Christmas Day

We had a great Christmas this year. Santa definitely found Tate this year. He probably even delivered a few too many presents this year.  But, it made for a fun Christmas morning.  Tate woke up very early, 4:00 a.m and after an hour of trying he finally went back to sleep.  When he woke up at 7:30, we had to remind him that it was Christmas morning. Which is kind of funny beacuse on the morning of Christmas Eve, Tate came running out of bed and downstairs to be rather dissapointed that Santa didn't come.  After a few minutes we were able to convince him that he hadn't been forgotten, that Santa would come tomorrow.  Christmas morning came and once we told Tate to go and check downstairs the fun began.  He was so happy to see that Santa ate his cookies and that the reindeer ate his carrots (contrast to last year when he got made that Santa ate all of his cookies).  He spent the morning upwrapping presents and playing with all of his new toys.  Then we spent they day in our jammies playing games, toys and being together.  We ended the night by going to my sisters for dinner and opening of presents from Grandma and Papa Joe.  What a great Christmas!

                                   

                                    Coming down the stairs for the first time to see the presents.

                                     

                                                      Getting closer and more excited!

Checking out the stockings.

Santa left him a Mickey Mouse painting set in his stocking. 

Opening his first present, a Toy Story figurine set.

More presents--HotWheels race track. 

Happy to have an Etch a Sketch.

Opening his most wanted gift!

YEAH!  A castle with two guys!  Good thing Santa listens. 

Playing Hot Wheels with dad.

Tate recieved another train and controller from  Grandma and Papa  Joe. He is waiting oh so patiently for Papa Joe to get it out of the box.

Tate helping Grandma and Papa Joe open their presents. 

My favorite!  This is my cute little niece, Madilyn, born December 6.  Can't get enough of her!

Christmas Eve

I didn't do very well at taking Christmas Eve pictures, but we have a few to document the night.  This year was the first year we decided to have our own family Christmas Eve. We stayed home and celebrated together. My  mom and Joe decided to join us. It was fun to have them here.  We started the evening with one of Kraig's family traditions, breakfast for dinner. We had french toast with buttermilk syrup, eggs, hashbrowns, sausage, bacon, orange juice and chocolate milk. It was delicious.  Then we headed out the Festival of Lights here in Spanish Fork. We love going there to see all of the lights.  We came back and got ready for Santa by getting cookies ready for Santa and carrots for the reindeer.  The night ended with my favorite cinnamon rolls and Russian Teacakes.  YUM!   Tate was able to open presents from mom and dad of Christmas jammies and slippers as well as a game, UNO attack.  We spent the rest of the night playing UNO as a family.  Tate went to bed surprisingly easy and was sound asleep by 8:30.  We lucked out!

Tate and Papa Joe

Showing off his new Santa jammies and Lightning McQueen slippers. 

Getting cookies ready for Santa. 

Hollist Family Christmas Party

This Christmas was so much fun having Mom and Joe home from their mission.  We are glad they came home in time for Christmas.  We met the Saturday before Christmas and had a great time together doing some of our usual family traditions.  We started the night decorating gingerbreads and then had a yummy Christmas dinner of ham, turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, homemade sugar rolls and a relish tray.  Dessert was ice cream pie and chocolate crackle cookies.  The night ended with a little talent show from those who wanted to participate and then of course marshmallow fight.  What a fun night. 

Tate decorating his gingerbread house. He loved putting on the frosting and the licorice. He had a ton of licorice and pretzels decorating his house. 

Checking out the candy.  Oh heaven!  Look at all this candy and they say I can have whatever I want. 

Grandma, Tate and Addie taking time to stop for a picture. 

Mom, Dad and Tate and the finished product. 

All of the cousins waiting for dinner. 

 Tate wanted to do something for the talent show. He was going to sing Jingle Bells, but then his cousin, Hyrum, sang Rudolph. Of course, Tate changed his mind and sang Rudolph instead. He did a great job. I was actually really surprised he even got up and sang at all. 

Let the marshmallow fight begin. 

Now that is one serious marshmallow shooter. 

Getting ready to blast Brooklyn with marshmallows. 

Just a picture to show all of the fun you can have with marshmallows.  This is probably one of our favorite Christmas traditions. 

