Thursday, December 26, 2013

Keeler Christmas

The best time for all of us to get together and celebrate the "Keeler" Christmas 
was the day after Christmas...at my house.

Everyone showed up after I got off work (yea, had to work that day).  We talked and snacked around while my mom worked away in the kitchen to get dinner ready.

 
My clean house.        PRE-Christmas presents.  


I tried to get a picture of all of us at the table eating, but it didn't work.  I even had my mom try to take one as she tried to hold and console baby Hudson...but that one didn't turn out either.

So I'm stuck with the "after" picture...which includes Jason still eating what was left from Christmas dinner.


After dinner and before presents, I insisted on getting a family picture.  It doesn't happen very often that we are all together, so I set up my old camera on a tripod and used the self-timer feature to get this one.  It only took three tries to get a good picture of everyone looking at the camera with smiles and eyes open (except the baby, who was asleep).



While we had every body together, we did some individual family pics, too.  

Hunter thought he still needed to be in this one 
(see bottom right of pic) - hilarious!





It was near impossible to get these pictures before everyone dug in to the presents.  I think the big kids (ie JASON) were more excited than the little kids to be done with pictures and on to gifts!

I only took pictures of the gifts I got...not everyone else's.  
That would have been picture overload...as if this isn't already. 

In order of age:

Hudson was actually really in to his little light up remote control!  
He stared at it the rest of the night!
 

 


Hunter got cars.  Of course.
 

Hadley got a Frozen book.  She's obsessed with that movie.
 

Brody got a soccer ball and a Blake Shelton CD.  I was really worried about what to get him, but with Christa's help, I think I did alright.  He seemed to really like them both!
 

Allie got a t-shirt, a headband, and some awesome glitter nail polish.
 


The boys were clearly both very excited about their t-shirts they got.  More gag-gifts because I felt bad not getting them anything.



Christa made Kelli and I some awesome leg warmer/boot cuffs 
AND a bright ear warmer that I just LOVE!

Mom got some presents, too (scarf, chocolate, etc).


The kids got so many presents.  I think Hunter has to officially  have every toy car and truck sold.  He just has to...


 

Hadley is in to American Girl now, and got a doll, a suitcase that she carried  around instead of rolled around on the wheels, a toy mixer, all kind of fun stuff...


 

Brody got a soccer goal that folds up in to a back-pack thing.  Of course we had to set that thing right up in the middle of the family room...

 

Long story short, my once clean house was soon looking like this:




And you know what?  

Even with all of those new toys, the iPad still won out for the best toy by the end of the night...    

Apple for the win.


The night ended with a "new drink" of mulled wine -- (my mom always tries something out on us every holiday) -- and a very fun few rounds of a new game:  What's Yours Like?  

I would highly reccomend it for kids AND adults.  You pick a card, and tell everyone what the word is except for the person guessing.  Then you tell that person what yours is like and they have to try and figure out the word.  Did that make sense?  The instructions explain it better, but here is an example:

The word was toothbrush, and the clues went something like this:

"Mine gets wet"
"I use mine a lot"
"Mine goes in my mouth"
"Mine has little hairs on it"
"Mine is old and dirty"

Yea, you better believe we were all dying.  Oh how the mind wanders...

Anyways, it's a really fun game and we had a great time playing it!

I think everyone was pretty happy with how the Keeler Christmas went this year.  You can't beat good food, family time, and presents!

Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Christmas Day

I felt sick all night from eating so much dessert on Christmas Eve, 
so I slept in on Christmas Day.  

When I finally got up and opened my door, this is what I saw:

 
Presents lining the stairs (and my dog).         My mom is the best...


  

 

  
Dress pants for work, cool bracelets from Indonesia,a hoodie, new plants..and a leopard print bra from Victoria Secret.  Sorry, but that one's going back to the store. 

Her turn!  I got her a neck warmer/scarf thing from the Harvest of Talents in October, some lotion from Bath & Body Works (that I actually bought for myself and then didn't like), and a bag I got in Ibiza that she LOVES and I don't.  Nice gifts, huh!? ;)

 

Oh, I also got 6 lottery tickets to scratch...and I actually won on two of them!  I think I get a total of $15!  Not bad!

 

After a healthy breakfast of homemade pumpkin muffins, I went up to try on some of my new stuff!  Along with the dress pants for work, she also got me fake leather pants.  I only tried those on for fun...they definitely went back to the store, too.  I'm too old for that!


Leather pants!?



I also got some Christmas presents for myself:  

an iPad Air (LOVE IT!) and a new purple coat for my ski trip!

 
                                                                  Too much purple??   Never.


That afternoon, I went over to Tony and Christa's to see them for a few minutes, and Christa had time to trim my hair.  She was "bored" after that, so she decided to straighten it, too!  Hunter was asleep the whole time I was there, so no cute pictures of him, but he got a new trash truck and was pretty happy with it from what I was told. :)

Later that evening, we went down to Jason and Kelli's house.  Hadley was outside making a snowman when we got there, and was pretty proud of it, as you can see:


 

I guess once Christmas presents are opened, it's time to get rid of the tree.  We wrapped the giant thing up and drug it out to the curb, leaving a trail of pine needles the whole way.  That's why I just do fake.  No clean-up, and not expense every year! 



Hadley made Christmas presents for my mom and I, and even decorated the box with drawings (and Kelli wrote "Hadley's creations" on them.   So cute!

I didn't really get to open the present myself.  Hadley as way too excited for that.  So she handed me the box and then isntantly started opening it for me, haha.



 

Other random cuteness from the afternoon: 

Hudson and some dogs on the Petco facebook feed.

 

I went down to run on their treadmill for a little bit, and when I came back up, Hadley decided she wanted to "do" my hair.  I wasn't sure what exactly that entailed, but being the good aunt I am, I obliged.  Lucky for me, it was just her taking it out of the pony tail and flinging it around.  Nothing painful, which was nice. :)

 

We ate a little dinner and hung out for awhile, and called it a night.  

It was a pretty low-key and uneventful day, but I got to see everyone in my family, got some cool new presents, AND got straight hair, so I'd say that's a pretty solid Christmas!