Christmas 2016

Christmas day is one of my most favorite days of the year! I just love the feeling of Christmas :) We woke up to a houseful of presents and ate a fun breakfast of Christmas Tree cinnamon rolls (which I didn't get a picture of darn it).

In true kid form, these two were (not so) patiently waiting for the rest of the family to join them under the Christmas tree to see what Santa had left for them. They were just giddy, running back and forth between the tree and the rest of us, asking if we were ready yet and if they could open gifts. The excitement in the house was simply off the charts!

I politely asked that we not tear through the gifts as fast as we had in previous years. I know...I'm such a downer! But they abided by my request and took turns opening gifts (for the most part), and it was so much more fun! They got to see the excitement in each other's eyes and really pay attention to more than just themselves.

Lincoln got a few larger toys, one being a grill so he can stand outside and grill with daddy. We use our grill year round despite the temps so he's pretty pumped to help daddy!

He also scored this sweet ORANGE snow blower and is over the moon excited! Seriously, I don't understand where this wish-list came from, but he kept telling everyone that Santa was bringing him an orange (his favorite color) snow blower.
Wait...what!?

I'm so thankful that Santa came through! He's going to love helping out next time it snows!

Sidney and Regan used their own money this year (Regan's unprompted idea) to buy each other gifts. Sidney's reaction after opening her shopkins stuffed animal brought tears to my eyes. She raced over to Regan to give her a huge hug and nearly knocked her into the fireplace!

And Sidney scored a Little Live pet dog "Lulu" from Santa. It's the closest thing we're getting to a real pet around here so she's loving her up as much as possible. The thing even breathes like a real dog! Super cute :)

Grandma Jan and Papa came up in the rain (yes, it was raining in Minnesota on Christmas!) with their ugly sweaters to spend the rest of the day with us. At that moment, after seeing their awesome tops, we decided that next year we will ALL be finding ugly Christmas sweaters!! It's our new tradition, and Ryan has already been online looking for his!! I love it :)

We soaked in as much time with them as we could, seeing as though they departed for Texas after leaving us :( but thankfully they gave each of  us plane tickets to come visit and so now we are busy preparing for our winter vacation! 

I had to get a picture of each kiddo in front of the tree and then one together, because they are growing up just so fast.

Lincoln: 3 years old

Sidney: 8 years old (with Lulu)

Regan: 10 years

After a huge lunch with turkey, potatoes, and all of the fixings plus dessert, my dad promptly fell asleep snuggled next to Regan's new gigantic sized teddy bear!

One of my most favorite 'decorations' are all the Christmas cards we get throughout the month. We line them up this wall and occasionally I will find someone standing just staring at them. I found a way to hang on to them for longer than 3 weeks (thanks Pinterest!) and will be creating a cute little album to pull out again year after year. 

                               

I hope you and yours had the most lovely Christmas. Once again, I'm beyond thankful for our health and happiness.

Let's all just pardon Ryan's purple Vikes pants and recall that he had knee surgery only 3 days before Christmas. It added a bit of stress to our holiday but he has seemingly recovered just fine and again, makes us thankful for our health!

 Merry Christmas!

And before I forget, here was our 2016 Christmas Card:

Christmas Eve 2016

It's hard for me to imagine that Christmas is already over, and we are heading into the New Year. I love December because we look forward to some extra family days, good food, treats and celebrating Christmas. Once it's over, I get a little sad that we have 3 months of winter weather to endure.... so let's re-live those 2 magical days of Christmas:

We dressed in our red on Christmas eve, all for SANTA is what Lincoln said :)

I love these three cuties more than life itself. And I don't often get into pictures so I forced the camera on whoever was nearby and jumped in for a few pictures. Can you believe how tall Regan is getting? Standing next to her really points out her height. I'm not super tall by any means (5'6"), but she is on my heels and catching up quickly. Her feet are officially bigger than mine...and she's only in 5th grade! I made her stand next to her growth chart the other day and realized she's grown 1.5" in the last few months. Wowzas!

Grandma and Grandpa Friederich came up on Christmas eve and spoiled the kiddos rotten for the first of many celebrations. Regan's favorite was her gift cards, Sidney got a cozy robe that she wears nightly and Lincoln will be loving up on the wee-ride copilot to attach to my bike this summer. He loves the burley and I think this will take it to the next level for him.

