Christmas with Grandma Amanda and Grandpa Terry!

We continued our whirlwind trip of Christmas fun with a visit with Jon’s Mom to celebrate Christmas-New Year’s. :)

When we arrived on Friday afternoon, Eli tried to teach Grandma Amanda to play Mario while Matea charmed Uncle Jeremy by playing peek-a-boo and wanting to get thrown up in the air nice and high. Which, since Uncle Jeremy is the tallest person we know, is pretty high. :) She LOVED that game.

Peek . . .

a-boo!

 

Good thing Uncle Jeremy works out, because I could do this all night!

Saturday morning we opened stockings and gifts. Inside their stockings, the kids found candy dots on paper (that’s a throwback to my childhood!), Froot Loops/Apple Jacks, Easy Mac, a stuffed monkey ornament, candy canes, and stickers. Grandpa Terry knows what kids like, that’s for sure. Eli thought his stocking was awesome! Matea loved the Apple Jacks and, knowing this was a rare treat, promptly ran behind the chair  to eat them all.

Checking out the stocking haul.

Eating my loot before Mom takes it away!

Matea, who loves to cuddle animals and blankies, loved her new puppies, monkey, and baby doll. She prefers to sleep with them all in her crib with her if she can. She still has much to learn about baby care though, as she likes to throw, sit on, and stick candy canes in the eyes of her baby. :)

Lovin’ my new cuddle buddies!

You feed a baby candy canes through the eyes, right?

See, this doesn’t hurt . . . much.

Eli continued his gaming Christmas by getting Sequence for Kids, which he totally dominates us at even you’d think we’d be able to outsmart him.  Eli also got a new toy trumpet with valves and everything (one too many valves than a real trumpet, but it’s all good). So Eli is well on the way to becoming another trumpet player in a long line of trumpet players, including Jon, Grandma Amanda, and Great-Grandma Corinne!

Sequence! I’m going to OWN you guys!

A trumpet of my own!

Matea kept trying to get Santa to play.

Matea got the general idea of how to play.

On Saturday night we were able to visit Jon’s Aunt Laurie’s for a wonderful Christmas dinner as well, which gave us an excuse to dress up the kids. :) The kids loved Aunt Laurie’s collection of musical instruments (she’s the director of music for a school district and an incredible musician herself), and the giant stuffed gorilla in the living room when they arrived.  Spending time with family is one of my favorite things, and we had lots of family time this Christmas! What a wonderful time!

Matea and Grandma Amanda pose. At least one of them is smiling!

That gorilla was WAY bigger than Matea and she loved it! 

Eli playing the “whatever that thing is”. :)

Dancing to the beat of the drums Daddy was playing.

About to ring the gong *loudly* for dinner.

Christmas with Grandpa Bob and Grandma Sherry!

We headed over to Jon’s Dad’s to celebrate Christmas with them over New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day this year, arriving late on Wednesday night. The kids, well, Eli, were excited to open gifts the next morning, but we were able to get breakfast first. Then the gifting began. Matea, predictably, wanted nothing to do with her presents and instead brought gifts to people and then ripped the labels off. Too bad she wasn’t bringing them to the right people. Don’t worry, we managed to get a peek of the names before the labels were torn off and everyone got their correct gifts. :)

Here you go, Grandpa. It’s not yours but you can have it anyway.

Eli was super-excited for his gifts, as we expected. The highlight of his opening was when he got the New Super Mario Brothers Wii game. That was what he had been wanting and wanting and wanting. So he was soooo excited when he opened that box and saw it!

Do you think he’s excited or what!?

My game was hiding in a big box! Oh yeah!

I don’t think he could grin any bigger than this.

Matea wasn’t forgotten, even if she didn’t want to open her gifts. She got a step stool with her name, just like the one Eli has – so now they have matching step stools, and a puzzle, and a bird house which she carries everywhere like a purse, and the thing she loves the most – books. I think I read her the whole series of Baby’s Family books by Karen Katz at least two or three times a day. They are her favorite!

Playing with my step stool. That’s my name you know.

