Finishing Up 2012

Matt's Uncle Jim passed away before Christmas. We attended his funeral in Mesquite. Although it wasn't the happiest of circumstances, it was nice to get together with family. We had a good time catching up with Matt's cousins and aunts and uncles. These boys looked sharp:

We took advantage of Leanne's freedom--no twins!!--and rushed down to the strip to try our luck at a Criss Angel show. We scored third row seats for a great deal. 

I was worried, on account of the whole mind freak vibe he has, that it was going to be a dark and racy magic show. It wasn't. It was pretty family friendly except for the less than modest clothes his assistants wore. He didn't even look as emo as he sometimes does. He is also much shorter than I expected. He disappears a lot and reappears in amazing places, he can somehow guess a specific motorcycle and make it appear out of thin air and he sawed a lady in half in a very spectacular way. 

These photos are terrible but because we technically shouldn't have even taken them I am including them. At least the usher didn't make me delete them ala Matt at the Beatles' Love show. 

We spent New Year's Eve with Ken and David & Emily's family. I enjoyed delicious food and Bananangrams. 

Matt: delicious food and guitars. My kids: video games and hot wings & cookies. 

From the roof of their house is a perfect view of the strip and fireworks. It was cold and these were the best pictures I could get from my phone while my body was shaking. It's better in real life. 

Cheers! 

Christmas Day

Another year that Santa was liberal with the definition of nice. 

6 am & not a second sooner. 

The banana board--love the yellow "sunnies."

Ben's looking pretty cool.

This is Zack's preferred way to ride a skateboard, usually down David & Emily's driveway.

Guitar Center--what else can he possibly need?

The kids were really excited to give presents this year. We took each boy out on a parent date so they could pick it out. 

To Zack from Ben:

To Ben from Noah:

To Noah from Zack:

Something to mix it up this year--the present fake out. We bought a gift for Ben that was pretty obvious. I knew he'd figure it out, so I wrapped it, then wrapped it again and put Zack's name on the present. To keep things even, I did the same thing to one of Zack's presents. Ben was the first victim and wasn't a fan of the trick...

Until it happened to Zack. 

This is how Emily became the favorite Aunt

and sister-in-law. 

Ben mentioned that he wanted to have a treasure hunt to find a Christmas present. I wasn't sure how to work that, until we decided to give a family trip for a present. This gift was the beginning of the hunt: 

The clue:

Off to our bathroom

where they found this clue:

Then it was out to my car

for the final clue:

The clues didn't reveal the destination and required them to use their heads a little. They were quick to notice the seemingly random capitalized letters and went to Noah's new laptop to decipher the clues.  (Good thing he got that for Christmas--how would they have solved it without it??) 

They were excited for a trip to Universal Studios. They were super excited for a trip to Universal Studios with their cousins. 

And a few random shots: 

Bobble head Dwight.

Zack in a bag.

Serious excitement.

A great big mess= a great Christmas.

12 Days of Christmas Fun

 Mom warned us that this year might be different, so when the box arrived with the first set of 12 days of Christmas presents, the boys were extra surprised and excited. I didn't take very good pictures, but here are some of the fun things we received from Grandma & Grandpa this year: 

Thanks Grandma & Grandpa for the Merry McGarry Christmas. 

Christmas Eve

 I always have the greatest Christmas Eve intentions. I want to be home all day with the family baking cookies, playing games, reading Christmas stories maybe even busting out a Christmas carol or two. But I never quite seem to be able to pull it off. There is always a last minute trip to the store, the kids fight, no one wants to sing. We have a few Christmas Eve traditions and, I think I might as well be realistic about it, rushing around at the end of the night trying to complete all the traditions is a tradition for us too.  

This year, we decided to have a nice dinner so we'd have left overs for Christmas Day. I put a turkey in the oven and proceeded to start baking rolls. I set the timer on the oven for the dough to rise. It dinged and I turned it off. I turned the entire oven off. Luckily I realized my mistake after about 20 minutes but it threw the entire food preparation/baking times off and caused dinner to be later than I planned. On the plus side, the turkey was really, really good. Maybe I've stumbled upon a new technique. 

Since Christmas break started the kids have abandoned getting dressed for the day and really wanted/needed new pjs. They were nagging and nagging me for the chance to open them up. 

Because my baking was so messed up, there was no possibility of actually baking cookies. Thank goodness for my parents' gift of Oreo candy molds. The kids had a good time creating these cookies. Aren't they impressive? We felt very fancy leaving these for Santa. 

We used to watch the Polar Express to help the kids fall asleep but that is a tradition that we don't seem to have time for. Thank you Norad Santa tracker--the kids see that he is in the country and rush to bed. I won't complain about that! 

The Decorator

It's no secret that Zack likes to make things festive.  He recently told me that he wouldn't want to live in a world without decorations. It's kind of fun but it can be very overwhelming. At least he is learning to be somewhat reasonable about it. Like Halloween, I gave him a Christmas decorations budget and we went to JoAnn's to pick out some new things to make our house look great. 

This is the first phase. 

At one point he had garland around the stair railings. It took some convincing to get him to move it. A few days before Christmas, he had a little money left in his budget so we added this. 

On Christmas Eve he decided to add to our door and move a few things around. 

He was at peace with how it all turned out. 

We were lucky to get these pictures. There is almost always either a jacked up black pick up or blacked out Cadillac that parks right in front of our house. It drives Zack crazy! 

Zack wasn't as concerned about the inside as he has been in the past. But he had a say in where everything went. 

 He was obsessed with garland this year. We had more garland than space to put garland and he still wanted to buy more. 

He did set up this Lego scene right in front of our living room electronics. It was a test of my patience and sense of order to leave them there. His brothers liked to move things around just to watch Zack freak out when he saw it was all messed up. Ahh, that holiday spirit. 

 Now that we are kind of looking for a house to buy, one of Zack's main considerations is the outdoor holiday decoration possibilities. He'd like a house with a big tree, courtyard and a gate. 

School Projects

What is it about third grade book reports? Why do they have to be so complex? Noah's projects nearly killed me-puppets, dioramas, posters. The kids are only 8 or 9--spare the poor Mom! Ben's were better because he is pretty easy to work with. I'll let you decide what that says about Noah. And now, Zack is in third grade.... so far so good. He loves this stuff and I barely need to help him. He had his mystery book movie poster finished 3 weeks in advance. 

December's project was the dreaded puppet. Zack had to read a book about animals and make a puppet of the main character then re-tell a scene from the story to his class. He read The Miraculous Life of Edward Tulane, about a stuffed bunny. We put together this puppet fairly quickly, he had the ideas for how to make it, I did the sewing. 

But, because it is Zack, a puppet wasn't going to be enough. He decided to make a background for the re-telling. I gave him poster board and he created this scene from the conclusion of the book when Edward found himself on the empty shelves of a toy shop. Give the kid some packing tape, scissors, cardboard and markers and watch him go.