Super Bowl Party

We decided to have a Super Bowl Party at our house this year and it was so much fun. We had a group of around 40 people, many being kids. It was a house-full but so much fun. Everyone brought their favorite appetizer and drink of choice, so we had a ton of food. It was all delicious and everyone had a great time. And bonus, the Eagles beat the Patriots! Yay! Not to mention Justin Timberlake performed at the half-time show!

The day before the party I had the kids help me make some brownies in the shape of footballs. They loved helping.



I also spent a majority of Saturday cleaning and decorating for the party!



Everyone had a great time!



Five on Friday

Happy Friday!
Today I'm linking up with Christina, April and Natasha for Five on Friday!

One

I've been wanting a map to hang in our living room so that we could pin our travels and Jake got me a really cool one for Christmas. I finally got it hung on the wall this past weekend and pinned our travels. The yellow pin is home (St. Louis, MO), the red pins are where Jake and I have traveled together and the blue pins are where we've traveled as a family. I can't wait to continue to add more pins to our map. ☺

Two

Santa brought Avery a Frozen sleigh for Christmas. She LOVES it and was able to get it out a couple weekends ago while it was warm outside. She's gotten the hang of driving it pretty well. It's really cute!!



Three

Last Friday was Jackson's 100th day of school! I can't believe he's a little more than half way done with the year already. Everyone in Kindergarten had to make a 100 days of school shirt and have 100 things on it. Jackson and I did a little research on Pinterest and he decided to do 100 sports balls on his shirt. I found these stick on foam sports balls at Hobby Lobby along with some foam letters to spell out "Having a Ball for 100 Days". It turned out really cute!

Four

I thought I'd share a few pictures I've taken of the kids lately. Right after Christmas is my slowest time for Storybook Photography. It's cold outside and everyone has just had family pictures taken. So I don't have too much going on usually. It always gives me a chance to get my camera out around the house and take pictures of my kids in their own element, which I always enjoy.

Avery eating lunch last Monday while I was off. She LOVES peanut butter and often asks for a spoon full of it for a snack.

Jackson loving on Max. Max looks less than thrilled, but he tolerates the kids well. ;-)

Jackson and Avery have your typical brother/sister relationship. They often annoy each other on purpose and don't always play well together or agree on much, but this day I caught them playing well together with Jackson's Bat-Cave that he got for Christmas. It was a sweet moment and I'm glad I was able to capture it.



Five
If you haven't seen it yet, please make every effort to see The Greatest Showman at the theaters. You will be so glad you did. It's SUCH a good movie. Probably one of my top 5 movies of all time. In fact, I loved it so much I'd pay to go see it again in the theaters.

"Canvas Press" Review

**Sponsored Post: This post is sponsored by Canvas Press, but the content and opinions expressed here are my own.**

Every year I love to get our family picture on a canvas to hang in our gallery wall above our sectional in the living room. I have tried several different companies and have always had a pleasant experience, but this year I used a new company called Canvas Press and they were absolutely wonderful to work with. From the exceptional quality to the extremely fast turn-around time, I was really happy with everything from start to finish.

I ordered my canvas on a Tuesday and it arrived that same week on Friday. You can't beat that fast turn-around time. The canvas was wrapped beautifully and the colors are spot on and very vibrant. It was easy to upload my photo and order the canvas on their very user-friendly website. I really can't say enough great things about this company.

They have a special right now where you can get 55% off (plus free shipping on orders of $50 or more), so now is a great time to order.



Five on Friday

Happy Friday!
Today I'm linking up with Christina, April and Natasha for Five on Friday!

One
At the beginning of January I made my annual Storybook Photography video. I've done this for the past couple years as a way to say thank you to all my clients for continuing to choose me as their family photographer. I always post it on my Storybook Photography Facebook Page, but thought I'd share it here as well. I just add 1 photo from each session I had that year and they're always so fun for me to look back on.

