Five on Friday: Christmas Edition

 

Happy Friday!

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



One

We have our Christmas Tree up and a majority of our presents wrapped (though not all the presents are shown in this picture). We went to the Kirkwood Farmer's Market for our tree this year. We got a Frasier Fir and it looks so pretty in our living room.

Two

This past Tuesday evening, Jake and I, our moms and the kiddos went on a wagon ride through Santa's Magical Kingdom to see the lights! It was so much fun.

Three

While we were at Santa's Magical Kingdom, we also met Santa and had our picture taken with him. He was a great Santa. Originally the picture was just supposed to be of Santa and the kids, but Avery wouldn't take a picture with him if we weren't in it with her. She talked to Santa, told him that she wanted Doc McStuffins toys for Christmas and she even gave him a high five, but she would not sit or stand by him for a picture. Jackson did great. He told Santa that he wanted Dinosaurs and Space toys for Christmas and stood right by him for the picture, but Avery wasn't having it. So for the 2nd year in a row, we got a family picture with Santa!

Four

I mailed out our Christmas Cards yesterday. I went with a buffalo plaid theme since it matched our pictures. I'm really happy with the way they turned out!

Five

We're gearing up for Christmas festivities starting tomorrow. Our festivities are all spread out and I love it! I love having it all spread out and not all in one day! Tomorrow we have Jake's family celebration, Jackson has his school party on Tuesday (Avery's was yesterday), Christmas Eve is spent with my Mom's side of the family (her dad and brother and his family) and then we go to church that evening. We are spending Christmas Day at home! This is our 4th year in a row to just spend the day at home and we love it! I'm so excited to watch the kids open their gifts, sip some coffee by the fire and stay in my pajamas all day long!! Then the Monday after Christmas we'll be hosting my immediate family (my parents, sister and her family). So we have a lot to look forward to this week!

I hope you all have the Merriest of Christmases and a Wonderful New Year!



Family Pictures 2016

On Thanksgiving day, I roped my family (my parents, my sister and her family and my family of 4) into dressing for family pictures! I brought my camera along and had my uncle snap a big family picture of us and then between my sister and I, we took a few individual family pictures as well. They turned out so cute, so I thought I'd share a few of our favorites.

We decided to do a buffalo plaid theme. Some of us wore buffalo plaid and some of us just wore, red, black and/or gray. I think it turned out pretty cute!

My mom and dad with all the grand-kids.

My mom and dad. :-)

My sister and her family.

And last but not least, my family!

We were done in a matter of about 20 minutes, maybe less. It was overall painless and they turned out great!! So very worth it.

Walt Disney World Vacation || Part 7

We spent all day Friday at Animal Kingdom and had such a great day!! I hadn't spent much time in Animal Kingdom when I was at Disney World last and didn't realize just how cool it was.

When we first got there we rode a dinosaur ride and then Avery met Pocahontas and got her autograph.

 

Next we rode the safari, which was awesome!!

 

 

Then we took a train over to meet Chip and Dale and Rafiki. Jackson was very excited to meet these characters!! :-) He had wanted to meet Chip and Dale when we were at Disneyland last year, but they weren't out and Jackson was very into Lion Guard and Lion King at the time, so he was excited to meet Rafiki.



After that, we got back on the train to head over to our fast pass to meet Safari Mickey and Minnie!



After that we stopped for lunch and then Jake took Jackson to ride a few rides while My parents and I took Avery to see the Finding Nemo Show!! It was awesome and I highly recommend it. We had front row seats right by the stage!

Next up, we all took turns riding Expedition Everest multiple times. It was by far my favorite ride at Disney World. It was SO much fun!! I think Jackson rode it about 4-5 times it was so fun!

After that we went and saw the Lion King show which was also really great!!

After the Lion King show, we stopped and got a Dole Whip! SO yummy!!!

Then I took Avery over to meet Russell and Dug from the movie Up!

Since it was our last full day at Disney World, we ended the day doing some shopping for souvenirs. These kids aren't spoiled or anything. Ha!

After leaving Animal Kingdom, we had dinner and then watched the Magic Kingdom fireworks from our resort pool! It was a great way to end such a magical vacation!!

The next morning we loaded up and made the long drive back home!

Goodbye Grand Floridian... until next time!




Be sure to check out Parts one, two, three, four, five and six of our Disney Trip if you missed them.

Walt Disney World Vacation || Part 6

Thursday, Jake and I originally had planned to go to Universal Studios and let my parents hang out with the kids around the hotel. But Jackson had so much fun at the beach on Monday, that we decided to do a second beach day. I had also wanted to take the kids over to the Art of Animation Resort and we were running out of opportunities to be able to do that, so I thought Thursday evening would be a good time for that.

So we got up and headed to a different beach on Thursday. We went to the Daytona Beach area and found a great beach with a splash pad for the kids. It was a lot of fun.

Avery was rather crabby while we were at the beach that day. I'm not sure if she was just tired or what, but she wouldn't leave my side and wouldn't let me get in the water much. So I stayed out with her and we played in the sand.

We were only there for a couple hours (if that) before a storm blew in. Eventually it poured down rain and the life guard made us all get out of the water. It was fun while it lasted and such a nice beach.

After the beach, we headed back to Orlando. We got cleaned up and drove over to the Art of Animation Resort. I wanted to take the kids there because I had seen it on the Disney World website and thought they would really like seeing it. It is broken up into 4 sections and there was a Cars section and a Lion King section that I knew Jackson would like. This resort was so cool and totally geared for kids. Each room is themed according to what section you stay in. There were pools, playgrounds and all kinds of cool stuff for them to see. We could have stayed there so much longer. It was really a cool resort.

We started on the Cars end and it was so very cool. They had life-sized cars of each of the main characters.

It was like you were right there in Radiator Springs.

They just loved checking out each of the cars! So cool! Disney really is so great at paying attention to such detail. I love it.

After checking all of the Cars area, we headed to the Finding Nemo area next.

Then we headed over to the Lion King area, which was also very cool.

The fourth section was The Little Mermaid, but unfortunately, we ran out of daylight to go check it out, but I'm sure it's just as cool as the rest of the resort.

It was another wonderful day in Florida!

There's a couple more Disney Posts to come, so stay tuned.
And be sure to check out Parts one, two, three, four and five of our Disney Trip if you missed them.