Mommy’s new spoons make great drum sticks. Let’s head over to the glass table and try them out. :)

I’m puzzled by this puzzle.

Reading one of my books for the first of a bazillion times.

After presents we, of course, needed Wii time with our new games (Mommy got Wii Fit Plus, but you’ll see no pictures of me trying it out). The rest of our time was spent playing with our new toys and having fun as a family. Merry Christmas New Year’s! :)

Matea made sure to get her exercise in. Christmas is no excuse for laziness I guess!

Time for our new game! Eli is Mario, Uncle Jeremy is Luigi, and Jon is toad. Matea is eating pretzels.

Christmas with the Koorndyks!

To ring in the first Christmas at our house, this year we hosted the Christmas festivities when my brother came in from Ohio. Scott and Jill and the boys arrived Wednesday and stayed through Sunday, and we had so much fun!

The kids were literally roaring laughing when they played Boom Blox together, and after they went to sleep the adults played. Scott, Jon, and Eli were the champions of Boom Blox in the family. Almost every night we played card games too, so Jon and I were loving that (we love to play games). It was so much fun to have everyone here!

That’s one (well three) full tables!

Boom Blox – Eli’s excited to show his cousins!

We opened presents for the kids on the morning of Christmas Eve, in our jammies. That was a first for us for some reason – we’ve always done it in the evening I think. We made people wake up at 8 am for breakfast though (*cough* Scott and Jon *cough*). The kids were sooo excited to open their gifts and have all day to play with them.

The obligatory kids in front of the tree photo. The only one where the majority of the kids look normal has Andrew hidden though.

Matea actually opened one present I think, though most of the time she spent bringing Christmas ornaments to people (mostly Uncle Jeff) and eating crackers in the front entryway. She came running though when she saw Tori’s Rescue Hero command center. I never thought of putting Rescue Heroes on her list, but I should have! She loved that command center. After getting her doll house, instruments, and cash register out of their packages she got in to those, but the Rescue Heroes were the biggest hit. And, of course, sitting on the presents again.

A Christmas miracle – she’s opening a present!

Naw, I like opening the crackers better Mom. Matea came running when this baby was revealed. Was I supposed to open this or sit on it?Lexi’s helmet fits me pretty good, don’t you think?Making noise with my instruments!

Eli really wanted to open his gifts (a.k.a. not wait his turn) and he loved his presents. He got the Piranha Panic game and said, “This is exactly what I was wanting!” And he got Sorry Sliders which he loves to play at Lexi and Tori’s house. He was very excited about that.  And Grandma, in her wisdom, got him a little Lego Castle set of his own. Nathan and Andrew and Tori were getting Legos and Mom knew that Eli would want some of his own.  And he did. He loved sitting at the table with the kids and putting everything together. Good call, Grandma!

Time to panic! The Piranhas' are loose!“Whoah, Legos!”

Friday, Christmas Day, brought more family time, and the adults opened their presents (no pics, sorry). We were also treated to a “play” by the kids. Since I grew up putting on plays with my cousins, I thought it was a hoot. Lexi was the MC and Nathan and Noah were comic relief. :) Friday night also, unfortunately, started the stomach flu, with Tori getting sick around 1 am. She seemed a little better in the morning though, which was the calm before the storm.

Singing one of many versions of Jingle Bells. 

Saturday brought the Koorndyk Christmas Party with my aunts and uncles. We were in the gym at church and the kids loved dodgeball, scooters, and running running running. We got to catch up a little (not nearly enough) and afterwards play some games back at our house. Saturday night Scott and Noah and Lexi fell to the stomach flu as well though. Our family stayed well (I think we had it the week before, sorry guys!), but it wasn’t the best way to end our time together. As Lori said though, “It wouldn’t be Christmas without a Koorndyk getting sick!” Despite the ending, we had a wonderful 5 days of Christmas fun with my brothers and sisters!

Getting the balls out of the storage room was a favorite for Matea.

Dodgeball!

Nathan got his workout pulling these four around on scooters.

Who can resist this cutie pie? Not me! (thanks for the picture, Toni, I love it!

Our Christmas!

