Christmas with Papa...

The first thing to do with Papa, was to help him deck the halls...

Cute garland boys...

There was a lot of snuggling and loving going on...

And, of course, with these kids there is always dancing going on...

Then the present opening began...

This girl's excitement never disappoints...

Taylor showing us how she can use her new nerf gun...

Even when giving papa a gift, she couldn't be held down...

We had such a wonderful day hanging out with Papa, Kathryn and the Campbell's. We are so lucky to have such wonderful family that we love to hang out with.

I love these Santa beard lollipops Kathryn got the kids. She always finds the cutest things.

And the rest of the day was spent hanging out and enjoying the day together...

Thanks Papa for the wonderful day!

Visit from Santa...

We had our annual visit from Santa this year. Usually he shows up at my dads house on his Harley when we do Christmas at his house. This year, he couldn't make it the night we were doing Christmas with Papa, so he showed up at a party at Kathryn's house. It was a Christmas miracle that he didn't forget about us!

Oh my gosh, I love this fat face:

We even got to hang with our good friend, Carter:

By far the cutest kid there:

After Santa left, things got real crazy up in here. Carter started showing us his break dance moves. He seriously takes a break dance classes. It's awesome:

I'm not exactly sure what's going on here:

Oh, and these two had a good laugh in their mock turtle necks and cup o' hot cocoa...

Good times! :)

Christmas with Grammy Kelly...

My children are so spoiled by their grandparents, that sometimes I am embarrassed to even blog about our 4 Christmases each year. If it weren't for my desire to document and journal our lives through this blog, I wouldn't go into such detail about all that we were blessed with this season. We truly are so blessed and lucky to have such loving and supportive and caring families. I know we could have it a lot worse. Sometimes we (jokingly)complain about how much my mom is ruining our kids with her spoiling, but really, we know that they are so lucky to even have a healthy and loving grandma in their lives, and not only one but 4 of them!!!

Our celebrations started out this year at our house with Grandma Kelly. It was such a wonderful day. It ended up being a few days before Christmas, so it was nice to sit back and take a day to relax after all the excitement and craziness of the holiday's we had already had.

annual Christmas ornament from grammy...

I will never tire of watching my kids open up gifts. Their excitement is too much, I love their enthusiasm.

This boy didn't know what to think of all the excitement. He had the best seat in the house, though and just sat back and watched it all.

This little guy seemed to be pretty happy with his new scooter!!!

The best gift of the day was Ben's to my mom. He bought her a plain white T-shirt  and a note that said, 'This is what the Florida State National Championship shirts will look like, because it's not gonna happen!!!' :) For those who aren't aware, Florida State (my mom's team) and Auburn (Ben's team) played this year for the College National Championship. Unfortunately it didn't end too well for our team, but....we won't get into that right now. At this point, the game hadn't happened and there was a lot of trash talk going around while grandma was here.

After presents, was a glorious day of playing with cousins...

And playing with our new toys with grandma: (and of course, watching football)

Snuggling with Uncle Nathan while watching a movie:

And it was a Christmas miracle! It snowed all day so by late afternoon, the kids were dying to head out...

Uncle Ben took them on some rides around the cul-de-sac...

Taylor wanted to pull her cousins for a few rounds. The girl is so funny!

This big boy desperately wanted to play with the big kids. I can tell he is already getting to that point in his life where he wishes he could do what they are doing. poor thing.

It was just a perfect day. Absolutely perfect. I'm so glad we got to spend the whole day with these peeps doing nothing but hanging out together, doing all of these fun things, dancing a little:

Oh, and of course, eating A TON!!!

Thanks grammy for all you do for us!

Christmas Prep & other random December activities...

This Christmas was full of the 4 major F's: Food, Friends, Family and FUN!

