Santa Encounter....

Tonight we visited Santa Claus Indiana. Where else would you rather go this time of year? We really wanted to take the kids to see Santa and we wanted to see the Lake Rudolph Land of Lights display by Holiday World.  And since every weekend from now until Christmas will be completely busy we thought what better time to go than now!

Olivia (with my help) colored Santa a cookie on elfontheshelf.com so we decided to give it to him in person. She was SOOO excited to give it to him, when we were on the way. She also told us in the car that she was going to walk up and talk to Santa (Nate and I both knew better)

And here I am telling Santa all about her cookie and that we have one of his elves at our house named Boo (thats why the cookie said Santa and Boo).  Notice Olivia's head facing down making sure not to make eye contact with Mr. Claus

Lake Rudolph's Land of Lights was pretty neat! Although I'd suggest going with another family in a van and splitting the cost for this 1.2 mile excursion :)

We kept telling Olivia we were going to see the lights and when we drove by we told her we were going to go in there (meaning the wooded area where they had this display set up). The first half of the lights she kept saying she wanted to go in them and I kept explaining we were in them, then we reached the light tunnel and when we entered it all was well because we were "in the lights". Thank you Koch family for putting in a light tunnel and sparing us a 3 year old meltdown! :)

The Santa Claus Store where we met Mr. Claus!

Our Elf named Boo...

We adopted one of Santa's Elves last night.  Santa sent him our way to keep a watch on the kids this year!  Olivia named him Boo and each night he flies back to the North Pole to give Santa all the info, from what they want for Christmas to how they behaved that day.  Each night when the kids go to bed Boo leaves and in the morning when he comes back he hides somewhere different.  This morning Olivia found him pretty quickly. She was so excited! We can't touch Boo or his magicaly flying dust will go away and he won't be able to report back to Santa, and Boo can't talk to us, he can only listen... Santa said so! Such a cute new tradition that we are starting. I wish I had come up with his money making idea myself! We'lll keep you posted on the where abouts of our new little elf friend this Christmas season! 

Cousins and friends!

This weekend we had Thanksgiving with Nate's family (our third and final Thanksgiving celebration). The kids love getting together and playing. Olivia adores Mati and Bryson was loving Ben! Here are a few pictures from the day.

Aunt Traci giving the girls star treatment with manicures and pedicures!

Finished product!

These girls sure do love each other!

Ben wore out Papa Rich! He loved being thrown up in the air! to funny!

Bryson and Ben playing together

Notice Bryson's hand on Ben's face, when the baby won't look at the camera, make him look at the camera! haha

Pretty girl

Usually I always put posts on here with pictures, but recently I found out that there is a site where you can print your blog into a book! So I thought I would just start writing little things down in here so I can always have these memories of my kids and the funny things they often say. This one is short but I found it to be quite funny.

Me- "Olivia do you want to go to Menards with me?"
Olivia -"YES!" (Menards if her favorite store by the way)
Me- "Do you want to wear the dress you have on or do you want to change first?"
Olivia- "I want to wear this dress so people can see me and I can be pretty."

Zoo with friends!

Last week was so beautiful outside and we knew it was probably our last week of nice weather for a while so we spent a morning at the Evansville Zoo with our friends Alison and Adi. The kids only had 1 meltdown each and they all happened at the exact same time, but other than that it was a great morning at the zoo!!

Adi, Olivia and Ben sitting in a boat

Liv and her pal Adi

spooky bats! haha

Alison and Adi

I loved this picture of Adi! haha When I saw it I had to laugh, she looks like shes bustin a move!

Liv checking out the otters as they nap peacefully

Adi in all her cuteness!