Drexler Christmas

On the 29th we headed up to spend some time with the Drexler side of the family.  It turned out to be a very busy couple of days, but we had a lot of fun in that busyness!

We found out that Avery LOVES her Papa.  But, she loves him even more if he has food. ;-)  Whether it was this milkshake or a sub from Subway, she made sure she was nearby, so she could steal whatever it was that he had.  It was hysterical!

Shortly after we got there that afternoon, we had our christmas/birthday celebrations. Kendalyn's birthday is just a week before Livie's (the 21st), so we brought out her birthday presents.  She got the Little People princesses and a Doc McStuffins figure.  She absolutely LOVED the Doc doll and carried it around with her for the rest of the day.

Just had to post this picture of sweet Avery.  Those girls have the most beautiful blue eyes ever!

Papa actually wrapped the presents this year - and by "wrapped", I mean, stuck in christmas bags.  He had the kids gather around and pull one thing out at a time from their christmas bags.  It was a lot of fun for them.  They got lots of great stuff and, amazingly, none of it was a duplicate of what they got at the Trolingers!  Way to go, everyone!

Because mom can't buy for dad anymore, we decided to forego the adult gift exchange and just go in together as siblings and get a couple things for dad.  We got him a Kindle Fire and, as you can see from his expression above, he was super-surprised!  He doesn't have the faintest idea how to work the thing, but I tried to show him some things and told him to just mess around with it to figure it out.  I think he'll enjoy it a lot.  I mean, we already downloaded the ESPN app.  How awful could it be, right?

Livie got her birthday presents after the christmas presents were opened.  She loved this house she got with her little mice people.  She has some of the other animals that she got last year, so it's been a lot of fun for her to play with!

Madie got these hilarious earmuffs!  Of course, I'm not allowed to laugh at them, because her sensitive tween self will get offended, but I think they're great!

I found this giant bear hat (aka Yeti hat) and had to get it for her.  She rocked this thing!

Jill gave me this Spongebob costume for Kendalyn, since she's such a big fan of that yellow guy.  She and Avery posed for me, so I could take a picture of it.  So cute!

Just another picture of Livie in her new Yeti garb!

We went to church on Sunday, where we listened to a really wonderful sermon by dad and sang to some really wonderful worship songs, led by Jeff, Em, and the Worship Team.  After the service, we headed out for a big family dinner at the Olive Garden.  We went here last year when I had my terrible cold and couldn't taste a thing.  It was great to go again this year, because I could taste it all!!  YUM!

We took Tater back with us and he and Sherm became best buddies.  They would chase each other through the house, play outside together.  It was so cute to watch!  They were both exhausted by the end of the day from all that playing!

Kendalyn got a little Leappad for Christmas and was so adorable sitting on the couch, playing with it.  Again, those kids and their devices.  That was the theme for Christmas this year!

They spent a lot of time playing in the basement too though.  Mattresses on the floor might not look cute, but boy are they fun to play on!

Before we left yesterday, we headed to the nursing home to see Mom and give her her gifts.  We walked all over the place until we finally found her getting ready to leave the cafeteria.

We took her to one of the common rooms and gave her her presents.  We had quite a crowd there for her!

We got her a digital frame, but it wasn't uploaded with pictures yet.  That's on my to-do list this week.  And, we gave her this framed handprint thing I made with all the grandkids handprints in it.  She really doesn't talk too much anymore, but I heard her very clearly say "I love it". :-)  We stayed for about a half hour, before she got too tired and we took her back to her room.  She was so happy to see us all and really enjoyed her presents.  We got home last night without any problems on the road at all and were able to take down our christmas decorations tonight.  We're ready to move into the new year of 2013!  Hoping that it's a great one for all of us and our friends and family!