Day after Christmas

Christmas night was another fun filled (late) night but the next day we were at it again...home for just a little in the morning and then headed over to Grandpa Harold and Grandma Mari's for breakfast and a day full of presents, food and fun!

Andi was very persistent about wanting to immediately take all of her Christmas presents to her room...I caught her first thing Sunday morning carrying them in to lay them out on her floor!

TJ playing with his pile of presents.

Cooper sitting in his new chair reading his new book.

(being calm for the time being!)

Christmas at Ecklers in our jammies :)

a full house with a big belly ;)

Andi excited to get "another bed" for all of her barbies.

She loved all of her Christmas presents this year. It was neat to see all of her "surprised" and "excited" faces! Here she is opening her Ariel and Eric dolls from Kyle.

and then her "big present" from Grandma Mari (and Grandpa Harold), and art easel.

TJ, again wearing his Missouri Tiger gear, was very excited to get pliers and new plier holders.

TJ Moe...with "muscles" aka towels stuffed under his shoulder pads!

Toy Story Mr. Potato head...another big hit!

Cooper and Travis opening more presents.

A family picture of us all!

Christmas Day

Christmas morning came early, well for some of us anyways! I was worse than the kids and could not sleep at all! Then I woke up bright and early before 6 am and decided to just get up so I wouldn't miss anything.

We were on somewhat of an early schedule so that we could open our presents, make it to Middletown to see Grandpa Tainter and then Grandpa Tom and Grandma Barb AND make it back to Leonard for supper with the Belts.

I never would have imagined that might kids would sleep in but I finally had to wake them up so that we could make it to all of our Christmas'.

Christmas morning 2010

(not sure TJ was awake yet...we missed his smile with his eyes closed!)

The boys busy opening their presents.

Andi loving her new tinkerbell movie!


Christmas was SO much fun this year being able to watch the sheer excitement and joy as the kids opened presents and expressed their thankfulness! :)

Travis excited for some new Mizzou pajama pants.

We didnt get a lot of pictures Christmas morning but thats because we were busy opening and watching the kids tear into their presents! Thankfully we did get it on tape so that we can watch it again! :)

Next we traveled to Middletown to see more Great-Grandparents.

First we stopped by to see Grandpa Tainter where the kids were excited to share Grandpa's popcorn tin with him (that we got him!) and to play with their new toys (2 noisy trucks and a barbie- perfect!)

Then we headed to Grandpa Tom and Grandma Barb's house. It was a full house as always...with lots of people to see and things to do!

Of course, like everywhere we went over Christmas Break, our kids were spoiled with attention and gifts! They had an absolute blast and so did we!

Andi excited about her Glitter Sheep.

TJ loves his new cowboy hat "just like Papa Tom's."

Coop's theme of the day seemed to be diving into Christmas paper and helping pick up the trash.

After Middletown we headed back Leonard...

where Andi was excited to get her puppy

and TJ was excited to get his Mizzou football stuff. Now he looks exactly like TJ Moe!

Here's Cooper helping pick up wrapping paper off the floor. :)

Another big hit with Andi was her "Repunzel game" for her leapster.

Christmas Eve

It seems like we always have way too much fun planned for Christmas Day and the day before and after (which is not a bad problem to have because we do have tons of fun and get to see ALL of our families in that short amount of time. It just usually means some exhausted kiddos and parents at the beginnings and ends of the days!)

Christmas Eve started bright and early so that we could squeeze in our family tradition of reading the Christmas Story and letting the kids choose 1 present to open. We also set out cookies, just in case the kids were sleeping when we got home that night because we knew that it would be super late.

Cooper picking out a present to open. We were very lucky...he never messed with any present or package underneath the tree (until Christmas Eve when he got his first chance to open one!)

TJ was VERY excited to (finally) get the Cars phone that he had been eyeing every chance we were in WalMart!

Andi surprised to see her purse. She informed me that it was "lying" because we had seen it shopping together and I told her that she couldn't have it...haha I helped her realized that just because things were "secrets" didn't mean it was a lie! :)

Next we headed to Papa Harold's and Grandma Mari's for lunch, quality time with the Pollard boys and Uncle Kyle and of course to help make the several several dozens of cookies that are made and taken to Middletown.

"Eckler Cousins"

After several "takes" this is my favorite one! Everyone looks pretty good except for Cooper who is mimicking the people behind me who were trying to get the kids to smile.

Of course there was some Wii time...

and now on to the decorating!

All dressed up for Christmas Eve Mass

Next up...Christmas at Grandpa G's house

The Griffith Great-Grandkids


These are my absolute favorites pictures! When Andi first opened up her present she saw the "Huggies Wipes" box and really thought she had gotten diapers.

I convinced her to open it up and she realized it was pretty neat...then she realized what it was and was SUPER excited! :)

Cooper was excited to get Rex.

And of course had to ham it up and lay in Ally's chair.

TJ, our future card shark ;)

What was I thinking? The kids would actually fall asleep on the way home?! Even though we didn't get home until almost 11:30 the big kids were still awake (can you tell by the picture?) and were able to set out some new cookies and milk for Santa and carrots for the reindeer.

Christmas Eve's Eve

We continued having fun over break and then started to get busy on the day before Christmas Eve... First we decided to play a little dress up. Andi received some "real" makeup which she could not wait to play with. While Travis was in the woods I went ahead and let everyone indulge in a little pampering (including myself and the boys lol) Lucky for everyone the makeup didn't show up the best and wore off pretty quickly!

The finished products. All 3 had makeup on but only Andi and TJ decided to get dressed up :)

TJ touching up his own makeup.

Travis back in to participate in some Christmas Crafts.

Later that night we were excited to have Kyle and Steph come over for supper and to help decorate Christmas cookies with us. I think everyone had a blast decorating, taste testing and then playing afterwards. There were some pretty fantastically decorated cookies and they didn't taste too bad either! :) Of course I just now realized I have no pictures of the finished products.

Travis creating a masterpiece and TJ making sure it taste good.

Andi showing us how "not messy" she was.

Cooper trying to "sneak" some icing...we left most of the green cookies at home ;)

working hard to create spectacular cookies!

More December Fun

We had lots of fun over Christmas vacation. Even though Andi was bummed that she didn't have preschool for 2 weeks we decided it was a good thing because that meant we got to squeeze in lots of extra fun things to do and spend some more time with family!

Andi was excited to show us how to "build a snowman" just like the one they made a school.

Of course everyone's favorite part was eating it afterwards! :)

There was plenty of time to make sugar cookies...which everyone enjoyed helping with.

Cooper and Andi cutting out cookies.

Andi rolling out some dough. Travis even got in on the action before he hit the tree stand...

Working hard to create beautiful cookies.

Cooper decided he would rather "taste test" than decorate.

Another fun activity during break? Playing in the snow of course! One of their favorites is making snow balls and throwing them at Cooper and I who stayed inside the house on this particular cold and snowy day!

Cooper waiting to get hit by the next snowball. Of course I think one of their favorite parts of playing outside is coming inside to warm up by the fireplace and drink their hot chocolate! :)