Christmas Adventures - Part 2

After getting home around 3:30 am Saturday morning, we all three crawled in the bed together with the hopes of sleeping as long as possible.  Kate did wake up around 8 and we thought that would be it for her, but to our surprise she fell back to sleep and we all slept til around 10.  We met Nana in Clayton to get Jackson and finally made it to Wilson around 1.  A little later than we planned, but there none the less.  Kate looked so pretty in her Christmas dress, but her sweet little eyes still looked so pitiful.  

As is usual, Jackson did his best to avoid the camera, so we got a shot of just the girls.  

But once we told him no presents til we took a picture, he was all smiles!

Look at our all our stockings hung by the chimney with care -- Mom-Mom, Pop-Pop, Mamma, Papa, Aunt Amy, Uncle Stevie, Ryley, Emma, Sean, me, Jackson & Kate. :-)

One of the few things on Ryley's Christmas list was a pottery wheel, and guess who hooked her up - her favorite Nini!!  I can't wait to see what our new potter creates!

Emma seemed to get equally excited about everything she opened -- evened the clothes!  

Jackson didn't even have to wait on Santa for the Buzz Lightyear shooter he asked for!  MM & PP hooked him up!  

Amy may not look too excited about this here gift, but she was.  It was only the name that weirded her out a little - it's called a g-spout and it's an attachable spout that supposedly makes draining grease from browned meat easy peasy.  We had both seen it on Pinterest, but it took quite a bit of googling to find it.  And yes, I did have some fun with the name...mostly because it was so hard to find.  :-)  

Christmas Adventures - Part 1

Our Christmas week got off to a rather rough start.  Kate started running a fever on Sunday that continued for SEVEN DAYS!  On Tuesday, we decided to go ahead and get her checked out.  Dr. Chip (our pediatrician) said she looked fine and that she likely had a stomach bug that was hitting the area pretty hard.  She had only had a couple of relatively minor tummy troubles, but it was enough to explain what was likely going on.  He told us that the fever would likely last 24-48 more hours, but by the weekend she should be fine.  Well, Friday came around and she was still feeling lousy and running a fever.  We went on as planned and left for Bladenboro mid-morning on Friday for Christmas with Nana and Pa-Jack and then Nana's side of the family Friday evening.  

She may looks like she feels good, and as long as the fever was under control w/ ibuprofen she was, but you can see in her eyes that she just wasn't herself.  

Jackson totally knew what was in store for the next couple of days and he could hardly contain his excitement!

The first present he opened was the one that he had been talking about for a while, but never actually seen in a store as far as I know.  An 'army car' complete with 'army men' and lots of guns!  Sadly one of his men has already suffered a casualty that is currently being treated w/ super glue.  Hopefully he'll recover. 

Kate got her first Cabbage Patch doll and a sweet new stroller for her babies.  The stroller has a buckle that she insists be unbuckled every time she puts a baby in and a storage basket underneath for whatever else she can cram in there.  She even pushes it around with a little bag hanging on the handle -- just like a little mommy.  :-)

Look at Kate waiting so patiently on Pa-Jack to retrieve a toy from vicious packaging!  He did get the stroller assembled in no time at all -- and under pressure from us all to get it done quick!

After the kiddos tore open their loot, us adults joined in on the fun.  

Sean got some hedgetrimmers....

Pa-Jack got some new shoes...

Nana got a new pair of slippers.  (And promptly disposed of her old ones in the trash.)

Jackson AND Sean got Nerf guns!  Oh the fun we've been having with those!

The kids gave a Nana a framed picture of her and them that said, 'Nana - another name for love'.  Aww...

By mid-afternoon the crowd began arriving and noise level increased.  ;-)  It was so good to see my family and those that couldn't make it were missed.  Everyone had a great time catching up and Jackson, Easton and Maddie had lots of fun together.  Except this one time when the boys hurt Maddie's feelings. :-( My cousin Brooks was chosen as the honored one to read the Christmas story.  It's my favorite tradition from our gathering every year.  

After dinner, Jackson (once again) could hardly wait to see if there were any presents for him.  Oh that boy!  He stayed up wayyyy past his bedtime and couldn't have been anymore thrilled.   

Jackson's late bedtime is about where our night took a slight turn.  As I said earlier, Kate's fever had still been going strong throughout the day and she felt especially lousy that evening.  When she woke up around 10:30, I checked her temp and it was 105.1.  Admittedly, I panicked and called the doctor's office which forwarded to WakeMed triage answering service.  When a nurse called back and I explained the situation, she said that with a fever that high, they wanted to check the child out.  I was already beginning to be more concerned, since the fever had lasted longer than expected, so we didn't hesitate to take her in.  We did discuss for a minute on where to take her, but eventually agreed to come back to Raleigh to take her to the pediatric ED at WakeMed.  At least there we wouldn't have to wait in a waiting room filled with all kinds of folks.  

After a couple of hours hanging out in the hospital, with one wide awake Kate, the doctor said her urine was clear, her lungs sounded fine, and that the high fever was the virus our pediatrician had suspected earlier in the week.  Only she said the fever could last 7-10 days!  But all in all that was the best news we could have gotten.  Just a nasty virus and nothing more serious.  But it's Christmas and when the fever went up, my sweet girl crashed.  

A visit with Santa

The Christmas frenzy that was the past four weeks has finally slowed down.  Our tree is still up, but only for a couple more days.  By the weekend, it'll just look like winter around here.  I have lots to share and am going to try and get it all posted (even our annual Tree Hunt weekend) by the New Year.  How's that for a resolution?!  