We ate food, opened presents and just enjoyed the evening together.

And before bedtime, the girls/I put out our luminaries to line the driveway and side walk. When I told Ryan about my "project" 2 weeks prior, he waved his arms as though he was money just flying away....aka: a waste of money. But even he admitted it looked pretty cool. There were many slow cars driving past so I knew it was a hit, and definitely something we will continue. Every Christmas, it appears that more and more of our neighborhood is participating in this fun annual tradition. I'm so excited to be a part of it!

 

As we laid our heads to rest on Christmas eve, bidding farewell to the beloved Ellie the elf, I prayed our little ones remembered the real meaning of Christmas.

Pre-Christmas

In the days that led up to Christmas, we did all sorts of Christmas-ey things like baking and taking photos. Unfortunately, our baking wasn't exactly like the girls and I would like for it to be, but it will suffice. With Lincoln's allergies, we have to be super careful while using peanut (butter) and any dairy so we can't let the girls make a mess of the kitchen when he is around or we run the chance of spending the next 24 hours in the ER. So we found a few key things that we could make and had some fun. I loved watching Sidney work on her (safe for Lincoln) cut out cookies. She even frosted many of them in his beloved favorite color: orange :) Such a sweet big sister! 

I love that the kiddos will still let me dress them, pose them and take all sorts of pictures. This time of year is so much fun with all of the lights and colors and decorations. One night, I convinced them to put on their winter pajama's (Lincoln only sleeps in one specific pair of PJ's so this took some begging on my part). I took this same photo last year and adored it so much that I had to recreate it again this year. 

Our new fire place stone is a definitely a conversation piece these days, and I love how it looks in pictures too. This was our first fire (we remove the middle stockings for safety purposes...it's not that we only have 2 stockings!), and everyone was so warm and cozy cuddled up in the family room. 

I couldn't resist placing a few lights on Lincoln and snapping some shots. I realize these may have been cuter had I thought of doing it when he was 1 or 2, but I'll take it at age 3. 

I love this wonderful time of the year!! 

Christmas celebration

We had our first round of Christmas celebrations last weekend when Ben and Jon came to town. It was a weekend full of family, fun and food! They stayed at the new JW Marriott at the MOA and we were able to take advantage of the location (and the pool) Friday night when the kids got to swim in the pool and then take in the mall in the evening. Saturday morning, we hung out at home and the girls put together the Gingerbread house while Lincoln napped. I haven't figured out a peanut/dairy free gingerbread house so I'm thankful that he still takes naps :) 

Lincoln begged for days upon days to open presents, and he didn't even care when the gift wasn't his. He just wants to open them! 

Oh how we love it when Hope comes around and we get to spend some extra time finding out about her coursework at the U of M and how busy she stays everyday. Our kiddos love to hang out with her, play on her phone and hear about life as a college student. 

Ben and Jon bought Lincoln 3 variations of these toys ("because I couldn't figure out which one to buy")! It's a working drill with holes for screws. Can you tell his favorite color?...everything is ORANGE for that boy. 

Each time we all get together, I make sure to take a family picture. With the help of my awesome gorilla pod (best Christmas present ever that I got some years ago), I work on getting just the right set up. And thankfully I have a few models who happily pose....: 

Eventually I get it right and we nearly completely block the entire tree but at least we all fit and are smiling at the camera. 

One down, more to go! Merry Christmas! 

Slowing down

I happen to work with some great people who are ahead of me in the game of raising children. Some of them have kids that are either grown and gone or close to that. The one thing I continue to hear from those who have kids older than mine is "enjoy this time, it goes by fast". Similarly I've been told that the "holidays aren't as exciting without little kids around". And so, in heeding their advice, I'm working hard at slowing down. Really slowing down. Now this is not an easy feat when our girls are in 3 dance classes each, softball clinics, gymnastics and have loads of homework. But I'm doing my best. Especially when the little guy asks "pway wif me?". It's a work in progress for me, because 1) I feel the need to keep a very tidy home and with 5 people living under one roof, we produce a lot of laundry and dishes, and 2) I don't particularly like to "pway" trains or trucks. I've changed my tune and am really trying hard to get down on the floor, race trucks, paint pictures and chase him around and around. And you know what?, he loves it when I do! Plus it actually makes him better at playing on his own when I do have to go switch out laundry or scrub the floors. 

