oReGoN tRiP

The day after Christmas Eric and I hopped on a plane to Oregon to have Christmas #3 at my dad's house. There are always a ton of people there for Christmas with my siblings, step-siblings, and their kids. This year was VERY chaotic. Presents were being opened left and right and there was no keeping track of what was going on. It was crazy.

Even though Christmas was a day late, Santa didn't forget about us. He made a surprise appearance. My sisters and I got to take our annual picture on Santa's lap in matching Christmas shirts.

Eric felt left out because he didn't have a matching shirt, so he bought himself a nice festive one to wear.
These are my two favorite tiny people:
Amora wearing her new headband I got her. It took awhile for her to get used to it, but I think she looks so cute in it!

A lot of kids are afraid of Santa, but not Billy. He walked right up to Santa waiting for his chocolate.

Sisterly love!

First Christmas Together!!

Eric and I were finally able to spend Christmas together this year! Yay for being married. We had our own little Christmas in our apartment that morning. Santa was nice enough to get us Wii Fit! For weeks I joked that every present under the tree for me was the Wii Fit but I had NO IDEA! I'm glad to know that Santa supports our New Year's Resolution of getting fit and healthy.

Like every year, the first thing we did when we woke up on Christmas morning was look in the stockings!!

After Christmas in the apartment, we headed over to the Walker house. It was a different experience for me. I've never had Christmas away from my family. Not only that, but I can't remember a time that I've had Christmas with all my siblings and both my parents in the same room like Eric gets to have every year. I look forward to many more years of that.

I don't think the Walker side of the family is as big on pictures as the Kooistra's, so I felt too awkward to take pictures every second like I normally would. But here's a couple pics of the gang.



After opening presents Holly, Eric, and I had a blast playing Super Mario Brothers for HOURS. Thanks for all the presents everyone!!

Another Tradition?

This being our first Christmas together, Eric and I didn't have very many decorations to put on the tree. However, we did have an ornament decorating kit that I got on sale last year after Christmas. I thought, "Hey, this would make a great tradition. We can do something crafty AND increase our ornament collection!" After seeing the end product, I may have to reconsider.

Eric started decorating the snowman. Why is it blue? I don't know. When he finished coloring he said, "Why did I make it blue?!" At least it's unique!! Great job Eric.

I didn't have a lot to work with when I decorated my ornament. It was just so round and empty. We never found a first Christmas ornament that we liked so I tried to make it relate to that. Nevertheless, I'm still set on buying one.

So should we keep trying to decorate every year or just give up!?! I don't know.

Holiday Cheer

After two long and stressful weeks, Eric and I are finally done with the semester and finals. We have no idea what our grades will be like. I have senioritis and really don't care if I get A's right now. I just want to be done with school forever!! One more semester to go. If only Eric were that lucky...he still has years ahead of him.

Work has been pretty crazy with the holidays. You'd think people would be nicer this time of year but NOPE! Now that school isn't consuming all of my time, I don't know what to do with my free time. Luckily my friend Sara told me to write a blog post or I might be going crazy right now.

Last year Eric and I made cookies for Halloween and this year Halloween passed by before we knew it, so we made some pretty awesome Christmas cookies.

Of course, Eric started eating the cookies before we were done decorating them.

Here are some of the finished products.

Eric's attention span is pretty short...he left me to decorate the rest of the cookies. Then I told Eric he could only eat the cookies he decorated :) That left me with a lot more!!

Last weekend Eric and I decorated gingerbread houses with our friends Ruby and Brett. Here we are with our little house.


You may be wondering what that white and red clump is. We seem to have a murder scene on our gingerbread house every year. This year the snowman was the unlucky one. His head got shot off.

Here's Ruby and Brett with their house. It was Ruby's first time making a gingerbread house!

Unfortunately, their frosting sucked and the house slowly started falling apart...sad day.

Christmas is only a few days away! It doesn't feel like Christmas to me AT ALL. I'm so glad Eric and I did most of our shopping the day after Thanksgiving so we don't have to stress too much before the holidays. I'm not that excited for Christmas just because it doesn't feel like Christmas, but I am super excited to go to Oregon the day after and see my family and have a week away from school AND work.