic of Zane and his legos and Lance and his leatherman too. OH, and Todd got a gun that he is pretty excited to go pig hunting with all the men ....to Texas - Wild Pig Hunting. Thanks Dad and Mom for always putting on a wonderful evening and making some beautiful memories for us all!

Snuggle Time

Testing out the looks of a new rug, everyone got into snuggling on the softness of it.

On the Hunt!

Last year, we converted Todd back to a real tree. Not the artificial one that the kids thought "was tradition" to assemble BRANCH by BRANCH every year. But, instead, we started our new (but really old...and best) tradition of going back to the tree lot and going on a tree hunt...to find the best tree ever (within our budget:). This year, we were running late, but a week before Christmas we were finally able to go on our hunt in the Home Depot tree lot. Brrrrr. It was cold out there!

Zane liked this one ....or maybe he just liked to hug it?

Weston heard us talking about the good smell and so he had to walk around and smell all the pine trees. Love that pine scent ...something we never got with our artificial, limb by limb assembled tree.

Todd wonders is this the one? Yes! We found our tree. It was a successful hunt afterall.

Then, we went inside Home Depot to pay for the tree. The boys didn't get too far inside the door. They got sidetracked with all the singing stuffed animals. How many can one get to sing all at the same time?