My friend Katrina and I did our annual holiday baking. This was our fourth year doing it now. We spend the whole day baking and cooking treats for our friends. The first two years, we just brought our own ingredients, made the plates together at her house, and did it that way. It took us all day and it was so much fun. Last year, we combined forces and just made HUGE batches of this sweet chex mix and put it in baggies. That was also fun. We've also always had kids home to help us, because we usually do it when the kids are on Christmas break. Since break started so late this year, we did it while the kids were still in school. We also decided to try our hand at those cookie jars, where you put all the ingredients to make cookies in the jar, and they can make them at home with their families. It was fun and they turned out really cute! I'm so lucky to have such a wonderful friend--she is seriously the best!

Of course, there were many nights of just hanging out at home with hot chocolate, watching Christmas movies and drinking hot chocolate. I love the evenings in December when the house is lit only by the lights from the Christmas tree and Mantle.

This little man even got in on the Christmas (torture) spirit...

Of course, a trip to see Santa and the big tree downtown was a must. We went with our friends one day after pre-school...

{Taylor & Lily}

And since we were downtown, we stopped in a Mobius...

Speaking of friends, many a play dates were had in the month of December. All four of these boys were born within a month of each other this summer. We didn't mean to coordinate with the stripes, but we think a future boy band might be in the making here! :) I'm just hoping that they are all still friends in 15-20 years so we can show them this picture. My friend, Dori, invites us over for baby brunch every now and then and it's so nice not having any kids big enough to walk or move there yet, so we can just chat and relax! :)

{George, Jackson, Crosby & Jack}

These are the photos I get from my husband during the third hour of church when he has taken Jackson. He makes a pretty little lady! :)

Speaking of this boy and a pretty little lady. I can't tell you how many pictures I have of poor Jackson being 'loved' on by his siblings. They just always have to touch him or pet him and love on him. It is really cute, but unfortunately, most of the time he is leaning his head back to try and miss their little fingers! :)

December was also spent getting little gifts ready for Tucker's classmates. 25 of one little item to bring for his classmates. When I saw these star ornaments in the dollar section, 15 for $3, I was sold. I thought they were so cute and perfect for class gifts...

Of course, lots of crafting happened in the month of December:

The best part about December is when family FINALLY starts getting in town for the holiday's. This year was a bit different with only Nathan and his family making it. Jason had to work and only had Christmas day off, so they didn't make it. And Allen and his family had just moved to Las Vegas, so they opted to stay put for a while and not travel home. It was strange having such a small crowd during the holiday's, but also way fun to get to spend some one on one time with Carter & Chase.

These two boys are both snuggle-rs: 

And I just can't get over the way Carter watches movies. SO cute! :) We were so happy to get to have him over so much during the holiday's to play.

It wouldn't be Christmas without some serious cookie decorating:

And it wouldn't be a Pyper get together without a serious competition. In this case cookie decorating, between Ben and I. I won't say who won the facebook vote. Ben did make a homemade piping bag for icing using a ziplock baggie. I had to give it to him. And just for the record, Tucker did start out decorating mine, I inherited it from him already started! :)

Along with family, friends always come in town, too! Which I get way excited about. That is one nice thing about living in Spokane (well, there are many) but I love that I get to see all my old friends when they come in to town to visit their families or for holiday's. My dear friend Emily came into town. I hadn't seen here in over a year and a half. That is the absolute longest we have ever gone without seeing each other. She had been living in Chicago while her husband did his rotations. And they didn't make it home for not even one holiday! It was so sweet to see her!

And her big boy, Ryder, who was just a few months old when I saw him last. He is now huge and so dang cute!!! :) He loved him some baby Jackson.

As much fun as it is to have kiddos, let's be honest. That breakfast was spent purely trying to tame the wild children. So, we snuck out for some late night dessert one night with another good friend, Gen. I love these girls. I was a bridesmaid for them both and have been good friends with them since we were 12. I am so lucky to have great friends!

Of course, when family and friends come in to town, the food around hour house multiply's by the hundreds! Between treats for school, church, friends, pre-school party and other Christmas parties, we were fully stocked all month long. Here is just a sample of what the corner of our counter looked like every day. We have hot chocolate, ginger snap cookies, sugar cookies, chex mix, puppy chow, fudge and that is a pan of bacon wrapped little smokies for a Christmas party. I was in heaven, but I seriously need to do something about this food habit of mine...bummer!