Christmas Service Activity

This year for Christmas, we decided as a family to not exchange gifts between siblings and cousins, but to instead use the money we normally would have spent on each other to do a service project.  So, we put together Christmas gift bags for the local homeless shelter to give out the children.  The bags included:  drink, granola bars, fruit snacks, candy, a few toys and some other snacks.  The kids decorated the bags and then created a little assembly line to fill the bags. It was so neat to watch all of the kids get so excited to serve.  They loved decorating the bags and then filling them up for the kids.  Definitely a new family tradition. Well worth going without a present or two. 

Ashlyn and Tate decorating bags.

Tate loved putting the stickers on the bags to decorate them.  His bags were full of Christmas stickers.  Can't get enough! 

Here is everyone in their assembly line waiting to put in their things into the bags.

Tate's job was to put a Christmas pencil into each sack.  He was quite excited to have a job.

After all the work was done, the kids got comfy and cozy and watched a Christmas movie.  Tate loves being with his cousins. 

And of course, a trip to Grandma's and Papa Joe's isn't complete without sitting on top of the fridge.  Papa Joe puts the kids on top of they fridge and as you can tell, they love it. 

Bowling with the Cousins

My mom and Joe took all of the family bowling for a little pre-Christmas activity.  We had so much fun with all of the family together.  It is always fun for Tate when he gets to spend time with his cousins.  Tate loves bowling and thinks he is so big because he can do it all by himself. 

Ashlyn, Grandma, Tate and Kraig getting ready to bowl.

Tate and mom waiting for dad to bowl so we can have a turn. 

Can you see how excited Tate was about bowling. He knocked down all of the pins and if you can't tell, he was just a little bit excited. 

He missed the pins this time.  This is is dissapointed look.

Tate was too funny.  He would set the bowl on the little roller thing and then run back as far as he could. He would then run as fast as possible up the ball and then push it as hard as he could.  It was very entertaining to watch.  We had a great time and can't wait to go bowling again. 

Let It Snow! Let It Snow!

Tate has absolutely love the snow this year.  Everytime it snows, he gets so excited to bundle up in his snow clothes and help shovel the walks.  He loves to throw snowballs at everyone and shovel snow on top of you.  It has been so much fun to watch him play out in the snow.  So much fun.

Taking time to pose for a picture.

Taking a break from all the word work of shoveling.

Tate made himself a snow chair in the big piles of snow!

Such a happy boy. 

Santa Claus Comes to the Library

The library here in town always does a Family Night one of the Mondays during the month of December.  This is the second year we have attended and it is always so much fun. They read a bunch of fun Christmas stories, sing Christmas Songs and at the end Santa Claus comes and the kids get a chance to sit on his lap.  Tate had so much fun. He loved singing all of the songs and as soon as Santa came in he jumped right up and was the first in line to sit on his lap.  At the end of the evening everyone received a Sugar Cookie.  I am glad that Tate had so much fun and was so excited to see Santa. 

                                  

Tate jumped right up on Santa's lap and told him he really wanted a Castle with two guys!  That is Tate's only wish. 

I love this cute little picture of Tate staring up at Santa. 

 

 Happy to get a candy cane from Santa. 

Happy Turkey Day

I didn't do so great at getting very many pictures of Thanksgiving, but we had a great day! It was fun to have my mom home again after being gone on an 18 month mission. We missed having my brother and his family here (home with sick kids), but loved eating lots of yummy food and spending time with each other. The day was beautiful so Tate loved spending the day outside following his 2 older cousins around. Brayden and Camden are so nice to Tate. They let him tag along with them all day and played tennis, football and basketball with him. Needless to say, Tate was in heaven.

Tate loves playing on the tennis court behind Grandma's house. You can't see it very well, but he has is tongue sticking out in this picture. He does that all the time.
Tate and Brayden playing tennis.

Since we had such great babysitters for the day, Kraig got to relax and watch some football.

While, I looked through the ads to plan out the next morning shopping trip. What a great day! You have to love a holiday where all you have to do is eat and be lazy.

I'm So Glad When Grandma Comes Home

A few weeks ago Tate's grandma and Papa Joe came home from their mission in Florida. For a few months before they got home, Tate kept asking my mom if she would play Mario Kart with him as soon as she got home. She agreed, probably thinking he might forget. No such luck, as soon as she cam home, Tate pulled them upstairs for a driving lesson. Tate had so much teaching them how to play. Welcome home, we are glad you are back!