Tickled Pink and Orange

Christmas Eve Eve

Tommy and I always host a Christmas Eve dinner for our friends. We have so much fun and it's such a nice time together. Well, given our current living conditions this year, we decided to spend Christmas Eve in Lexington, therefore not allowing us to host. Amber took over, and we had a yummy, quite nontraditional meal of grilled pizzas (our favorite!), on Christmas Eve Eve. We had a blast together as we always do!

I was in charge of kid's entertainment. We made reindeer food, which they love to do, and decorated cookies for Santa.

(Did you know this bagged, squeeze icing was like Royal Icing? It worked great!)

(Please excuse me. I had THE stomach bug the day before and was recovering. And I was freezing so this is Will's coat. Geez. I was a hot mess! That was a cute Christmas tshirt under there though!)

Annual Christmas jammies pic. Except I felt awful so Tommy packed the bag and couldn't find any of Drew's three pairs of Christmas jammies. Oh well!

The original three!

And our Drewsie. What a great Christmas addition!

All five babes. I love how Jack is not only sitting in the Bumbo, but also checking out Drew. Ha!

I love it. William's feet in the air, Jack stuck in the Bumbo, Cody playing with a toy, and my kids looking at the camera, but deer-in-the-headlights looking. LOVE IT!

Christmas Fondue

Our annual Christmas fondue is one of my most looked-forward-to events of the holidays.

We eat until we are sick.

The kids open presents and love playing together. Even better now that they are old enough to play upstairs in the Seidel's playroom without us worrying... much.

We tend to have a new addition each year.

I'm so thankful that this year it was mine!

I believe this is the first shot of us girls in a six-year old tradition! It was also only the second time that one of us haven't been pregnant! (Although I'm oddly sticking my tummy out in this picture.)

This year's new addition stayed on my lap during almost my entire meal. Fondue and a baby don't mix well. Tommy took over for dessert. He knows I'm serious about that and needed both hands! (I was actually holding Addie Kate for dessert, but she's easier!)

And baby boy had a really big Christmas treat! Daddy gave him a marshmallow to gum. And did he love it! Note here that Addie Kate didn't have her first taste of sugar until she was one!

Here's to wonderful Christmas traditions, fabulous friends, great food, and precious children!

Cutest Little Elf

(Darn Blogger wouldn't upload these rotated. Ugh.)

Oh be still my heart. Mommy loves this precious boy.

Roper Mountain Lights

Our annual trip to Roper Mountain Holiday Lights:

I think one of Addie's favorite parts is getting to sit up front in my lap!

Every year it's drizzly when we go!

It was raining, but just barely, so we ventured out to look at the other decorations.

They had several of these "put your head through" things, and she wanted all of us to do every one of them!

Even baby brother!

We love this pretty sleigh. And one day we'll have a picture of all of us in it!

Daddy's Birthday 2011

We were so glad Daddy was in town to celebrate his birthday with us! With the large amount of travel he's been doing lately, it was up in the air there for a bit.

Addie Kate loves, loves, loves any celebration. She was so excited that it was her daddy's birthday. I took her on a "girl's day" to pick out gifts for him. We had such a good time.

All we need is a tiny excuse to bake a cake around here. She loves it and does about 75% of her by herself!

We had to get creative with the candles. (And they were pink, of course, because that's just about all that's in our house. Although it's changing slowly but surely with little man around!). I tried to make a 33 with the candles. It didn't work. We also didn't have but a casserole dish here in the apartment. So he had a sheet cake, my least favorite, in a casserole dish, with Christmas colors and sprinkles, and pink candles. Good thing he's a good sport!