In our family we have a few Holiday traditions which include: 12 Days of Christmas, Writing letters to Santa, building ginger bread houses, breakfast Chrismtas morning with the Nihipali's, going to see a movie at the theater, Christmas work party, making cookies for Santa, New PJS, new Christmas clothes for church & our new tradition is going to look at the lights at the Las Vegas Speedways.
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| Our Christmas card this year. Home photos of the babies as Santa's little helpers. Totally cliche but kind of funny :) |
Writing Letters to Santa
Every year Macy's will donate $1 to the Make-A-Wish Foundation for every letter that is dropped off at their Santa Mailboxes. This year we all, including Lizzy, wrote letters to Santa & dropped them off at Macy's.
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| In Lilianna's hand writing it says: soccer ball, Toms, bike, Dora doll, & Pjs. |
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| Dropping her letter off at Macy's. |
Gingerbread Houses
For FHE one night we made a gingerbread village, courtesy of Target. Last year I tried the whole thing from scratch, yeah that was a disaster. Note to self always stick to the box.
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| Lilianna's house |
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| Dad's house & Lizzy's dog house |
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| Mom's house |
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| Ellis' house |
Christmas Outfits
Every year Lilianna gets a new Christmas dress, if not two :). This year she picked out a non puffy sweater dress, which really shocked me. I thought it was adorable, since it has a owl on it. I asked her why she chose this dress & her answer was, "Tia likes owls. I like owls too." Auntie Tia has quite an effect on Miss Lili!
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| Peace |
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| Ellis received hand-me-downs from me. These were my moccasins authentically made for me from my mom's coworkers. Real buckskin, hand stitched beads. So cool! |
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| Lilianna & her little friend Tori. These hand out while dad plays soccer. Little Tori is the one who taught Lilianna how to ride a bike! Made my job easier :) |
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| Like Father like Son, matching sweaters at the work Christmas Party, all though Taylor's was an ugly old lady sweater courtesy of me. Ha ha! yeah he wore a ladies sweater! |
Christmas Visitors
Over Christmas Vacation we had a few visitors come to town. Cousins Alec & Taylor came to play with us for a day. We always have a good time with these two!
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| Alec & Lilianna |
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| Taylor & Ellis |
Christmas Eve
We spent our Christmas here in Las Vegas & actually it quite fun spending quality time with our little fam. We created some new traditions, & did some usual ones as well. We started the day off with making cake balls for Santa, followed by going to the movie theater & seeing Rise of the Guardians. Great movie & Ellis even enjoyed it. We then made our way out to the Las Vegas Motor Speedway to experience the light show. After that we came home & opened a present (aka PJs) & read the
Pajama Elves story. We finished our night with putting our Santa's cookies & some reindeer food.
Cookies for Santa
This year we actually made cookies, or I should say cake balls, for Santa. We liked calling them our Red Velvet "Bon-Bons" :). They actually turned out really yummy & I know Santa sure liked them sense he ate ALL of them!
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| My little cooking assistant |
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| The finished "Bon-Bons" |
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| All for Santa |
Lights at the Las
Vegas Motor Speedway
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| Opening our new PJs |
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| Our Christmas lights :) |
Christmas Morning
Christmas morning is always exciting! Waking up way too early & seeing the excitement on every one's face as they lay their eyes on what Santa brought. This year Santa brought Lilianna a new princess bike! So cool, plus some movies, a new soccer ball, & a long awaited dream light. Ellis received a few little things as well as a basketball hoop. After opening presents we went over to our good friend's house for the traditional Christmas brunch, yum yum! Later we took a family walk to test out Lilianna's bike riding skills. You can't beat 60 degrees on a bright Christmas day! The joys of living in the desert :)
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| Showing off her new clothes from Auntie Tia & Uncle James plus her new TOMS. |
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| Ellis in his new clothes from Auntie Tia & Uncle James. So stylish! |
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| Out on our family walk testing out the new wheels. |
Nana & Papa
Two days after Christmas, Nana & Papa came to visit us. We did the usual with them, plus a couple new adventures one of which we ventured to the Fashion Show Mall (down on the strip) for a girls day +Ellis of Build-A-Bear Workshop & Red Velvet Cafe, yummy!!
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| Papa & Lilianna playing with silly putty. |
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| Ellis & Nana...I believe Nana was talking to Tia :) |
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| Build-A-Bear picking out some new clothes for Rainbow Bear |
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| Such a Papa's boy! |
New Year's Eve
I don't know about you but to me New Year's Eve is a weird holiday. I understand the purpose but you know its kind of a dumb holiday, just saying :) Anyways Taylor & I got to go out on a date to the movies. Guess what we saw & it was ALL Taylor's choice: Les Miserables....okay I totally lied it was my choice :) Les Miserables is my absolute favorite musical of all time! Don't get me wrong, I love me some Andrew Lloyd Weber but the music of Les Mis & the story of redemption gets me every time. I cried, I laughed, I cried some more. If you haven't seen it go & hey its not just a chick flick, it is about the French Revolution which = war for the men. Followed by the movie we celebrated with some bubbly (sparkling cider) & poppers, while watching the ball drop. Hope everyone had a safe & wonderful holiday season!
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| Santa baby with papa |
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| Happy New Year's! |
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| Cheers to 2013 |
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| Red Velvet Cafe signature Red Velvet Cake....oh it makes my mouth water just looking at this picture right now! |
Randomness
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| Papa playing with the kiddos before he left. |
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| Lilianna is no longer a Sunbeam, she's a CTR4. |
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| Mr. Cuteness helping mama do the laundry |
Vegas Motor Speedway
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