Christmas with The Miller's

The Sunday after Christmas, we loaded up the van (and Tracker) and headed to the other side of the state to spend sometime with my Mom. We worshiped at my hometown church in Perrysville, and then went back to Mom's where Jake, Jos and family met up with us.

Karter and Jonah had a great time passing out the gifts.

And tearing into them!

Grandma Vicky had given Jonah his birthday present right before we opened Christmas gifts, and he was pretty content with the train he got. Grandma convinced him to open his gifts, with her help.

Again, Kaden showed little interest in opening his own gifts, just playing in the wrapping paper!

After the older boys had opened all their gifts, it was baby Olivia's turn. Karter and Jonah were very eager to "help" her open her gifts too!

Joscelynn won the family "Quick Tater" prize!

Kristoffer was very pleased with his electric razor.

This year we all went in together and got mom a Kindle. She was very surprised and happy with her gift...she acted like a little kid, and couldn't wait to get it out of the box to play with!

We spent the rest of the afternoon trying to get the kids to nap, because we were all so exhausted. All of them, except for Jonah, napped, but of course not at the same time! I didn't mind hanging out with my beautiful niece!

Poor Olivia was bullied by Kaden most of the day. He kept sticking his fingers in her mouth and eyes, she tolerated most of it pretty well...

...until he tried to kiss/eat her!

I love these two so much!!

That evening we went over to my grandparents house for dinner. Grandma made an amazing dinner and we were all so full afterwards! We had a little bit of time before my cousin, Ryan, could make it after work, so Grandma went to the attic and brought down some old books.

Jonah was really starting to feel the effects of not napping!

So was Livi.

Kristoffer wrestled the boys for awhile. I just love Kaden's expression (and hair)!

When Jake was younger, Grandma and Grandpa had gotten him some personalized books, and Jonah and Karter enjoyed having them read to them.

When Ryan got there, Karter quickly took up his role as the Christmas Elf and passed the gifts out.

Sleepy baby!

All of us went in together and got Grandma and Grandpa a new TV...I think they were pretty surprised!

Before we left we changed everyone into their pjs, and when we got back to Mom's, we all went straight to bed!

It was a fun, but exhausting, day spent with our family!

Christmas Morning

Christmas was very exciting for our family this year. Having a 2 year old in the house added a lot of excitement and anticipation! Over the past week and a half we have had 2 1/2 days worth of Christmas and 1 1/2 days of New Year celebrations, and we are just now recovering from all of the festivities!

Kristoffer had Christmas Eve off, and he volunteered to watch the kids so I could make cookies for Santa. Karter was excited to leave cookies and milk out for Santa and carrots for the reindeer.

We were excited to see Santa and his reindeer had eaten all of the snacks and left a lot of packages for the boys...and one for Rascal!

It was an early morning for all of us, but Kaden wasn't quite ready to wake up.

Before we opened any presents, Kristoffer read us the Christmas Story from the Bible.

Karter was a little hesitant at first, but soon got the hang of it...especially when he saw he got race cars and a race track.

Kaden didn't know what to do, but he had a lot of fun playing with all the wrapping paper and boxes.

Since Kaden was too little to unwrap his own gifts, Karter was more than happy to help him out!

After all of the gifts from Santa were opened, we opened our gifts to each other. Karter was very kind and let Kristoffer open his gifts first, then me and Kaden, and he wanted to go last.

It was so cute to watch the boys checking out all of their new stuff.

Rascal enjoyed his Christmas present too!

We had a wonderful Christmas filled with lots of family time!! Now that we are settling back into our "normal", the boys are enjoying playing with all of their toys. It is amazing what a room full of new toys can do...they have been entertaining themselves all day!!

Little Shepherd Boy

This past week our church presented a Live Nativity, and our little Karterman was the cutest little shepherd boy in all of Bethlehem! He was bundled up pretty good and could barely put his arms down (think A Christmas Story), but he thoroughly enjoyed wearing his costume Gran-Gran made.
The animals were a big hit...

