Zick Family Christmas

We celebrated Christmas with my parents and Kyle, Maggie and kids on Sunday, December 21st.  GG and Grandpa Zick joined in on the festivities too.  

Nothing says Merry Christmas like a sword fighting 2-year old!  

Abundance is the first word that come to mind with this photo! 

This was just my mom and dad's doing and didn't include the gifts that we or Kyle and Maggie brought!    

Appetizers to get the party started.   

Tyler could hardly wait for Christmas to start.  

Brody sure made 2014 a good year! 

There were lots of offers to help open Brody's gifts! 

There was lots of excitement about Grant's new tower garage blocks with cars too.  

I think Grandma may have been just as excited as Tyler for Christmas to start!   

Mom got a new Mizzou polo!  

Dad got new Blue Jay gear!

Grandma got Popo a camel color cashmere sweater vest.  

The reason this gift was funny is because my mom got my dad a camel color cashmere sweater before they were married and the sleeves were too short so my dad cut the sleeves off and wears it hunting.  Who cuts the sleeves off cashmere sweaters?  My dad. 

A Barbie movie for Hadley.

This child beats to his own drum. 

I am pretty sure no one opened their presents without help from Tyler. 

New books! 

Popo and Kyle got new hunting seats/buckets.  Nathan will need his own in a few years too! 

We have to lose the sippy cup before he can have his own hunting seat. 

The big kids (aka Tyler, Nathan and Hadley) got personalized sleeping bags from Grandma and Popo.  We kept ours bagged up since they were going to Colorado for our ski trip several days after this Christmas celebration but Hadley got to get her's out! 

"Come on, Grant, get in!" 

Grandma had a snowman craft project ready for Tyler.  

Happy Brody! 

The party really got going when the kids took off their pants!  

It was an awesome Christmas with lot of food, great gifts and the best part - excellent company!
Merry Christmas...in February!  I love Christmas so much I like to drag it far into the next year!  

Gingerbread House Decorating 2014

Our Elf on the Shelf, Red, left the boys a gingerbread house kit again this year. 

You can see last year's gingerbread house post here. 

When I say our boys have the most amazing dad, I mean it!  He does it all including decorating gingerbread houses.  I am sure Jeff would love to lay on the couch and watch a college basketball game but he jumps in on all our fun projects!  

Nathan did way more sneaking candies that he did decorating. 

Tyler was very detail orientated.  Next year, we may have to ask Red to bring multiple kits because Tyler has a very specific idea of what his should look like and did not approve of Nathan's haphazard candy placement.  

They each got to decorate half of the roof.  

Thankfully, Grant was already in bed for this project.  

I love this photo of Tyler, Nathan and their finished product!  

Little Rascals Christmas Program

December 17 was Tyler's Christmas program for Little Rascals.  Ms. Brenda and her crew do an AMAZING job with ALL the little boys and girls.  We are so lucky to have an awesome preschool!  

See the 2013 Christmas program here. 

The big boys ran around the gym while we waited for the program to begin.  We had to get there pretty early to save seats for our crew! 

Nathan started preschool in January so more coming on that in a post soon to follow. 

Tyler was so handsome in his tie.  

Nathan loves his Baby Brody!  

When Tyler walked in with his drum on I could not stop smiling.  

The pride Nathan has for his big brother is awesome!  

Tyler was amazing.  

Obviously, I was very tickled by the whole performance as I giggled through the whole thing.  I sure wish I could have muted myself. 

Here is the Missourian video taken by Aunt Jeanne!  

She is giggle free! :) 

Belting it out his songs!  

Yes, Tyler is a giant in his class!  

Brody was less than impressed with the performance. :) 

This kid rocked the drum!  

While I was super proud I was also having visions of drums in our house in grade school for band...yikes! 

Some of his friends from the Tumbling Teddy Bears. 

Grant's favorite part of the night was cookies with Grandma.

Tyler was excited to see Santa again. 

Lovely smile for mom. 

It was a fun night celebrating the hard work of the kids and teachers!  

Merry Christmas! 

Church Christmas Program 2014

Tyler and Nathan both were able to participate in the Church Christmas Program this year.  You can see last year's post here.  Hard to believe Grant was so little just a year ago.  

We had practice for the big performance on Saturday, December 13.  

Saturday practice. 

Nathan wasn't too sure about this performance thing so he sat and watched for a few songs. 

He was all about playing the bells though.  :)

Grant sat with me and ate snacks while the big boys practiced.  

The Sunday of the performance was an exciting one.  The boys were all dressed in their Christmas outfits from Grandma Zick.   

Both boys were supposed to be sheep...and look at the camera.   You can see how well that turned out. :) 

Tyler was very into the program this year as he was his program at Little Rascals too (another blog post for that one).  

Aunt Susan helped Tyler get the microphone ready. 

Tyler was asked to memorize and speak a line in the Christmas program this year.  

"Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel." - Isiah 7:14

He just marched up there and spoke with such confidence.  The other speakers were all older grade school kids.  We were so proud of him. The best part was after Tyler finished saying his line (I so wish I would have gotten it on video) Nathan shouted out so the whole church could hear "Good job, Tyler!"  It was so sweet and cute that he was so proud of his big brother I laughed and got teary eyed all at the same time.  

The boys also practiced the rainbow bells for several weeks prior to the performance. 

 They played Joy to the World and did a great job!

Tyler was sure to instruct Nathan when NOT to play his bell.  

"Hey, Tyler" 

Nathan was happy to see Dad, Popo, Grandpa Wood, Sandy, Krista, Anna, Erin, Jeff...okay so pretty much the whole Wood family that wasn't involved in the church production.  

GG, Aunt Susan, Grandma and Mommy were all helping out with the program.  

See them...up there!

Nathan refused to wear the sheep hat.  I don't really blame him.  The boys both had on black corduroy pants and the cotton balls from the hats and gloves were not a good combo with the pants. 

Such a two-year old!  

And we might as well pick our nose in front of the whole church while we wait too!  Unbelievable!  

Thanks to my dad who was in charge of photography for the performance and captured this classic moment.  

Nathan is such a little ham! 

Bored.

Yep, the family is still up there. 

It sure is great to have our kiddos involved in telling the Christmas story and learning so much in the process.  I know I said it a thousand times before but I will say it again...holidays are so much fun with the kids!