No Rest for the Weary

So it is official. The Holidays are exhausting. We arrived home on Friday night, just tired. I have a few pictures of NH but not nearly as many as I would have liked. We are hosting a small New Years Eve gathering so we have been quite busy preparing for that. It will be nice to see our friends from PA and NC that we have not seen in a long time.

I will post pictures hopefully tomorrow.

Christmas in CT

We celebrated Christmas this morning since we will be in NH for the actual holidays. Rather than lug the large things to NH we decided that we would ask Santa to come to our house a little early.


Aly had a great time with opening the gifts, she opened everyones for them. Brianna just loved to carry the bags around.

Dear Santa

We have been talking to Aly about Santa and everytime she sees Santa she gets excited. I don't think she grasps the whole concept of Santa but she has been soooo excited about Christmas. She does get the presents piece.

Yesterday I picked her up from school and she had a present wrapped for Mom and Dad once buckled in her car seat holding the coveted "present" she promptly unwrapped it and showed me what she made for us. Have I told you that I love this age?

So we have drafted a letter to Santa from Aly,

Dear Santa,

For Christmas this year I want fruity snacks. I like Dora ones. My dad needs new gloves, I like purple ones for him, and new sunglasses for him since his broke.

My mom wants the sharing fairy to visit everyday between the hours of 3 and 7. I don't really understand why but she says that this will promote peace on earth.

Brianna needs sunglasses to because she keeps stealing mine. You can also bring her fruity snacks so that I can have my own.

Do you see why mom would like the sharing fairy to come?

I baked you some cookies yesterday. Mom still has peanut butter in her hair.

Thanks,

Aly

Getting Ready for Christmas

We have an extra special treat at our house these next few days. GRANDMA!!! My parents still have no power in NH from the ice storm last week, so Grandma came down to visit. Of course, we got right in the kitchen and started cooking. We made tons and tons of cookies. Aly helped decorate them. Check out the monster cookie she made for Daddy!

Brianna is getting ready for the stormy weather. Aly loved this hat too when she was little!

IOWA Recap

My sister Brooke reminded me that I had not posted the Iowa pictures. There are not that many since once sickness hit our family the camera kind of disappeared. Although Ryan is disappointed that I did not get snapshots of both girls puking on him.

I did however capture how adult like my husband can be as he is wrestling 3 or 4 of his neices and nephews. Now combined all 4 of them probably equal Ryans weight, and in true Ryan fashion he was not going to let anyone win. ***Please note the poor individual underneath -you can see his legs - Sorry Dallas***


Here are the twins. We visited Derek and Shelbys house in our second week and there were 5 girls ages 3 or under. What a madhouse. It was great fun to see all of the Miller girls play together. We are excited for them to come East this summer - hint hint.


This is a story in itself. This is the Iowa version of salad. Salad in the midwest takes a completely new meaning as it must include either whipped creme, or jello or both. This was strawberry pretzel salad. In the East we call it dessert.

This is one of the few pictures of the kids that I got. When we celebrated the Miller Christmas on Friday night. Brianna was fast asleep in her bed, so Aly got to enjoy opening presents without any little sister.

WE ARE HOME

I will post some pics tomorrow but I figured I would say that I survived the flight with Aly and Brianna by myself. It was not as bad as I had imagined that it could be. Thank you DVD player, Dum Dum lollipops, and M&M, I am forever greatful.

Where are the trees?

So yesterday we left Maxwell, IA and headed towards Cedar Rapids to visit Derek and Shelby and there three girls.  Yes, 5 girls under the age of 3 = a house full of craziness.  When we were driving, Aly wanted to know where all the trees were.  She then decided, it must be close to Spring.

If only the cold winters went that fast, Aunt Tara would be in heaven.

We head back to CT on Saturday.  YAHOO for my own bed.

On the Mend

It never seems to fail. We arrive in Iowa only to be hit with the recent bug that is going around. Brianna got sick on Friday and then I got it on Sat, Ryan followed on Sunday and we are anxiously awaiting Aly.

The good news is that it seems to be a 24 hour bug and not much longer. No pictures because we don't have our laptop. Hopefully the rest of the trip will be uneventful.

Holiday Decorations

Even though we leave for Iowa tomorrow, we have been decorating for Christmas. Aly has been getting really excited about the tree, and she spent most of the afternoon putting the remainder of the ornaments on the tree, while Brianna was napping.

I love the real tree, but man with two kids, the needles are everywhere. I think I have vaccuumed twice today and they are still everywhere.

When Brianna woke up, she helped undecorate the tree. How fun!