Two

A co-worker of mine got us all a Christmas Cactus for Christmas last year and I'm so excited to have this bloom on it, along with several other buds that are getting ready bloom soon. :-) When he gave them to us last year, they had already bloomed and there weren't any blooms left on them, so it's exciting to see these pretty little blooms on there now.

Three

Jackson had his second basketball game of these season this past Saturday. He actually got the ball got to shoot a basket, unfortunately it didn't go in, but I was so excited he got the opportunity to try!

Four

I took a few pictures the other night of Avery in the bathtub and I just love them. :-)

Five

Last weekend I put up my Valentines Day decorations and I also finally got a felt letter board. I had been seeing everyone else's on blogs and instagram and loved them, so I couldn't wait to get one for myself. I happened to find this one at Hobby Lobby for 50% off!! Such a good deal, I just couldn't pass it up. I love it so much!



Happy Friday! Have a great weekend!

Pre-Christmas Events

Between our neighborhood Christmas party, the kids Christmas parties at school, Avery's Christmas party at dance class and snow the Saturday before Christmas, there was a lot going on before Christmas that I didn't ever get around to sharing that I'd like to have here on the blog to look back on.

So first I'll share our neighborhood Christmas party that our neighbors across the street hosted on Dec. 9th. It was so much fun! We had 15 kids and 1 on the way and we had 13 adults (we were missing 1 as he was out of town for work).

Here are a few pictures!

Avery and her friend Ellie. 

Jackson and his friend Andy. 

Our best attempt at getting a picture of all 15 kids. Ha. 

All of the adults.

The Sunday before Christmas I dressed Avery up in her adorable new Christmas dress that our pastor's wife got for her. She looked absolutely adorable so I had to get a quick picture of her. Jackson dressed nice that day too, but wasn't as eager to get in a picture. Ha.

Later that same Sunday, we went to Six Flags again for Holiday in the Park with my Mother-in-Law. Our main reason for going was to get a picture with Santa, but we had fun writing letters to Santa, riding a few rides and seeing the Nativity Show again so that my MIL could see it. She loved it of course.

That Monday before Christmas, Avery had her Christmas party at dance class. She and I made little gifts for her teachers and she was so excited to give them their gifts. We just bought little sequence stockings in the Dollar Spot at Target and filled them each with a pair of dollar spot Christmas socks and a nail polish. I found the tag here and it says "Thanks for Always Keeping me on my Toes, Merry Christmas." The kids were able to wear Christmas colored dance attire and they each brought a treat for the class. Avery's treat was Christmas fruit snacks. :-)

 

 

Then that Wednesday before Christmas was both Jackson and Avery's last day before Winter break and they each had their Christmas parties that day. So I took the day off work and was able to go to Avery's party that morning and Jackson's party that afternoon! It was such a fun day!

Avery's Party!

 

 Avery with her friend Aubrei. They were so cute in their reindeer shirts and tutus. :-)

 

Jackson's Party!

For Jackson's party I was in charge of coming up with a craft for his class to make during the party. I found this cute ornament idea on Pinterest and the kids all had fun making one during the party.

 

 

 

 

Jackson with his teacher, Mrs. Wenz.

The Friday night before Christmas, us and our neighbors across the street drove over to Candy Cane Lane to drive through the lights and then went to have dinner at Mellow Mushroom. In all the years I've lived in St. Louis, we've never driven through Candy Cane Lane, so it was fun to see it finally. The neighbors on this street go all out on Christmas decorations and people come from all over town to see it. We actually had to wait close to an hour to get through it. It was really neat.

 

Then lastly, the Saturday before Christmas, we woke up to snow!! The kids have never been sledding so we got all bundled up and headed over to the park to do some sledding before going to our first of 4 family Christmas celebrations, (which I'll share in a separate post.)



We had so much fun at all the parties and events leading up to Christmas. It really got us all in the Christmas spirit.