Our first Christmas in our new house was memorable in a lot of ways, but between all the parties and guests and travel, we had a hard time finding a time for our own Christmas present opening. We decided last minute to squeeze it in be00fore my brother and his family came in for Christmas. The last few years have been spent in flux with the house and moving, and now that we are settled we’d like to develop our own Christmas tradition. It didn’t really happen this year though, so we went with the flow and found time when we could. The kids didn’t care, that’s for sure!

Christmas always starts with stockings! For some reason I didn’t buy Matea a stocking when I got Eli a new one last year, so instead she got a brand new fuzzy pink stocking. :) Of course, she had no interest in what was in her stocking, only what was in Eli’s.

Getting our stockings down!

Matea got a hand-felted sheep ornament this year! (not hand-felted by me, but hand-felted nonetheless).

Finding the Skittle candy cane that he kept asking for every time we were in Target = a very happy boy.

Matea put all the things from Mommy’s stocking in the mailbox of her house for some reason.

Moving on to the gifts, Matea had ZERO interest in the gifts. She did not want to open them, touch the paper, nothing. She liked looking at Eli’s presents, but wanted nothing to do with her own until they were completely taken out of the boxes. She would scream and cry and kick the gifts (and throw them if she could). After a few tries of having her open gifts she retreated to the corner behind a big gift and we stopped trying to coax her in to it. Baby girl wanted nothing to do with it! She finally emerged to play with some of Eli’s gifts . . . and to sit on the presents if she could. Crazy girl! :)

I DO NOT LIKE THIS!

What kind of parent foists presents on their kids? :)

Traumatized by presents, Matea is off to hide in the corner.

At least she enjoyed one of her presents – a sheep book.

When she emerged from isolation, she sat on my presents.

Eli was a different story of course. We could barely get him to stop and look at his present before he opened the next one. He got to open most of Matea’s as well, so he was having a good time. He was very excited to get Boom Blox Bash Party for the Wii, and the Hot Wheels Color Shifters Color Blaster set he wanted. The books we got him he wasn’t feeling that much appreciation for at first (though he didn’t say anything, which I was happy about, he just wasn’t that excited). We’ve read The Mouse and the Motorcycle and Stuart Little to him now though and he loves chapter books, so he ended up being glad to get them. And the biggest hit of the day was the new markers which I got them and just kind of wrapped up for fun because I was going to give them to the kids anyway. They were both instantly excited about those! Go figure.

Boom Blox!

Another book . . . great.

Who knew they’d be so excited by markers?!

Mommy fought the crowds on Black Friday to get this for cheap.

Two fun moments for me was when Eli started playing with Matea’s presents, in particular her pink SUV, counting piggybank, and alphabet ball, and Matea sat there playing with Eli’s Bakugan, cars, and books. Both ignoring their own toys and interested in each others! The second memory was of them playing with the color shifting cars together. They would take turns squirting the cars, trade cars, and had a fun time playing – together! Now that’s a true gift for Christmas!

    Why play with my toys when yours look so fun!  

Peaceful playing – a rare treat!

Christmas Party! (Eli’s, that is)

Today was Eli’s Christmas party at school, and he had a lot of fun! Matea stayed with my Dad so I could get one-on-one time with Eli and help him with his crafts during the party without having to chase Matea around the room. I’m so thankful for that! Eli and I had a nice time together, and I could even help a few other children whose parents couldn’t make it.

We had five stations of craft/activities, but Eli’s favorite by far was when he got to make a bag of hot chocolate mix to take home and load it up with marshmallows, chocolate chips, and peppermints. We also made an ornament, a snowman magnet, and strung a bracelet (which Eli and I decided to make in to a candy cane ornament instead). :) After picking up Matea we headed home and made the hot chocolate (nummy nummy) and played games together while Matea napped. Eli, the Candy Land master, continued his dominance, and we had a great afternoon of crafts, food, and fun!

Listening to our instructions on the story mat.

Ornament time! Eli made his a face with trees for eyes.

Being silly. What a ham. :)

Studiously stringing beads.

The finished snowman magnet! Eli did everything but draw the mouth and tie the scarf!