Karter had fun with his church friends, Abby and Anna.

Earlier in the day he didn't really want to wear his costume, but we promised Uncle Kyler would be wearing one too and he was fine with it then...he always wants to do what Uncle Kyler is doing!

Papaw Bud and Gran-Gran stopped by to see the Nativity.

Aunt Emmy was the master mind behind the whole event, and did a great job organizing everything!

Daddy made a pretty cute shepherd too!

The Nativity was the perfect event to set the mood for our Christmas week, and to remind us of the reason for the season.

Merry Christmas!!

Kaden's Learning to Walk

This morning Kaden has started to take an interest in walking. He has been cruising the furniture for some time now, and will occasionally let go and stand by himself for a few seconds. For Karter's first Christmas Santa brought him a walker, and today Kaden has been cruising all around with it. (I apologize for the terrible camera work. When the screen goes black for a bit I thought I had turned it off, but apparently I had not!)

Right after he fell in the above video, he got right back up and tried again. After he realized the gate to the stairs was down, he abandoned the idea of walking and seized the opportunity to climb the stairs!

Christmas Cuties

This morning I downloaded a new program (Picasa 3) onto our computer and I have quickly become very obsessed with it. I love the collage option! To play around with it I took some of my favorite shots from our Christmas tree photo shoot and made a cute collage...oh the possibilities are endless with this program!!

Wordless Wednesday Part II

Wordless Wednesday

Hoo-Hoo-Hoo-Hoosiers

Sunday morning we loaded up the van and headed down to Bloomington for the day. The purpose of the trip was to take in a basketball game, but we made a day of it and went early to spend some extra time with Kyler and Kara. It was so awesome to be back in B-town and taking in some of our favorite sites again. We may have mentioned on a few occasions how much fun it would be to live there, and also how much we love the town because it is where we feel in love!

We took in a lot of old sites, but Kristoffer was really excited to take in a new one too...Cook Hall. Besides checking out the new building, he was pretty excited to teach his sons about IU's basketball legacy...

...and showing them the National Championship Trophies.

Our seats were up in the balcony, but of course there isn't a bad seat in Assembly Hall. The balcony was only about half full, so it was nice to have plenty of room to move around and not have to climb over anyone.

Karter was in complete amazement most of the time. For the first 30 minutes he looked all around asking questions about everything and pointing out every IU that he saw.

Kaden was really good for most of the game and loved all the clapping! Whenever the crowd would clap he would look around, smile, and then start clapping too!

With about seven minutes left in the first half, Karter started to get a little antsy, so I asked him if he wanted some popcorn and a pop. Of course, he jumped at the opportunity to have a snack, but I started to rethink giving him his own pop. However, once you mention something to Karter he does not forget it, so no matter how hard I tried he was adamant about having the pop too. In the end, we got a popcorn and a pop...and I would do it all over again. He sat still for a long time eating his snack, and polished off half the popcorn by himself!

Kristoffer has always loved the 8 minute time out in the second half...

...and he wasn't disappointed this time either!

Kaden was such a good baby the whole game, but towards the end, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't stay awake.

The Hoosiers played great and blew South Carolina State out of the water, winning 102-60. We had a blast being on campus again, cheering on the hustling Hoosiers, and look forward to taking the boys to more games in the future! Thanks Kyler and Kara for a great day!!

Go Hoosiers

We are gearing up for a weekend of family fun! Tomorrow, for the first time in a long time, we don't have anywhere we need to be (except Kristoffer has to go to work in the morning) and we plan on playing in the snow and making Christmas cookies. We are most excited about our trip down to Bloomington on Sunday. We will be spending the day with Kyler & Kara, and going to the IU basketball game in the afternoon.

Karter already knows he will be going to college at IU, so to prepare him for the game we have been teaching him the school song. He is pretty cute and will randomly sing "for the glory of old IU!" Last night we were talking about IU and he started doing some cheers...of course, by the time I got the camera he was done, but I did manage to get a cut video...