Holiday Lights

We went to Mankato yesterday (Dec. 26) for the Kiwanis Holiday Lights show put on at Sibley Park. There are over 1 million lights displayed at the park (with over 8 miles of extension cords to power those lights), with many of the lights accompanied by music.  It's free -- though they ask for food shelf donations and will take cash if you offer -- so it's a fantastic display.

Lights...Lights...Lights...

Most of us were happy to be there...it took Lex a few minutes to wake up after the drive...

More lights...

Luke and a Christmas tree...

There are lights on all sorts of things...

Kieran and Luke...

There was a contest for the best decorated Christmas tree between the non-profits who volunteer at the park...here's Lex's favorite...the ballerina tree.

More lights...

Why not sit on a tractor while viewing the lights?

More lights...

2014 is the year of the selfie....right?  Well...here's ours...Luke's there (barely)...

The show runs through New Year's Eve....

Merry Christmas!

I'm dreaming of a white Christmas

Just like the ones I used to know

Where the tree tops glisten

And children listen

To hear sleigh bells in the snow

I'm dreaming of a white Christmas...

It was not to be this year, and we don't know too many people who were disappointed by that fact.  We woke to Christmas with the yard looking like this:

Not having any snow did not slow any of the activities.  The tree before the early morning drama began...

First up was the stockings left by Santa and one present to tide the kids over for a while, Lex was happy with her horse....

Luke got some more dinosaurs....

Kieran got his Tom Brady jersey (he's the best player in the league, just ask Kieran -- he'll tell you)...

Later, all the presents were opened...Lex still likes Dora and Frozen...

We're getting a lot of presents (ornaments) that have been made at school....

It's not all actions, occasionally there is some downtime between presents to catch your breath....

What do you do after opening presents on Christmas?  Kieran and Luke play one of their two new playstation games...

While Sarah gets on the computer to inquire why a gift was messed up...when you order a pair of boots you expect two boots of the same size and different feet.  What was sent was two boots, both left feet, one a size 8 and one a size 9....

Merry Christmas!

Maddy's 16th

After a long day of school, work, managing dance practice and dinner with Sarah at Rey Azteca in Waconia, they got home to start birthday cake and presents.  It was about time too ---- you can only hear questions like "when do we eat cake?  when is present time?  why?  how?" a few times before you start losing it --- these questions were asked somewhere around a million times yesterday...

Everyone was excited when Maddy and Sarah walked in....we had to start with cake/candles and singing of happy birthday.

You don't really get to blow candles out by yourself in this house....

In fact, it's a little bit of a race to see who can blow the most candles out...

If this trend continues, we'll never have a remaining lit candle to indicate that he or she has a boyfriend or girlfriend....it that's what lit candles still represent.

Then it was time for presents (and shortly thereafter, thankfully, bedtime)....

Driver's license test is scheduled for next week...

Santa Comes to Town

Santa came to the local bank Friday night and the kids went to give him their wish list.

Kieran told Santa he wanted a Tom Brady (QB for the New England Patriots) jersey, an Andrew Luck (QB for the Indianapolis Colts) jersey and football cards.  Santa later told mom and dad that he would be getting Kieran a Tom Brady jersey....

Lukes request was much simpler.....lots of dinosaurs!  It doesn't matter if it would be dinosaur toys, books, puzzles, clothes, etc.  He wants dinosaurs...

Lexy's was by far the most detailed and specific.  She wants a pink horse with a saddle, a rider, carrots, apples and oranges (the horse has to eat you know)...

No one cried, everyone spoke, it was a nice trip to Santa...