This boy also enjoyed some Christmas treats...

One of my favorite parts of the holiday's...SHOPPING!!! :) This is what my dad chose to do one day while we were taking too long in Target. Jackson seems to be enjoying himself. :)

And one last tradition to complete, was driving down the Christmas street. We had been meaning to take the kids all week before Christmas, with my sister in law, and somehow never got around to it. So, finally on Christmas eve I drove the kids by ( a few times) and the traffic was seriously backed up for blocks to turn down this street. It is awesome. They go all out. You can see this huge tree for blocks. It's so beautiful, and the kids just love it. I'm glad we made the trip even if it wasn't as fun as last year when we did the scavenger light hunt. We'll do that again next year! :)

Preschool Christmas Party...

One of the first things on our long list of Christmasey things to do in December was Taylor's pre-school party. Pre-school happened to fall at our house on the week before break. I, of course, was very excited about that. I love any and every excuse to party and celebrate for Holiday's. I was also excited that my nephew, Carter, would be in town to join us. 

Pre-school party 101:

First, we made Stockings... Glitter, glue, paper, markers and cotton balls galore!

And just like that, they were gone! If I've learned one thing about having pre-school at our house, it's that I've got to be ready every 2.5 minutes with a new activity! :)

Then we hung our stockings:

I had each child bring a small inexpensive or homemade gift for all of the other kids. Taylor wanted to make these bracelets. We didn't have enough letters for all the names, so some got their whole name, and some only got their initials! :)

Then, one by one, while the other kids were playing, I had each of them put their presents in all of the other stockings for their friends. One thing I learned for next time, is to have the kids bring one for themselves. Each of them wanted to put their own gift in their own stocking. But none of them had enough for themselves. It was very disappointing to the kids who brought treats as their presents. oops! :)

We have all of these lovey pictures, because my mom happened to be in town on the day of our party, so she got to witness the madness!!!

Next up on the docket, making cookies:

Of course, Taylor in her own little world:

And Carter doesn't seem to be too excited about these cookies.

Funny story about the cookie making. I have to preface this story with another story. A few Sunday's ago Ben sent Taylor up to wake me up for church. Ben knows how I am in the mornings, so usually takes the kids on Sunday mornings and does the breakfast routine. He will then wake me up the latest possible so I can get ready for church. It was wonderful! :) One day Ben sent Taylor up to wake me up. She came back down and Ben asked her if she woke me up and what I said. She told him, she said, 'holy crap!' (it must have been a late morning!):) It was pretty funny, and I know she's heard him tell that story to a few people since then. Anyway, we were making cookies at the party, and one of the kids must have done or said something and I said, 'Holy Moly!' and Taylor said, ' No, mom, don't you mean Holy Crap!!??' It was pretty funny. So, sorry if my daughter taught your child to say Holy Crap! :)

Nex up was making these awesome stained glass Nativities. I saw these on pinterest, and thought they were so dang cool. I stayed up way too late the night before cutting the stupid things out, but they turned out so cool! It was perfect, too because the letter of the week was N that we were working on. So, N was for Nativity.

Of course, there was a lot of this going on: (shhhh...don't tell daddy!)

And there's always a lot of this: (these kids love baby Jackson)

Finally it was time to decorate and eat our cookies:

Cute Ollie:

Tater-tot:

Tarter sauce:

And Taylor being her weird self: (should I be worried???) :)

Finally it was time to open our stockings, and it was so much fun! We got gloves, and pencils, and hot cocoa and marshmallows (Snowman Soup & Snowman poop) Reindeer hershy's bars, bracelets...all sorts of cool things!

And finally, 'Twas the night before Christmas'...

These little guys are so much fun! It makes the holiday's so much more fun and exciting when you have little ones this age. (But I was glad to have that event checked of the to-do list!) :)

Lots more celebrations to be had!