Christmas Day 2016

Christmas was amazing this year. It might have been my favorite day of 2016. 

Elise was so cute opening her presents. But I really loved watching her play with her toys after she had opened them. We decided we will wrap presents from mom and dad, but Santa will bring his unwrapped. 

She loved what she got this year: some crayons and coloring books, some playdoh, some new clothes and shoes, some Legos, some new bath toys, a doll from Aunt Ximena, a lawn mower (because she was fascinated with them over the summer. She loved to watch daddy mow our lawn, and she even liked looking out our window and watching the neighbors mow theirs. So yeah, she was exited about having a mower of her own, lol.) But most of all, she loved what she got from Santa: an activity center with stairs and a slide. It came with three balls (basketball, soccer ball, and football), and those are what she noticed first. She really loves balls. She didn't seem to notice the awesome slide, but after we pointed out that there was a slide and showed her the climbing stairs, she spent the next few hours playing on it.  She would roll her balls down the slide, and she would give her baby dolls a turn down the slide too.  Sooo cute. Gaaahhh....Dan and I didn't even rush to open our gifts. We were content just watching Elise play. BEST CHRISTMAS EVER.

We did eventually open our gifts. Dan got me a vanity, which I mostly got myself, ha ha! I love that I have an actual place to sit and get ready instead of doing my make-up all over my house!  He also got me a gift card to Sephora, and also surprised me with a Cricket Explore Air machine. He did good. I love scrap-booking and making cards, and banners for parties, etc. Now I have my own Cricket, so I no longer have to borrow my friends' machine!

I got Dan new workout clothes, a workout jacket, some whey protien, pre-workout, and some new shoes. Ha ha, see the theme there. It was all things he asked for himself, so he can get in better shape again...not like I was trying to send him a message or anything, I swear!!

I made home-made cinnamon rolls for breakfast. They were the "1 hour" rolls made with instant yeast, and I had never made them before, so I was nervous. They turned out really good though!  I ate about nine of them over the course of two days...yikes!

She cracks me up! She always notices when she has toe jams and will stop whatever she is doing to get them. Silly girl!

Later on Christmas day, we went over to Lorin and Sue's. Grandma and Papa gave Elise a cute beanie, some Pj's, a snow globe, and a castle play set. It is nice because the small parts are not so small that she could choke on them. We enjoyed our traditional "yaki-niku" dinner and spent the afternoon relaxing and watching Elise play with her toys. Cheyenne got a Karaoke machine, so we also had fun singing a bunch of random tunes!

Christmas came and went so quickly. It was definitely a Christmas to remember, and I am glad I have this blog (even though I don't keep up on it as well as I could).  I love the idea of Elise, and possibly future posterity, being able to look back on these posts and by reading them know how much she means to us, and how much we love her!!!

The Jensen Christmas Eve Party, and Christmas Pj's

It's tradition that on Christmas Eve we go to the Jensen family Christmas party. We go caroling, we reenact the nativity, Santa visits, and we spend the evening with the entire Jensen family eating and visiting. It is always a good time. Elise got to participate in the nativity as an angel. She looked adorable with her angel wings and halo on. 

 She had a lot of fun playing with the "big kids" and trying to keep up with them.  She is so entertaining to watch when she is off doing her own thing and playing pretend. There was one little cousin, Addie, who is about four. Elise kept following her around. If Addie jumped on the bean bag, so did Elise. Whatever toy Addie was playing with, Elise wanted to play with too. It was pretty cute...until Addie got sick of her and was kind of mean to Elise and told her to get away...lol. Pretty typical behavior for a four year old.  Elise didn't seem to mind, ha ha.

Under the mistletoe

My favorite people

The smile I get when I ask her to "say cheese".

Elise loves her Aunt Chey-Chey

Brent and Bridge and Brenley

All Bundled up while Caroling!

She made the cutest angel for the nativity

Nativity

Having fun while we waited for Santa

She was not scared of Santa. She even gave him a hug...but I was holding her the whole time lol.

Brenley and Elise in the Christmas Jammies

Since we spend every Christmas Eve at the Jensen party, this year we started our own tradition of opening our Christmas PJ's on the 23rd, Christmas Eve's Eve. A friend told me about that tradition she has with her family, and I loved it! I wanted to make it a night we spend together as a family doing a Christmas activity, like a craft, or watching a Christmas movie. This year we ended up just putting Elise to bed after opening up the PJ's because it was late and she was grumpy...next year though :)

She was not happy about getting more pictures taken.

Halloween 2016

I've been meaning to finish up my 2016 posts before the year is over! It hit me that it's literally two days away, so I best get blogging!

HALLOWEEN...

...this year was so much fun. Each year, each holiday, gets exponentially better as Elise gets older and is able to get in to them a little bit more. This year, for the Jensen Halloween party, Whitney and Chris took on the planning, and picked out a theme for costumes: Nursery Rhymes/Fairy Tales.  That was a perfect fit for what I had been planning to dress us up as anyways because Elise loves animals, and I knew I wanted to dress her up as a sheep since she loved to say, "baa baa" every time we ask her what a sheep says.  So we chose to go as "Little Bo Peep and her lost sheep."  I made Elise's sheep costume out of a women's sized vest I found at DI.  I did not want to tackle Dan's costume, so we ordered his from Amazon, and it was hilarious on him. I found my white poofy dress from DI and, I ordered the apron and bonnet off of an Etsy store. It was a bit pricey, but it made the whole custome, so I think it was worth it! My Shepherds crook was just two of those $1 candy canes that I spray painted silver and then taped together. It was definitely not the sturdiest crook ever, but it was perfect for a photo prop!

We had so much fun at the family Halloween party. We LOVED that everyone went all out with their costumes. We ate lots of tasty treats, we played games, including the yearly "rap battle."

Dan is totally all in when it comes to getting into character on Halloween ;)

Little Bo peep with her sheep

Cutest little sheep I've ever seen

"Jack and Jill" AKA Grandpa Jensen and Sue

"The Gingerbread Babe".. and the old couple who baked it ;)

"Three little monkeys" Chey was so creative with this costume.

It was practically a zoo!

Brenley made the cutest gingerbread cookie!

AKA Chris and Whitney

Lorin's humpty dumpty KILLS me. The best.

My sweet little sheep

Jake and Cara. Loved their animal costumes.

We also dressed up for a second party with Kelee, Vinny, and some of Kelee's friends.

80's fam. Ready to party.

Elise's smile in these two pictures is my FAV!

And lastly, the morning of Halloween I ran in a 5k with these two crazies. I never enjoy running, yet for some reason I still do it. Like every three of four months is all, so I never get any better at it! The shirts were made by La-Shauna.