As the saying goes: the days are long but the years go fast. Thank you to my amazing friends who remind me of this fact when I still have time to enjoy them when they're young! 

House update: renovations complete!

We are finally finished with our home renovations. This process started back in early spring 2015 when we made some financial decisions to take the plunge and do some upgrades to the house. Fast forward through summer and we had chosen a general contractor and signed a contract. EEK!

Our completely functional but TOTALLY outdated kitchen was due for a make over.

 

A little background on why we choose the main floor. It was definitely not our original plan. My dad had always told me that you should continually update your house every year. So we painted, added a pool heater, a new AC, finished the basement and updated our washer/dryer in the first several years of owning this home. But I had always wished we had one more bedroom upstairs. And I had come up with some glorious plans to add a master and then leave the existing bedrooms the way they were. So we got some estimates and realized that plan was about $100,000 over our budget. Yea, at that point we might as well just move.

So our contractor suggested we make some changes to the main level instead. Afterall, that is actually where we do most of our living.

Made total sense.

So we picked the least updated part of our home and started to make a new plan.



Yes, the (fake) hardwood floors and all of the appliances were very functional. So they didn't need to be changed. But they were dated. Very  dated!

And that white painted brick on the fire place was a huge eye sore!!

The kitchen/family room flooring was actually something I had wanted changed from the moment we moved in. But again, it was functional.

 



Finally one October day I received a message from our contractor that they would be over in 10 days to start the work. YIKES! I had exactly 10 days to pack up our main level and move out of the kitchen and family room (and in between that time I had to host Lincoln's birthday party!). Frazzled was a good word to describe how I felt.

With great effort, we made it happen and I came home from work one Monday to a construction zone. 

 

At the beginning of this project, I joked to Ryan that it would be a test of our marriage. I had seen enough HGTV to know that renovations are tough. Decisions need to be made, living spaces are disrupted and tension is high. And that's exactly how it felt to us.

The house was a complete disaster for a total of 4 weeks. And the poor girls were told they could not invite friends over until it was over. There was a time when the train table took over the middle of the toy room and we had to squeeze the refrigerator next to it. Our food was in totes stacked up against the dining room. We had 4 couches in the formal living room and Regan commented it was like a movie theater.

I'm thankful that the fall weather was incredibly mild so we could spend so much time outside.

 





 

After the demolition phase, decision time started. Finding the color for the new cabinets was a huge challenge. I knew what I wanted but the stain guys could not read my mind. After days of trial and error, I was finally asked to produce my inspiration for color. And just like that, they finally got it right.

Note: none of the options below were right.

                           

 

I stared at paint colors for longer than I would like to admit as well. Ryan cares about paint about as much as he cares about watching HGTV. So he was not any help. Shane was over one night and I tried to enlist his help until I remembered he's color blind and his input was useless to me. Regan finally helped me make this decision and I love it! 

 

                            

 

Lincoln and I spent many Fridays walking the aisles of Home Depot, Menard's and the Tile Shop searching for the right additions to the new kitchen. My phone is littered with pictures like this, so I could bring home ideas and ask Ryan his advice.

I'm so thankful that I have some amazing friends and coworkers who gave me their input so we could finally make some decisions! Slowly but surely, the house was coming back together.

 



    

And then....disaster. With the painting/staining complete, appliances were finally delivered and our kitchen was put back in order. For a little.

The refrigerator was too big but to fix the problem, would cost another $1000 and we were already well over budget. The microwave was FAR too big and had to go back for an exchange. Ryan called me during this debacle with heart palpitations. It had finally taken it's toll on him and he was stressing out. Unfortunately, that's not the end of the appliance disaster.

We managed to get everything in it's place and in working order, thanks to Grandpa Arnie! On Thanksgiving day, as we packed for a night away, I decided to run the dishwasher so we could come home to clean dishes. Lincoln was running through the house and promptly landed on his bottom after sliding through the kitchen. He was soaking wet! Did he just pee his pants and slip in it? Stand him up and give him a hug only to realize there was a giant puddle of water coming out of the dishwasher on our brand new hard wood floors!

