We celebrated Christmas early with Dad and Sheri. It was so good to see everybody…to hug my Aunt Jean, to listen to Dylan’s stories about the Crucible recruit training for the marines, to share worship music with Daddy, to love on Sheri and enjoy her cooking, and to catch up on life with my sisters and brother-in-law and niece. Blessed by togetherness.
We absolutely love Halloween in our neighborhood!!!
Here we are in our costumes: Tom as a snowboarder, me as a poke ball, Jonas as a black caped somebody with a scary mask, Xander as Pikachu, and Roman as Mario riding Yoshi.
The boys and I spent a lot of time in the kitchen today, cooking through our December Raddish box. Jonas made the entree, Cozy Chicken and Dumplings; Roman made the side, Alpine Pancakes; and Xander made the dessert, Chocolate Snowball Cookies. Yummy!!!
Winter Break with the Seyfried boys looked like: building with gum drops and toothpicks, coding with red and white pony beads and pipe cleaner, hunting candy canes in the woods, and filling mason jars with homemade hot chocolate for holiday teacher gifts.
We had one of the best Halloweens we’ve ever had this year. I’m not sure why…maybe it was because the weather was perfect (just chilly enough to be festive), because the kids are getting older which made things a little bit easier, or because we were all so thankful just to be able to get out and have some normal kind of neighborhood community fun. It also went a lot quicker/took a lot less energy because most everyone laid their candy out on a table in the driveway for the kids to pick and choose from. Tom was an old man, I was a hippie, Jonas was a light up stickman, Xander was Pikachu, and Roman was Harry Potter.
We spent Thanksgiving in VA this year! Here’s a picture of all of us together…
To celebrate the 4th of July, we joined in on our annual neighborhood parade in the morning. It’s such a beautiful thing, seeing patriotically dressed moms and dads and kids and dogs with their decorated strollers and wagons and scooters and bikes, walk behind a NVFD fire truck (driven by Tom), waving American flags in honor of our Independence Day. In the afternoon, we were invited to a potluck lunch and an inflatable water slide extravaganza in a close by cul-de-sac. I love our neighborhood. Happy 4th!!!
The Star Spangled Celebration in our little town gets better every year. To celebrate the 4th of July this year…there were tons of inflatables, a climbing wall, face painting, food trucks, live music, and booths galore (Tom helped out with the NVFD one). It was super hot, but the kids still had fun. They ran around, played football barefoot, visited booths to pick up swag, and waited with me in a crazy long line for ice cream that tried to melt before we could eat it all. Here’s a picture of all three of the boys together…
The boys love going to Breakfast with Santa at our church…there is yummy breakfast food, crafts and games, and of course…Santa!!! Here the boys are letting him know what’s on their lists this year…
On Christmas Eve, we: made Christmas cookies in the morning, spent the afternoon at MeMe and PaPa’s (where we enjoyed eating Peppermint Ice Cream Cake among other delicious things, playing Naughty Santa, watching the little ones, and just hanging out), went to Christmas Eve mass, sprinkled reindeer food on the grass for Santa’s reindeer, and set out cookies and eggnog for Santa.
On Christmas Day, we: opened presents and stockings from Santa, ate a pancake breakfast, opened presents from us, spent the afternoon at Maw and Pop’s (where we enjoyed eating Coconut Cake along with other yumminess, skyping with Rueben and Kaia and Marina in Norway, opening presents, and sharing funny stories), and hung out in the evening at home by the fire.
I’m so grateful for my family. Here’s my favorite Christmas picture this year…Dylan and Jeanne.
We spent Christmas in Virginia this year with Grandma and Grandpa Seyfried, the (Northern) Seyfrieds, the Longs, and the Paccassis. The boys had a BLAST playing with their cousins…exploring the woods, playing pool, decorating Christmas cookies, playing Wii games, going to mass, and opening and playing with their Christmas presents. Highlights for me were: catching up with everyone over after meal conversations; learning to sew a pair of pajama pants from a pattern with Sherri; watching all of the kids play together; family prayer time; continuing my half marathon training by running my first 8 miles in 13 years; and seeing Gabe, in his little man Christmas pajamas, hug Joseph and kiss baby Jesus in the nativity.
For more pictures, click on the “Christmas in VA 2016” picture page to the right.
After school today, we took the boys to Walden Pumpkin Farm to kick off Fall Break. They ran through the corn maze, went down the slide, played on the seesaw, climbed the hay bales, played in the corn box, and picked out pumpkins. It was hard to get a good picture of them all together because they were in constant motion and looking every which way, but here’s what we got. By the end of our time there, I think I was more worn out than they were!!!
We had a neighborhood 4th of July parade this morning!!! The neighborhood kids decorated their bikes and trikes and scooters, followed the fire truck blasting patriotic music (driven by Tom), and enjoyed popsicles in the shade. It was a great turnout! We even decorated Petra. 🙂
We spent Thanksgiving in Virginia with Grandma and Grandpa, The Seyfrieds, The Longs, and The Paccassis. We enjoyed just hanging out with everyone…family is such a blessing!!!
Click on the “Thanksgiving 2015” page to the right for more pictures.
We had a fairly laid back Halloween. We went to a fun neighborhood potluck, trick or treated around the loop, passed out candy, and watched a Halloween episode of Paw Patrol before tucking in for the night. Here are a few pictures, featuring: AhAh as Curious George, Roman as a Dinosaur, Jonas as Pikachu, Xander as a Dolphin, Jodi as Katniss, and Tom as a HazMat worker.
We ended up having a two day celebration of the Fourth of July due to the rain!  Uncle Kerry came out for s’mores on the fourth and a little bit of neighborhood firework watching.  Tom even busted out the sparklers leftover from our wedding!  We had so much fun playing with them that it sparked a creative idea in Uncle Kerry’s photographer’s mind…he came back the next night for more neighborhood and city firework watching from our neighbor’s yard, and we had a BLAST experimenting with different, creative photographic scenes with sparklers and a delayed camera exposure after the big boys went to bed.  Among the winners were…a tornado, a flower, a city skyline, and names in varying combinations…my favorite part was watching Uncle Kerry’s robotic, dance like movements while he was mid-creation.
On Easter afternoon, we all loaded up and went to Aunt Jean’s for a delicious lunch and a super fun egg hunt.  It’s always so good to spend time hanging out and catching up with family.
That evening we went to the beautiful Life Teen mass.
Here are a few pictures of the boys egg hunting…
Here’s a recap of some things the boys and I did over the winter break to keep busy: painting, making bracelets and necklaces from pipe cleaners and beads, making sticker scenes, playing with water beads, making and decorating salt dough ornaments, drawing with sidewalk chalk, and hanging out in the triangle woods.
My sweet little boys are so excited about Christmas…here they are the night before and the morning of…so precious. Merry Christmas!!!
