New Years Eve & Fun Games!

We had so much fun staying up on New Years Eve (Dad's Birthday!) to watch the ball drop.  Tara and I had planned games for everyone and I seriously have not laughed that hard all year.  First up was my "Minute To Win It" games.  If you don't know what that is, just google it but we had the best time trying to do all the games in less than a minute.

Jingle in the trunk-- shaking 12 jingle bells out of an empty kleenex box attached to your booty… absolutely hilarious:

Cookie face-- moving the cookie down from your forehead to mouth with no hands!

Reindeer nose-- trying to get the pom stuck to your vaselined up nose!

Candy cane pick up!

Stacking cups!

Ping pong bounce to peanut buttered bread!

Here's a video of some of the highlights… HILARIOUS!

Tara also taught us the game of "fish bowl" and we loved playing that for an hour or so before it was time to ring in the New Year together!

Such a fun night and loved celebrating with all my favorite people!  Happy New Year, everyone, and Happy Birthday to the best Dad there is!

Baker Christmas in Boone 2013

We had a great time in Boone up with my family celebrating Christmas!  We went up there the Saturday after Christmas and stayed until New Years Day.  The cousins had such a blast as usual, and we enjoyed having some quality time with the family.  Here are some pictures documenting our visit!

Presents!

Dad made wooden block sets for all the kiddos-- HUGE hit!

Braved the freezing cold a couple times with a trip to the park and a hike up to Moses Cones burial site:

 Inside Cabin time:

Eating out at Capones one night!

And lastly some pictures of our family that we took inside the cabin one night!

Cuzzies-- all best friends!!

The original kiddos & loved ones-- all best friends as well!

So grateful for our family and the blessing of all being together to celebrate Christmas, no matter what day our actual celebration was!

Christmas Day 2013

Christmas morning, Emery ran into our room saying "Merry Christmas" at her usual 7:00am wake time!  We headed downstairs shortly after and she was so excited to see that the milk and carrots had been eaten and that Santa ate the cookies but left her a little bite of a chocolate chip cookie-- she kept saying "that was so nice of him" haha.  

She had only asked him for one present so right beside the cookie plate was her gift from Santa… a Belle Barbie!

Love this next picture… her day was made!

We then opened stockings-- the mini m&ms and $2 princess camera were the biggest hits!

Next was Tyson's turn!

And then Pucky's turn!

We ate a delicious breakfast and then decided to remind Emery about the other gifts under the tree.  She was so great opening one, playing with it for a while and then opening a couple more.  We called both of our families and wished them Merry Christmases as well before heading to go see FROZEN in the theater!  Emery hadn't been to a movie since her and I went over the summer and we knew she would just love this one and boy were we right.  It seriously can't come out on dvd fast enough.  She was so happy having both Kyle and I in the theater with her, and the popcorn, lemonade and fruit snacks made her day as well!

After nap time we played with some more of her new toys, had a chocolate milk "tea" party and just hung out together.
 
Before dinner we made our cupcakes for Jesus' birthday… a tradition she loves and reminded us constantly throughout the day that we still had to make them!

Such a sweet girl… we love baking things together in the kitchen!

And a pic of our delicious dinner!  We splurged and bought filets from Earth Fare paired with twice baked potatoes, sister schuberts rolls and salads!  Thank heavens for sparkling grape juice or else I would be really missing some wine at our nice dinners!

It was a wonderful Christmas where Emery kept saying "BEST DAY EVER".  So thankful for the traditions we've started with her and for a relaxing day with our family!  Oh, and here's a picture of the outside of our house.  We decided to not buy any new decorations this year and just use what we had from our town home.  Worked out pretty well!

And I have to share a picture of my $2.99 goodwill Christmas tree that I bought last summer.  Make some burlap bows, wrap it with ribbon, add pinecones and a few ornaments and voila a perfect foyer decoration! (And the artwork behind it was supposed to be used for Christmas cards but they didn't stay on really well ha so it stayed empty the whole month!).

Merry Christmas everyone, 2013 has been a great year!