Pomerleau Family Blog: First Christmas in our new house!

We got back to our house and Sean’s sister’s family and his parents were already there. They all got in late in the evening the day before. Brandon was super excited to see his bud cousin Kevin who is just a year older than him. It was fun seeing baby Sofia and how much she grew. She was crawling all over the place. Olivia and Bianca were also reunited. Olivia had been getting over a bad cold and had been refusing to nap with us most of the winter break which was a recipe for disaster and was making her cranky and more sensitive than normal. Coupled with us being gone on two trips from the house and her being out of her normal routine and then before that also having several days of snowy weather where we were stuck in the house also did not help the matter. We ended up having Sean’s sister Dawn’s family of five and then Sean’s parents staying at our house. We moved Olivia into our room on the floor on the tempurpedic pad, put Sean’s parents in our bonus room on the futon, and then Dawn’s family took Olivia’s room with the trundle bed and we put Kevin in Brandon’s’ room on the bottom bunk. It all ended up working out.

The first day the kids hung out and watched a movie. Then I got out the gingerbread house kit from Costco and the kids enjoyed making the gingerbread house. We had yummy homemade beer cheese soup. On Christmas Eve, the kids helped Grammy make her sugar cookies. They had a lot of fun rolling out the dough and cutting out the shapes and then decorating them of course with lots of frosting! The kids went outside and ran around for a bit as it warmed up just enough to be able to do that. The kids each got to open up one present on Christmas Eve and had fun doing that. Sean’s mom and I took the kids all together in the car to drive by and look at Christmas lights before dinner. Then we had dinner and Olivia who did not nap was super tired. So she left out her cookies for Santa and ate her dessert under the Christmas tree and then we went upstairs to read the Night Before Christmas with daddy. The older kids had their dessert under the Christmas tree and then Papa read the Night Before Christmas to them as well. I was surprised that they were able to go to bed they were so excited!

First night making the gingerbread house

Getting ready to make the gingerbread house

Cousins having fun with the gingerbread house

The boys did such a good job

They made most of it entirely themselves

Daddy and Olivia looking at the Christmas village

Brandon and Kevin working on one of Brandon's lego sets

Cousins dancing with Grammy

Making sugar cookies!

Cousins working away at the cookies

Grammy and her two girls

Working with Grammy to make the cookies

Cousins having fun making cookies together

Brandon working on decorating the cookies

Brandon and Kevin hard at work

Decorating away

Brandon and Kevin working on the cookies

The boys working hard on the Christmas cookies

Cousins working hard making cookies

Yay sugar cookies are so good!

Sugar cookies produced

Papa pushing the girls on the swing

Sean and I on Christmas Eve

Warming up by the fire before Christmas eve dinner

All warmed up by the fire

Enjoying the warm fire on Christmas Eve

Baby Sofie joined her

Brandon and Daddy

Opening up Grammy's present on Christmas Eve

Climbing up to big brother's bunk before bed

Christmas Eve leaving cookies, a carrot for the reindeer, and milk out for Santa

Reading The Night Before Christmas with daddy

The cousins eating cupcakes under the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve

Cousin smile shot Christmas Eve

Papa Reading The Night Before Christmas

Christmas Eve

The next morning the kids woke up at a pretty reasonable time around 8:00 AM although Olivia had woken up earlier at 6:45 AM but was content to watch the iPad to let everyone else sleep in a bit later. We came downstairs and the kids were so excited to see that Santa came! We let them open up their stockings and Olivia was so happy to see a bunch of blind bags in it. Brandon also had some fun blind bag stuff too in his stocking. Olivia was also very happy that Santa had left her candy. I was able to get some cute photos of the kids and the cousins by the tree and then we started opening up presents! It was so fun to see both kids super into Christmas this year and opening up presents. Some of the Christmas highlights this year for Brandon included a Lego Star Wars set, a Nintendo 3DS from Santa, 6 Nintendo 3DS games, some Imaginext action figures, tons of Pokémon card packs and sets, and some books. Olivia got a bag full of various blind bags which she loves including Littlest Pet Shop, My Little Ponies, and other misc. collectibles. She also got a gymnastics Barbie set, an equestrian Barbie and pony set from Grammy, a light up Princess Cadence pony, a Rapunzel doll, several old school Polly Pockets sets that I found at the consignment sale, and a Polly Pocket set I found at the consignment sale. Olivia’s big present was a Barbie dream house from Santa that came with several Barbies and clothes and accessories. Olivia had wanted a Barbie dream house for months from Santa and was super excited to get it. Brandon was super surprised by the 3DS and hadn’t played it that much before. Halfway through the present opening, it started snowing just fluffy wet flakes, so we even got a partial white Christmas!

Super excited to see all the presents

The kids were super excited to see all of the presents and immediately started sorting them

Daddy and Olivia on Christmas morning

Sorting Christmas presents into piles

Everyone was super excited! Santa had come

Getting presents!

So excited to open up presents!

Mommy shot with my kiddos Christmas morning

Shot Christmas morning of my two sweeties

Beyond excited

Cousin shot

All the cousins together

Opening up stockings

Looking at the stockings

Love this one of the two of them

Such a silly face

Another good photo of the cousins

Looking at the loot in the stockings

Excited for some My Little Pony blind bags

The boys enjoying looking at their stockings

Candy canes for ears!

Super excited for the ponies

Brandon looking in his stocking

Opening up Strawberry shortcake house

Livie's big present-a Barbie dream house!

Living the candy canes!

Checking out the Barbie dream house

Sean opening up his present

Brandon and Kevin checking out his 3DS

Brandon super excited about his 3DS that Santa brought him

Looking through her stocking

Christmas morning opening fun

Brandon opening up 3DS games

The kids enjoyed playing with their toys with their cousins throughout the morning. We had a yummy Christmas breakfast with Mimosas. Sean began getting Christmas dinner ready. He got a prime rib and put a rub on it. Olivia and Brandon had fun dressed up for dinner under the Christmas tree. We had a yummy Christmas dinner and Sean’s Grandma and Aunt Linda came over for dinner. We ended the night by playing some fun card games including Cards Against Humanity and Code Names. Olivia fell asleep initially but woke up as she had a really bad cough and couldn’t stop coughing and came down and hung out with us for a bit while we played the card games.