After 16+ hours on the phone over 2 days with Best Buy, I have come to the notion that we will never ever purchase another product from Best Buy. Especially an appliance. Their sales team is top notch, but the warehouse and customer services teams leave a lot to be desired. Let's just say they showed up to exchange the dishwasher and had a flat screen TV in hand.....and then when they were expected to return with the correct item, they never showed up. And then they wanted us to wait another 10 days for rescheduling.

Worst customer service ever. 

                                    

                                  

Painting the ceilings did not fall into the budget either....to save a lot of money, we opted to do this work ourselves. Ryan's not eager to paint so I got started one afternoon during nap. Unfortunately, I climbed up on the counter top and grazed my head along the freshly painted ceiling and my hair turned a nice shade of grey. Sidney laughed and said it looked like a porcupine!

 





 

And then one day, 4 weeks after we had started, it was all finished. And we breathed a huge sigh of relief to have our home back again.

The layout didn't change, the Cambria counters are the same, but everything else is different. The 2 step down to the family room/eat in kitchen was completely reconfigured and made the top 2 items for Ryan (first is the fireplace of course). I'm completely in love with the new flooring and to have the same hardwood floor extend the entire main level is something I have always wanted.

It's gorgeous and yes, was totally worth it.

 



                                  

 

The fireplace is probably the biggest transformation. That old ugly white (err, grey!) brick was gross and embarrassing. We kept the existing mantel and put some effort in to getting it to match the kitchen cabinets (thanks to my  mom and Arnie!). Sadly we haven't been able to use the fireplace yet as it needs 30 days to cure or we run the risk of the new stone falling to the ground.



                                     

With furniture back in it's spots and toys spread out where they belong, we can actually say it probably wasn't as bad as it seemed. But I'm very happy the renovations are over and as I told people along the way: "this is the reason people just move!"

If you're looking for a good contractor, let us know!







Christmas prep--round 1

I suspect that I will have several rounds of "Christmas prep" the next couple of weeks. But so far, we've trimmed the tree, seen Santa, visited Macy's 8th floor display and celebrated St. Nick's day...it's been a busy couple of weeks! Somehow I managed to mail out our Christmas cards this week as well; what a relief that is. We sure love getting all of the fun cards in the mail and seeing what everyone has been up to!

Sidney trimming the tree 

We managed to only lose 2 glass ornaments this year. Maybe a new record? I still like to remember the time that the entire tree (fully decorated!) tipped over and we lost dozens of ornaments. Ryan got the task of holding up the tree while I ran to Target for a new stand (and maybe a little shopping along the way). He still doesn't think that story is funny.... :)

St. Nick blessed us with some fun treats on the morning of 12/6. Gone are the days that he left a few coins in shoes. Now it's sequin mermaid pillows, toys and snacks! Lucky kiddos.

We are treated with a horse drawn sleigh ride after picking out the best Christmas tree in the lot! Sidney opted out of the ride this year, feeling far too cold and opting for the warmth of the truck.

Sidney swears this is definitely "the real Santa". And you know what, we have to agree. This guy is the BEST! We pick him on purpose, because he's not the typical mall Santa, and he spends time talking to the kiddos instead of just snapping a picture. I love how he picks up on our cues and immediately knew the kids names (I happened to say them as we walked in the room). The eyes on Sidney lit up! I love it.

In a rather hurried decision several weeks ago, I bought tickets to take Lincoln to Disney on Ice on a Friday morning...turns out, it was a day that the girls weren't in school! Opps. But Lincoln had a blast and loves every second of these shows. It's so much fun to experience these things just one more time with the littlest guy :)

Macy's Santaland never seems to disappoint. This year was another special year because Sidney was able to read all of the captions and enjoyed picking up on things she hadn't noticed in prior years. Regan liked finding what might be slightly different, or locating all of the furry friends around each room. And Lincoln was just in awe of it all, so much so that we had to go through it two times!

Here's to our first round of Christmas prep. We all love this season, and although the date never changes, it always seems to sneak up on me! I'm soaking in all of these fun traditions, knowing that it won't be long and our kiddos won't have the same sparkle in their eye this time of year. So I'm hanging on for dear life!