Christmas part 3 (final installment)

Here in the Netherlands the 26th is "2nd Christmas" and that is exactly was it was like here in our household.  We hung out in Christmas PJ's all day and played, played, played and then celebrated Jesus' birthday (we had planned to do that on the 25th but honestly we ran out of time).  We had a great day!  The kids were loving the new kitchen...do you see Isabella peeking out of the window?  

Hopefully, this will be a toy that the kiddos love for a long time!

Some PJ pictures...do you know how hard it is to get them all to look at the camera...all I can say is 3 kids, 3 and under! :)

2 out of the 3 looking!

All gifts we unwrapped on the 25th but we didn't really open some of them until the next day.

Ava is always in the action.

Some floor time with Isaac and Isabella.

Time for birthday cupcakes.  Isaac helped me with the frosting and decorating his cupcake with sprinkles.

The girls were digging the cupcakes...see Isabella going face first?

Yumminess!!

Well, we hope you are having a wonderful New Years's eve day!  We are going into the evening here and just had some yummy Mexican food....yes, it seems to be our food of choice right now...we are both loving mango salsa and had some on Christmas eve and we made another batch tonight. :)  The girls just went to bed and Isaac will soon follow.  We have some wine and a good movie ready for us tonight. :) We might see what fireworks they have outside when it turns midnight...they are really into fireworks on New Years' here...we have been hearing them all day!

Check back for the Shafer top 10....the highlights of this last year and a few catch up items like our New York trip and the girls turning 18 months old...I really haven't forgotten!  Isabella also took some more steps today...maybe we will have a walker or 2 in early 2012! :)  I also fixed the video in the last post so you should be able to watch it now.

Video 2

Let's try it again...

Christmas Video

Do you think this cute face tells you how much fun the kiddos were having??
Check out the video below.  The 26th was PJ day and all we did was hang out all day long and play!  :)  Thank you Grandma Nadine for the great Christmas PJs!!

* we have another fun video for tomorrow.

Christmas part 2

Finally!  I was able to upload the photos!  We placed all the presents under the tree on Christmas Eve and the girls were  sooooo excited when they came downstairs Christmas morning!  We didn't open the gifts yet because we were off to Chruch.  Look at the beautiful dresses that Grandma June got them!!

The girls checking everything out. :)

After Chruch we came home and put the girls down for their naps immediately.  We even had to wake them up to go over and see our landlords/neighbors Giny & Alex that afternoon for cake & coffee.

They had kids chairs for the kids and they were enjoying sitting in them.

Once we got back home it was time for dinner.  I kept running back and forth between houses to check on things in the oven.  We had a yummy dinner of ham, sweet potatoes, green beans & cole slaw....yummy!

Gift time FINALLY!  It's a good thing the kids are young because I am guessing it will be impossible as the years go on to push the unwrapping of presents till 6 in the evening!  I remember barely sleeping and being up at the crack of dawn because I was sooooo excited when I was younger! :)

THE MESS! :)

THE MESS continues!  It is so much fun to play in all that paper.  The only downside with unwrapping so late in the day was that the kids were so excited that they didn't sleep well that night...live and learn. :)

This ended up being the BIG gift from us to the kids!  It is actually something that we bought from some friends of ours and the kids are digging it!  It is really big and even has a BBQ on the opposite side...for those man dinners. :)  We have decided that a Christmas tradition for us is getting the kids 3 gifts each from us.  Like the wise men bringing 3 gifts to Jesus.  I hope this helps us teach the kids something about the Christmas story and helps us not go crazy with gift buying...there are so many cool things out there!  This year we were able to get by with less than 3 gifts each because the girls are so young still. 

Yes, the 1st thing Isaac did was put together his new puzzles! :)
Our families blessed up with some awesome gifts and we feel very loved...thank you!!!
Part 3 is coming...

Soooo....

...it still is taking forever to upload photos so i hope to have better luck tomorrow but these are some of my favorite pics!    Marc has had the last 2 days off and it has been great!  He goes back to work tomorrow...at least it will be a short work-week. :)

Soooo cute!

Christmas

We have lots to share but I have been having problems uploading photos to blogger today.  Here is a pic of Isabella sharing some Christmas love! :) Here is also a video from breakfast a couple of days ago.

Santa & his elves!

Is Santa headed your way??

