The post of Christmas past

December was filled with Christmas cheer, snow days, beach days, and...
...reindeer hats?

During one of our snow days we broke out a gingerbread making kit and got to work on putting the house together and decorating it. Ben did his job and was the project manager on this one. [I was the photographer.]

Afterwards, we were able to play in the snow a bit. Believe me, the kids didn't last long. I had a hard time deciding if the pain of getting them into their snow clothes was worth the time they spent outside.

I'd say the views were worth it.

Notice that the snow is up to Jack's knees. You'll see in a future post how much higher the snow has gotten.

We went from snow...

...to sand.

This was the view from the condo my Mom got us at Christmas time. We travelled from cold PA to sunny FL for the holidays. My Mom tried something new this year. She kicked my sister and I out to a condo on the beach. Between the 2 of us we have 5 kids ages 4 and under. My family has gotten so big that it's hard to all get together. She thought there would be less chaos more room for everyone at her house if she did this. She does, however, have a flaw in her "smart" plan. We now expect the same treatment every time we go to visit her. Mom, don't forget to book the condo for spring break!

This was the view from our balcony:

..and the balcony in to the condo:

We had a great time visiting with family and staying in such a nice place. On Christmas morning we all packed up and headed to my parents house to see what Santa brought us.

Jack got a trumpet, among other things.

The boys love their semi trucks from the movie "Cars".

Anna Scott got lots of dress up items and enjoyed eating her ring pop on her throne.

The best part was just spending time with family and letting the kids play together. I love seeing our kids play with the toys that we played with as children. This Fisher Price giraffe was my brothers, which means it's really old.

Love you, bro!

And I just had to include a shot of the newest member of the family. Isn't he a cutie? He's a happy baby, but you don't want to be around if his Mommy leaves the room. He has a little separation anxiety going on.

We left this zoo in Florida to head back to our zoo in Hershey. We found when we got home that Santa had visited our house, too! Jack got this amazing remote control dinosaur.

He beamed with excitement as he learned to use it. The funny thing was how skittish we was from it. He loved it, but still wasn't sure of it. He liked to control it while hiding behind me.

And Anna Scott got a kitchen. Both of the kids LOVE playing with this. They also love making a mess with it. We're working on picking up after ourselves.

Hope all of you had a merry Christmas filled with love, joy, and family.