What are the chances???

Me drying my hair with the vents.
Jumping Kelli and Brent's van.
Just waiting for some help.
Jumping our van.

On Friday, Kelli called me to come get her, Brent, Aaron and Isaac from Sportsmen's Warehouse at Hamburg because their van died. Shaun took our van to go get them. Getting the car-seats out of her vehicle and into ours is no little feat but they managed. Well, guess what? Our van wouldn't start either!!! What are the chances that BOTH vehicles would have dead batteries at the same time. So they called me to bring jumper cables so we could at least get to Sam's to get new batteries installed. I had just gotten out of the shower when they called so I had wet hair and no make-up on. Not a pretty sight but she is my sister so I went out to get them. They mentioned that we could look around Sam's while the vehicles were getting worked on so I was not too happy about having to go in public with wet hair and no make-up. I went into panic mode and decided that I could at least have dry hair if I had to go out and see people so I cranked the heat up in the van and dried my hair with the air conditioning vents. Kelli was laughing so hard, but there was no way I was going in a store with wet hair. So, after taking the time to dry my hair, the men decided to just buy batteries and take them back to our house to put them in themselves. Crazy day.

Samuel's 8th Birthday

Opening up one of his birthday presents! Look how excited he is.

Lego Batman for the PlayStation. Thanks Grammy and Uncle Brett.

Samuel with his birthday cake. It says "Dude, Samuel Rocks".

Among all of the Christmas celebrations, we also have Samuel's birthday to celebrate. If you don't remember, his birthday is on Christmas Day so that makes it difficult to make sure it doesn't get lost in all of the other celebrations. We already had a small family party down in Mt. Vernon for him with all of his cousins BUT I like to acknowledge it on the actual day too. After all of the Christmas activities are out of the way that day, we then do his birthday celebration. We just had a small cake that we doctored up with blue icing (his favorite color). Notice what he wanted me to write on the cake in the pictures above. He got a couple of presents but is not getting his real birthday present from us until later this week when we can take him out with us to pick it up. He has always wanted to go to Build A Bear and make a bear so since this will be the last year he will probably want to do something like that, we decided to take him. I'll post some pics of that later in the week.

Christmas Day

The boys actually slept in on Christmas morning until around 8:30. Not too shabby. They were really excited about going down stairs to see what they got. Santa brings 4 gifts for each of them and, of course, the stockings. Harrison got Louisville items (sweatshirt, hat, etc), Bakugan and a Ripstick (basically a skateboard with only one wheel in the front and one in the back). Believe it or not, he can already ride it. Samuel got 2 Indiana Jones Lego sets and a paint set (complete with some canvas boards, new acrylic paints, paint tray and new brushes. He was really excited about the art set. Then they got a joint gift of a PlayStation. I think they had a great Christmas. I love to watch their reactions when they open their presents. Lots of screaming in excitement. It was a wonderful Christmas. Here are some pictures for you to see.

Did I ever mention.....

I hate wrapping presents. I really, Really, REALLY hate doing it!!! Typically, I put it off and put it off until Christmas Eve. Then, on Christmas Eve, we are running around like maniacs to Margie's house for lunch and then off to Rockcastle for the VanWinkle family Christmas for dinner. Then back to the house to put the kids to bed (sometime around 10:00 or 11:00 since they are so excited). THEN, I begin wrapping the presents. I end up staying up until around 3:00 a.m. and am exhausted the next day. BUT NOT THIS YEAR!!!!!! I have almost everything already wrapped. Now I'm off to Margie's house to wrap the gifts I hid down there. I have no clue how I will get them in the house but I'll do it. I might have to leave them in the van and sneak them in after the kids are fast asleep. I won't know what to do with myself on Christmas day after getting a full nights sleep. No grouchiness, no falling asleep on the couch; I'm a little freaked out.

1st Annual Cromer Cousin Christmas Extravaganza!!!

On Saturday Kim, Kelli and I got our children together for a Christmas party instead of buying tons of presents that they don't really need anyway. The kids painted salt dough ornaments, had a 12 days of Christmas scavenger hunt, ate lunch and decorated a gingerbread house or gingerbread tree (the little ones made ice cream cone Christmas trees). They had a blast and didn't even get the bead ornaments or the painted glass ornament crafts I had plans for.

SNOW DAY!!!

We woke up this morning to snow and ice so NO SCHOOL FOR US TODAY!! We all slept in and are having a lazy day at home today. Here are a couple pictures of the boys eating their pancakes (a special treat on snow days). Samuel loves, Loves, LOVES whipped cream on his and went a little overboard. When they get outside and play in the snow, I'll post more pictures.

On a different note, Samuel made his First Reconciliation on Sunday night. He was so nervous but did great. He wrote down what he wanted to say in case he got nervous and forgot what to say but I told him he could also say anything else he wanted to once he was in there with the priest. He was really happy when he came out and said it really wasn't that hard. He was bummed that he couldn't take his candle home with him that night but I think they get them on Wednesday at their class so he is fine with that. We're proud of you Samuel!!

Harrison gets a new class

Harrison got a surprise today when he went to school. The principal pulled him out of class and explained that she wanted to move him to the other class on the same 4th grade team (so he would still have the same teachers). He was really nervous but ended up REALLY loving the other class. We asked him why he loved the class so much and he said it was much quieter and easier to pay attention. I think that was also the reason they decided to move him. His original class had some trouble makers in it and made it very difficult for him to concentrate (and easy to goof off). Ms. Bell, the principal, told him to "try" it for a week and let her know how he feels about it. He told us tonight, he doesn't want to go back to the other class at all and will tell her tomorrow. I'm proud of him for recognizing that this is the better class for him to be in rather than wanting to stay in the other class with all of the clowns.