Gingerbread Houses

One day during the reunion we met with some family friends at church to play and build ginger bread houses.  Penelope and Bob worked on a Repunzel's tower.

Tucker built his all by himself.

Scarlett, Leon, and I all worked on this one together.  Although there were times when they lost interest and it was just me.

We chose to wear our reunion shirts that day.  I like how they turned out.

All the grandkids together.

Being silly.

All the Woestmans together wearing our shirts.

Being silly.

It seemed like most of the time everyone was playing basketball or eating lunch or running around the gym but I somehow only got one picture of Bob and Leon in the gym.

Woestman Christmas Reunion

About every two years the whole Woestman side of the family gets together for a family reunion.  This year it we did it over Christmas at Bob's parents house in Cincinnati, Ohio.  Bob's parents put a ton of work into it and it was amazing!  It was so nice to get to see everyone and we had a great time.

Some of these pictures I took from Maria she was really on top of the pictures this year. Both Christmas Eve dinner and Christmas dinner were scrumptious. 

The kids put on an adorable nativity play.

All the kids received at least one set of legos for gifts and they were dying to put them together.

The family also spent a lot of time playing games.  I was tired a lot, partly because of the pregnancy, partly because we stayed up late every night, and partly because I was on cold medicine part of the time so I took a nap almost every day.  I missed out on the life games because of napping and that was ok with me :)

More to come...

Christmas Trip

The kids were so excited to go to Grandmas house in Ohio this year for Christmas.  They were telling everyone how they were going to go on a plane and see their cousins.

They were even loving the bus that took us from the airport parking lot to the air port.

Everyone did really well in the airport and even carried their luggage most of the time.  We only used carry ons so everyone had things to carry.

Good by rainy Seattle.

At one point Bob and I got to sit in a row without the kids.  It was really nice!  I'm so used to having a lap child on airplanes that this was a treat.

Both flights were delayed and we did sit on one plane for about an hour before taking off but we made all our flights and over all it went pretty well.

Elf on the Shelf

Our elf this year started out so funny and crafty.  I think he got tired... I only ended up taking a few pictures.  Here are some of his best moments this year.

Christmas Morning

Bob made a video of the kids on our "Christmas Morning" (it was a couple days early because we weren't home on Christmas day).

O Come

"Times change, years speed by, but Christmas continues sacred. It is through giving, rather than getting, that the spirit of Christ enters our lives. God still speaks. He prompts. He guides. He blesses. He gives." 

Late Christmas and Bean Boozled

My sister, Talitha, and I had each other this year for our Christmas gift exchange.  Since I was out of town in San Diego we decided to just get together and do a late Christmas type thing when we got back.

They are in the process of remodeling their kitchen so it was fun to get to see all the changes they made.  We had a fondue dinner and it was so good!  I think it was the kids first experience with fondue so they thought it was fun.  There was a lot of trying to figure out who put which stick in the pot, but nothing we couldn't handle.  The chocolate was divine.  My very favorite was to dip rice crispy treats into the chocolate.

We took a break from fondue and opened presents.  

Talitha a David got us a pretty unique gift.  They made a cute book about our lives and then after a couple pages it said we had to choose what was next.  It was a choose your adventure book, and whichever one we decided would be our present.  It was tough to pick because it wasn't clear what we were choosing.  Once we decided what sounded good we got to go to the page and find out what we really got.  Here are the two choices we narrowed it down too:

1) Bob and Doranda both are competitive and athletic so if they are up for more of a challenge they should turn to page 21.

2) If Bob and Doranda feel like being kids again themselves then they should follow their hearts to page 25.

There were 8 choices and it was hard to decide.  I thought it was fun to pick, but Bob was getting stressed that we would make a bad choice.

We went with page 21 and got "PAINTBALL FOR TWO!!! Babysitting included."  It was perfect.  I've never been and really want to go.  After reading through what all the presents really were I think we got the best one.  Page 25 was to go skating and have dinner at the snack bar.  

They also got us the game Bean Boozled.  I have to say playing it was interesting.  For those who don't know the game it is based off of how in the Harry Potter books they make EVERY flavor of beans.  In this game they have lots of beans, and you spin to see which color you have to eat.  But there are two flavors of each color, one good and one nasty.

I took some videos of us playing.

Tucker got two gross ones, spit them out each time, and was done playing.

Penelope did really well, and seemed to even like some of the gross flavors like dog food.

Scarlett had fun, but after a couple rounds got a Skunk one and had to spit it out.  She was done after that.

Leon seemed to enjoy all the beans and said they were yummy even though many of them were not.

I managed to eat stinky cheese, and booger.  I didn't pull out a single good one.  On my third turn I got barf flavor, it was sooo bad.  I had to spit it out and now I don't want to play anymore.

Bob seemed to get lucky on his turns.  He did get one bad one but it was toothpaste flavor, which must have been the best bad flavor.

Thanks Talitha and David, we had a blast!

Christmas Fun

We normally visit family for Christmas so this year was pretty different for us.  We got started by making treats a couple days early.  I made a list of all the Christmas food I wanted and bought the ingredients.  It ended up being way too much food for us.  We only even made about 3/4 of it, so I'll be making the rest once we finish eating the left overs.  I wanted to include the kids so each one got to help with one dessert.  It worked out pretty well that way.

I didn't get any pictures but on Christmas Eve we made a fire and watched "The Nativity."  We also watched other lds Christmas videos and skype called some family.  The kids each opened one present, new pajamas, and we made cookies and left them out for Santa.  Once the kids were in bed Bob and I stayed up late wrapping all the presents.  We also got the cinnamon rolls and breakfast casserole ready so they just had to bake in the morning.

When the kids got up we did stockings right away.  I remember having to wait for everyone to get up as a kid and it being really really hard.

After that we ate breakfast and then did presents.  Bob wanted to just do it all before breakfast, but I liked breaking it up like that.

Tucker got me these sunglasses.  He got them for free once a long time ago, I thought it was sweet because he said he wanted to get me something on his own without daddy helping him.  He also asked me to try them on a couple days ago and wouldn't tell me why.  I did not put it together until I opened the present.

This year we had the kids draw names out of a hat.  It was just too crazy for me before to try to help each child get a present for the others.  This was so much easier.

And the boys hug.

This next picture cracks me up.  They are still learning that it is ok for others to get something that you don't get.

I got a cool fish eye lens attachment for my phone so we took some selfies.

Bob got a bunch of new ties and a dress shirt.

The rest of the day we played on the beach and played around the house.  I had a cold and it got pretty bad on Christmas so I was worn out by 1pm.  I think I enjoyed the dinner leftovers more than the actual meal.