Let's start with our visit to see Santa.  Jackson was super excited to sit with the guy and as per usual with Kate, she just followed right along with her big brother.  If Jackson does it, she's gonna do it.  I'm not sure if she actually spoke any words to him, or just stared, but she told us she told him she wanted babies.  As for Jackson, he asked for a Buzz Lightyear 'shooter'.  

As for Jackson, he asked for a Buzz Lightyear 'shooter'.  

I'm not sure if either of their smiles could be any faker. 

Christmas crafting and wrapping

The countdown is on! By next week at this time our Christmas weekend frenzy will be coming to a close. Last night Ashely and I had some holiday fun in my craft room -- she got all of her wrapping done and I worked on some of my sewing projects I have to finish by the weekend. We even took a break from crafting to make some yummy Oreo truffles topped with crushed candy cane. Every craft night needs a sweet treat, right!

My favorite part of our fun together was the lovely turtlenecks that Ashely bought for us to wear.  I mean,  clearly a Christmas turtleneck (that's right, turtleneck) is a must-have for any Christmas craft night!  :-)

It's been a dress up kinda day!

This morning she was dressed up with a tutu dress, a fire hat and cowboy chaps.  Later she was dressed up with 3 tutus on at the same time and Jackson affectionately told her she 'had a big butt'.  This afternoon, she put this ensemble together...

Hyena Ride

As is usual, when things get busy, Good Times takes a back seat.  While I work on Christmas cards and getting ready for Christmas in general, here's a video to hold you over....

Backstory:  Jackson and Cara Beth play this 'game' often -- they've called it the Hyena Ride.  Cara Beth ties the jump rope around her waist and the other end to the dump truck.  Jackson hangs on for a ride across the yard.  As you'll see here, this ride is an accident waiting to happen.  Fortunately though, the only injured party was the popsicle.  Quite the tragedy when you are 4!

My new craft room. (I heart IKEA!)

Our trip to Charlotte a couple of weeks ago concluded with a trip to IKEA to get the furniture for the bedroom Sean helped me transform into a craft room.  I am soikw excited to finally have a space for all my crafty things -- especially my sewing machine.  Before I had everything crammed into the closet in this bedroom and getting anything out of it was quite a task.  

After getting home from Charlotte Saturday night, we unpacked the car and I sat in floor and marveled at all my loot.  :-)  First thing Sunday, we met my mama in Dunn with the kids, so they could spend the day on the farm and hunt on Monday.  After a yummy (and quiet) breakfast at Cracker Barrel, we headed back home to embark on the transformation.  Before getting started, Sean went out to the building for a few tools. (Note what's in the grocery bag.) ;-)

IKEA's way of packaging their furniture is quite amazing.  The box had hardly no free space for packing materials.  

Here's a shot of the mid-day work in progress.  It all came together very well.  Even Sean said during the process, 'IKEA is good.'  Everything fit together well, the instructions for assembly were clear, there were no missing pieces, all the hardware (which wasn't much) was there.  It was just a good experience all around!

I was nervous that the two brackets for the shelves would be a bear, but just like everything else, it was no problem at all.  I was even able to get them into studs and still have it centered over the bookcase/sideboard on the floor.  

After a few hours of assembling and a few more organizing all my junk supplies, my craft room was finally complete!

I LOVE my new sewing table!

We even made a corner of the room the kid's area with the easel and a bar on the wall that holds the crayons, markers and chalk.  Jackson and Kate love it!  (Ryley and Emma, too!)

Since I was able to clear out the closet, it is now much more organized and neat looking.  

Here's a close up of my two favorite shelves - scrapbooking and ribbon.

The room really got 'broken in' Friday night when we celebrated Amy's birthday with a burlap-themed craft night.   My nice, clean space became covered in melted hot glue and burlap strings and dust!  That's what it's all about though, right!  Here are our creations...

A pretty burlap wreath with flowers made out of burlap and buttons in the center covered in fabric.  

And a handsome little turkey with felt feathers!

Papa drives a race car!

Our Ryan crowd went to Charlotte this weekend to watch Papa drive in the NASCAR racing experience! It was really neat to be able to watch from pit road!  The kids loved seeing all the race cars and didn't seem to mind their loud noises.  I've never been a NASCAR race, but I did get to see how fast these cars go.  The riding experience was going on at the same time and the professional driver gets up to about 180 with the ride-along passenger!  Holy cow, that's got to be a crazy rush!

It was fun to watch and Papa really enjoyed it!  He was told after his 3 lap race that he topped out at 122 mph.  Pretty cool!

He's next!  

The crew members take extra care getting you on and off the track.  Safety is obviously their #1 priority.  

Strapped in and ready!

And he's off....

 

Safe and sound, with his feet back on the asphalt!

I think this smile sums out how he felt about the 'experience'!

The weekend wasn't without big excitement for the kids, too!  We checked into Great Wolf Lodge Friday afternoon, so the kids had most of the afternoon to play in the waterpark.  Then after the race, we changed out of sweaters and scarfs, and into our bathing suits, then went back to the waterpark for a  couple more hours of fun!

Great Wolf is such a neat place and definitely somewhere worth visiting again!  The indoor waterpark was fun, though a bit chilly.  Jackson and Kate both did great on the slides.  Jackson impressed me the most with his fearlessness.  He was just above the mark to be tall enough to ride the bigger rides and some of them were pretty thrilling.  One was a 'race' where you slid down on a mat by yourself.  He did great and even won!  

Jackson and Kate rode home from Charlotte with Mamma and Papa, so Sean and I could take a trip to IKEA.  I can't wait to share our trip!  Let's just say I'm so excited about all new, very own space!