Christmas Eve 2011

The long awaited Christmas Eve had arrived! We had two very excited boys who just spent a full week at Disney...what a Christmas!

It's really important for Mike and I to develop some traditions during the holidays that are little bits and pieces from our own childhood all tied up into some new, special ones just for us. We've decided that Christmas Eve is a perfect time for decorating gingerbread houses. I'm sure over the years, they will evolve and get more and more creative. This year, we stuck to simple ones seeing that our day was cut short driving home 6 hours from Orlando. None-the-less, we had a blast!

Big decisions!

Big sweet tooth!

It didn't take long for Axel to remember how to use the frosting bag. :)

Lucas discovered a new use for pixi stixs...blue snow!

We had two adorable gingerbread houses sit on our counter for a week or so and I didn't manage to take a finished photo. O'well, I too need to get better at documenting our new traditions. Each day the houses got smaller and smaller. Two little theifs...sugar theifs, as sneaky as could be enjoyed them to the fullest.

We had special drinks with our special dinner. Looking back now, I need to get out some placemats!

Poppers or Crackers...a tradition we adopted from Mike's family. They make a big bang when pulled apart and come with fun little prizes...crowns, jokes, small knick-knacks, etc. Everyone has to wear their crown during dinner too.

Go Dad!Axel was pretty impressed!

Lucas was so excited! He had been waiting soooo long for Christmas Eve and if finally arrived!

Mommy's turn.

That evening, we let the boys open gifts from each other. Lucas received a Dinosaur Atlas from Axel. Axel received a Disney remote controlled train from Lucas. Each boy made special secret shopping trips to pick out a perfect gift for each other.

Big smiles all around.

Daddy surprised Mommy when he brought out a gift for me. I instantly had a few helpers to bust into the package.

I was so excited to discover it was a new camera! I lost my camera earlier in the year so I had to befriend my old one. Now, it's time to learn the in's and out's of my new Canon 100S...and S is for Sweet!

Thank you to all of my family who contributed to this awesome gift. It made my Christmas and I was so excited to be able to use it Christmas morning!

The boys also opened up PJ gifts from Grandma & Grandpa! So cute, so cozy and so perfect for Christmas Eve.

Christmas was really here!

Mommy and her old camera messing around! The new one was charging!

Before heading to bed, we sprinkled reindeer food on the front lawn, left out cookies & milk for Santa and read "The Night Before Christmas" with Daddy.

Sweet dreams!

Last Day in Orlando

Since we maximised our time at the parks, we decided to stay at the hotel and relax a little on our last vacation day. It was beautiful and we had a wonderful time. It was a perfect way to end a great trip.

Back to the Activity Center for some Christmas cookie decorating. So many sprinkles, so little time!

We also made it back to Downtown Disney. The Lego shop upgraded all their outdoor Lego statues. They were very impressive and the boys loved them...especially the Dragon!

What a great trip! It was finally time to head home to celebrate Christmas!

Our First Epcot Visit

We arrived to Epcot before the gates opened. This was our first trip and we wanted to be sure to have plenty of time to get it all in.

We hit all the rides early on before things got crowded. Some favs were the Test Race Track, Soaring, Mission to Mars and I'm sure others I'm missing. At one point, all the adults decided to go to the Soaring Ride. Mike & I had already been so we ended up with all the kids.

Instead of sitting down at a table trying to keep everyone occupied, we opted for a more adventurous approach. We took them on a boat ride! We were very proud of ourselves and all the kids were perfect angles...thank goodness! It was fun for us all and made us pretty happy we have two kids. Gets a little tricky when you are out numbered. It was like having two sets of twins and a 6 year old all at once. :)

Sorry for the red eyes...we have a new editing program I have yet to figure out!

At one point, Mike looked at me and said, "This is what my parents had to deal with!" Too funny! Good job Grandma & Grandpa for surving all those kids in one house!

One of our plans was to taste delicious baked goods from some of the countries. Our first stop was France and we got a little over excited. Luckily, we had 6 adults and 5 kids with us to help share. I'm sure Logan and Dominic ate just as much as the rest of us...right?! Everything was awesome and it made my year!

Cuteness in France!

Even cuterness in France! I'm sure "cuterness" is a word especially when describing Dominic.

To get the boys excited about seeing all the countires, we took time to make a little craft...teddy bear on a stick. They were able to get a stamp at every country and have their name written in that countries lauguage. It was pretty cool and the Arabic hand writting was gorgeous.

These Japanese drummers caugh everyone's attention.

Axel quickly discoverd the model train area. He was enamored! He studied the route, and raced back and forth waiting for it to hit it's next destination. I think he was there for at least 30 minutes and would have stayed all night if we would have let him.

Axel taking a little rest after train chasing while tapping his foot to the beat of the music!

Lucas really wanted to go to China so we made our journey around to all the countries and finally arrived. He loves the buildings!

Daddy going back to his roots and eating a Norweign snack of smoked salmon, multigrain bread, hard boiled eggs, red onion and goat cheese. It was tasty!

We really enjoyed watching the street shows in the countries we passed through.

At the end of the afternoon, we took a break to have a snack. Axel and Marcus are best buds and they loved teasing the birds with fake food...leaves, sticks, rocks. They were busy for 30 minutes and laughed the entire time.

Towards dinner time, Lucas was giving us "his face" that usually says in a not so nice way, "I'M HUNGRY!!" Sweet isn't it?!

We hit the boat ride with Donald Duck in Mexico.

Had to stop by the model train one more time to show Marcus on our way to Moroco for dinner.

Axel & Marcus kissing?! Yep, cousin love. They follow each other in all they do from eating, to screaming, to playing and laughing. It's pretty cute to watch them.

Lucas was over Epcot and on to Angry Birds.

After dinner we caught the huge Christmas Choir. They were amazing and really put everyone in the Christmas spirit.

Grandma and the boys.

I was even there with Daddy too!

Aunt Christina got a rare moment of these two sitting down. Believe me, it was just a moment.

The evening ended in one of the biggest firework shows I have ever seen. If I took one of the shows from my home town on one 4th of July and multipled it by 20 that would give you an idea of how big this was. There were three "grand finalies" and the booms were AMAZING!

We loved Epcot and will definitely have to go back!