Christmas in Colorado Part 2

On Christmas Eve we took the train up Pikes Peak. It was the perfect thing to do on Christmas Eve. We ate lunch in Manitou Springs and headed up on the Cog Railway to a VERY COLD 14,000+ foot mountain.


Some of the beautiful scenery along the way. Our tour guide pointed out so much along the way and it was really interesting.

Once at the top we had to take a photo. It was FREEZING. Literally the temps were 11* but with the winds which were whipping it felt like -8. No wonder we were so miserable. :)

Me & my brother, Ryan.

These dorks wouldn't let me just get a nice shot of our Cog Railway.

Hallie enjoyed the way down...

If you're ever in Manitou Springs you should definitely do the train ride. It's really interesting ane crazy to hear some of the history of Pikes Peak!

Christmas in Colorado Part 1

We spent the actual Christmas holiday at my parents cabin in Cripple Creek, CO. We spent 16 hours in the car getting there (driving through the night so the kids would sleep!). Once we were there we expected snow in droves (like our September 2009 trip) but to our disappointment... NONE came.

We had to get used to the static electricity again from the dry mountain air.

This would have been a fun little sledding hill had there been snow.

Instead we found a shady part of my parents road on the other side of the hill and spent a few hours here. We were actually surprised at how fun it was. I think the adults expected it to be lame since the snow was not at all fresh.



Had George done this much longer I'm sure we'd have had a ER trip.

We all got in on the action of the sledding... it brought out the kid in us all. This is my brother, Ryan.

In order to spare you of picture intense posts I'll blog about our trip up Pikes Peak on the train and Christmas day later.

Family Christmas 1 & 2

We crashed the Brawner family Christmas this year and celebrated with our part of the Brawners... it's all confusing...but the picture below shows the Brawner clan (all related).

These Brawners are related to us...but we aren't related to the rest!

This is Ginger. My lifelong friend who I've known since birth. She is 7 days younger than me and we've been friends since. She's part of the Brawner clan too. We used to try and tell people we were related but we aren't. The story is: My dad's sister married her mom's brother. Read that over and over again and you'll finally get it! So... we share an aunt, uncle & cousins.


The girls and their spouses

We tried to get a family picture too.... One kid not looking

Same kid not looking... one kid looking goofy

Two kids finally looking.... and one kid --- well let's just hope that this isn't something that becomes a habit for her.

The kids were really excited to open their first round of presents.

Then we celebrated with the Wallace side of my family at my parents house. Here is the kids table minus one cousin, Karlyn who is too little to sit with the big kids.

The cousins and their kids.

Kristy: Brooks & Blaise

Lindsay: Brooke, Hudson & Hallie

Kelli: Lance & Karlyn

Misc. December

Wow it's been a while since I updated this blog!

In early December our church had the annual Night in Bethelehem. The church is decorated like an old Bethlehem town with people in costumes and everything. There's all sorts of things for the kids to do.

Making bread

Decorating ornaments

Goats and other animals are there to pet.

The kids love the event and they also got to make pottery (playdoh), do sticker nativity sets, and take a picture with Mary and Joseph

Brooke had her Christmas program for school and I had my first "I'm a terrible mom" moment all on the same day. I was meeting with a college student who needed to be somewhere at 11. I planned to be at the church at 11:15 so I could get a good seat for the program which started at 11:30. At about 10:45 I checked my phone to make sure that the girl I was meeting with wouldn't be late for her appointment when I noticed my "event" on my calendar was happening NOW. That meant I was in the process of missing Brooke's program which started at 10:30 NOT 11:30! I RUSHED out of the coffee house and made it to the church just in time to see Brooke's teacher scanning the crowd looking for her mom and dad. It was AWFUL!! I ran up to the front of the sanctuary, hugged her teacher and told her my issue and then put on a brave face for Brooke so she wouldn't see me cry! Seriously it was that bad I could have (and did later) cried right there. The dagger to the heart was when Brooke asked me in her sweet innocent way "Why weren't you videoing me?" followed up by "I did REALLY good, Mommy!" I'm a good mom, I promise... I hope! :) Here is the sweet girl after the program in her angel costume.

Goofy face and all. I'm sure if you look close at my eyes you can see the tears welling up!

My only saving grace was that night Brooke had her choir program at church. She got front so I had a perfect view of her little performance. Sorry for the blurry picture...

Visit from the Arringtons

We had our friends Ryan & Ashley and their girls, Kaelyn & Shae come in for the Nebraska football game and they stayed the weekend with us. We had a fun time taking the kids up to campus for the spirit walk. We had all the kids lined up on the curb (including Hudson who didn't want in on the "girl" picture) and at one point a couple came up to ask us what the deal was... triplets, Quads, QUINTS?! We just laughed and explained they came from two families but that there were actually TWO sets of twins in the bunch! HA...

The kids lined up to give all the players high-fives as they walked in. It was pretty cute and one player was sweet enough to reach in past Brooke and give Hallie a high-five as she was a little timid about the whole thing.


The 4 year olds.... one month apart!

All the kiddos. Hudson was less than thrilled to be in on this photo... what a man! :)

We had a great time with our friends and loved that they were our first non-family member guests. We took the kids to the park on Sunday afternoon and then mananged a wrangle all 5 kids out to dinner that night. It was a comic event at times...but as always we just laugh and think to ourselves... This is our life!

Carnival

We took the kids to the carnival a few weeks back when it was here in town. They had a great time riding the rides (the ones they were actually tall enough for) and even managed handling the rain for a little bit.

I tried so hard to get a good picture of the three of them before the fun began... I love this one because Brooke is super excited because she sees a friend from her school clas

This one cracks me up!! She looks like a mini-me with her arm propped up on the door and her casual hand on the steering wheel. Haha.

Here is our sweet adventurous Hallie on this ride. Can you believe she could ride this ALONE but couldn't go on the kiddie motorcycles that go around and around in circles?!