We hope you are having a Merry Christmas Eve!  As I type this we are heading into Christmas and I am so excited!  We have had a fun and full day today.  We went over to our neighbors this evening and enjoyed some games of charades. :)  The kids are all excited and Isaac can't wait to have some  "happy cake" for Jesus' birthday tomorrow!  He loves birthdays and so all week we have been telling him that we are going to have a birthday party for Jesus tomorrow...the reason for the season.  

Ava was all smiles and loving wearing the fun Christmas clothes that Grandma June got the girls shortly after they were born...they fit great and are soooo cute! :)

Our happy elf! :)

We had to snap this photo because this is her FAVORITE place to be...Isaac's chair...she can sit here for a long time just hanging out and trying to drink his juice. :)

Isabella being her cute self.

She wasn't really digging the hood when I put it up but she loved the fur collar....she kept petting it! :)

Isaac and I this evening before we headed out to the neighbors house.
Well, this elf is tired.  Santa's work is done and we are off to bed! :)

Come on over...

Since we know many of you reading this are not going to be able to make it our house this holiday season we thought we would share a little holiday house tour.  Many of you know that I love to decorate but life changes a little bit with 3 little ones. :)  I love our house and our decorations but it is catered toward 3 young ones (and I'm loving it that way) so although most people don't have their tree up on a stool it works for us. :)

Our very sad looking tree.  It actually was quite cute but a week without water while we were gone = dead tree.  The kids have also pulled on some of the ornaments and things have been a little rearranged (notice the red garland?).  We got the kids those adorable stockings from Pottery Barn kids...aren't they cute!?

Since gifts can't go under the tree because of the 2 little busy bees they went on the piano.  Our families have blessed us with some fun looking gifts to open on Christmas and we can't wait!!

We laugh because window decorations are "very Dutch."  They have these huge picture windows and it is fun to look at what decorations Dutch people place in their windows.  We went for 5 trees this year. :)

This picture makes me laugh because it wasn't until I was looking back at these pictures that I realized where the remote control had disapeared to (I was looking for it all morning)...do you see it?

 I love these new pillows that I found on-line at http://www.dearlillie.com/

Mom, it's up again!  You did awesome with this tree quilt.  I love it!

...and this is real life!  Isaac usually does his puzzles on the table but the girls were sleeping so I let him do them on the floor. :)

The Dining room.

Foyer.

I love this new art I found at http://jonesdesigncompany.com/shop/

This cracks me up because Isaac has been decorating this shelf.  As the day went on today I kept discovering new things he had placed up there.  There is a monster truck, trolley car & "Harold" the helicopter. :)


Thanks for coming over! :)

Trying to get a good pic of the girls can prove to be a challenge...

This is life with TWO 18 month olds.  They love to go the opposite directions and definitely don't have time for a photo.

Do you think Isabella was having fun?  Check out the cute boots from Grandma Nadine.  :)

We decided to try to take pics outside in the falling snow but Isabella wasn't much of a fan of that either. :)

 Daddy is happy to be out with his girls but I am not sure about them...they just weren't sure what to think about that snow! :)

There's a little smile from Ava!
18 month post coming soon! :)
We have had a good and busy week!   Christmas eve is tomorrow..crazy!

Yummy!

One of the fun parts of a trip is the eating and drinking, right?!  Like I said yesterday we went with a tour company to Austria and where we stayed provided breakfast and dinner...yummy!  It was really good food and a fun part of our trip.  Here is Isaac and Marc having a little toast! That would be a little Austrian beer for Marc and apple juice for Isaac. :)

Ava and Daddy enjoying a little breakfast!

Here is our friend, Gwen, who always sat at our table for dinner (her family is the one that joined us on the trip).  She LOVES our girls and we always enjoy having her around.  The restaurant provided the kids with coloring books at dinner and Isaac was a big fan.  All the dinners were pretty typical for Europe....while they were tasty they were also long and so the girls often didn't make it to dinner at all or if they did it was only for a little bit.  Dinner started at 6:30 and the girls go to bed at 7.  While, we don't mind pushing them a bit...2 tired girls at dinner for 6 nights in a row is no fun for anyone. :)   

When they did make it to dinner it was in their PJ's! :)  Doesn't Ava look tired and also in need of a haircut?! :)

Isabella was enjoying drinking from BOTH their cups! :)
More pics to come...the girls turned 18 months while we were there....