Seibert Christmas- June.

We stayed at Uncle Kevin and Aunt Elizabeth's house. Henry insisted on sharing a room with Oliver or Natalie and Tessa. Once they settled down, they slept well, but it took a while to get them to settle down. The best part was that Uncle Kevin got the kids up and mama and papa got to sleep in.

The best part about Uncle Kevin's house is the big basement where you throw all the kids. The big kids played quietly for hours. These two were the trouble makers.
Aunt Jenni was feeling crazy and had an impulse to full the kids up with artificially-flavored goodness.
Tessa got the first shot of Reddi-Whip.
And the rest of the kids came in droves.
Natalie.
Annalise.
Oliver.
Henry.
I got put to bed before lunch because I'd spent the entire morning crying. The only way we survived the drive from Archbold was to play "Spaceman" by the Killers over and over until we arrived. It's the only song that makes me stop crying no matter what. Because I was such a grump, mama wouldn't let Aunt Jenni in the guest room to get her camera for fear of waking me up. Mama says it's payback for when Aunt Jenni wouldn't let mama in Evie's room when she was three months old and they'd driven up late at night to Minnesota to see her.
Seibert Christmas was a blur of ripping paper.
Oliver got a book about himself.
Annalise got a new craft (has she finished it yet, Aunt Jenni?).
Natalie got a BIG present.
Uncle Jim got a big box of puffed cheese products to get him through the long winter.
We all got helicopters from the Tallers. They are super fun, but got banned from the house when Grandma realized the blades were shaving the texture from the popcorn ceiling. But it really ran well in the barn.
Oliver got a funny pair of sandals from us and Tessa liked them so much she put them on.
Those funny little snails have stretchy antennas. Too bad you can't see the tails that light up when you walk.

Meanwhile up north-Henry.

We headed up to Northwest Ohio on Christmas Day. Grandma had a great lunch waiting for us

when we arrived.

After lunch, we went over to see Great Grandma and Great Grandpa Seibert. This is their first winter in Ohio in over 20 years (they usually go to Texas). I don't think they are too excited about the snow, but we were glad to see them!

It seems that mama hit every after holiday sale last year and got us these matching jammies for $2.

How embarrassing.

On Christmas night, the long week caught up with June and she came down with a fever and a major case of unhappy. She went and got her nukie and blankie and laid down with Grandpa.

I snuck in for a cuddle too, but just ended up jumping around and getting kicked off the couch. June felt better in the morning, but has spent the rest of the week demanding her nuk and blankie at all times. Unfortunately for her, mama won't let her have it and they get in yelling matches over it multiple times a day.

On Sunday, we had the Wagner family Christmas. Mama's cousin John had a good time wrestling with me.

June had her first instance of stranger anxiety in her life. She was still mad at mama for not letting her have a nuk and was woken up in the car after falling asleep a quarter mile from Aunt Mary Ellen's house. She was mad at every one until she saw our favorite Miss Christina. She cuddled June until June got sent upstairs for a nap. After her nap, June was in a much better mood and had a good time playing.

Here we are with Uncle Rick and Aunt Mary. We've said it before and we'll say it again. After raising two boys, one of which was high energy like me (we won't say which), we feel like that understand us most. And they do a great job keeping up with me. Too bad they're Browns fans. (Hopefully the video they took of June dancing to the Browns fight song never gets out. How embarrassing!)

Christmas eve (and morning videos)- Henry.

On Christmas Eve, we all got dolled up for a nice dinner.

Unkie with his three kids.

Then we tried for a shot in front of the tree.

Someone must have said something funny in this shot.

One more try.

And a good shot of Team Turner.

Usually, mama tries to convince Grams to have special dinners during naptime so the kids are not invited. This year we decided to have supper at 6pm- kids invited. After 5 minutes of June standing up in her chair, Sadie yelling for more applesauce and me refusing to eat anything, the adults all agreed to put on a movie and enjoy Christmas dinner in peace. Maybe next year.


On Christmas morning, we were excited to wake up and see that Santa came! Luckily for mama and papa, I was used to the idea of wrapped presents sitting under the tree, so I was patient enough not to open presents immediately. At 8:30, they let me wake up June so we could open up our big sand and water table from Santa. I don't think Santa considered how we were going to fit this huge thing in the van to get it back home.


Santa was also lame enough to get me clothes for Christmas. I didn't even bother unwrapping it all the way before I loked for something else.

Gingerbread house- Henry.

Every year, Aunt Girl and I decorate a gingerbread house.

Mama had to put the house together so the frosting would be dry and the house would be stable for us to decorate. Unfortunately, she put roof on too soon and it fell off the house, off the counter, and on the floor where it broke into 15 pieces. Luckily, mama was able to paste it back together with frosting and salvage Christmas.

All week, candy kept "falling" off the house and "right into my hand," which I took as a good reason to eat it.

All week, mama and papa caught me sneaking cookies and candy and I came up with some really good excuses. Why was I out on the porch with the cookie tray? I was making sure the babies weren't stealing cookies? Why am I covering my mouth (that was probably filled with candy)? I was just coughing.

Regardless of my sneaky behavior, we had a good time decorating.

And we even declared that Sadie was big enough to help (I was just two when I made my first house). She did a good job until she realized she was touching candy and then she just ate our decorations.

Grandma took me grocery shopping and was so impressed that I didn't ask for anything during the whole trip that she bought a gallon of chocolate milk (also a big favorite amongst Aunt Girl and Papa). After a big glass of milk, my tummy was hurting, so Grandma put me to bed and read me some stories.

Cooper Christmas- Part 2- Henry.

Back at Grams Crackers' house, we spent our time just hanging out.

PawPaw called us on Skype many times and we had fun talking to him. He was nice enough to stay up late to video conference with us when the kids opened our presents at 5pm (1am his time) and then he got back up at 9pm (4 am his time) when the grown-ups opened their presents. He even opened the presents we sent him so we could see. It was nice having him on the computer, but we wish he could have been here with us instead of all the way over in Iraq.

June did a great job opening presents. She had fun ripping through the packages, but once she hit one with clothes in it, she refused to open another.

June declared this present "stuck."

Here's anaction video of June ripping into a present.
Here's a shot at the spectacle that was the kids' Christmas.

June was really excited about her present from Aunt Katie.

Aunt Katie painted her this dinosaur from the book "How Does a Dinosaur go to School?" by Jane Yolen and illustrated by Mark Teague. June LOVES these books. We're pumped to hang this up in our room.

After all those presents, June worked up an appetite for some Skyline chili.

Cooper Christmas- Part 1- June.

We got to Cleveland and mama said she was so tired that she couldn't even sleep. I don't know what she was talking about because I slept all night and I felt great!

My dolly and I hid underneath all the presents and hoped someone would take us home for Christmas.

I held a private dance party and showed everyone my moves.

Henry loves Aunt Molly and Uncle Michael's house because it has a open upstairs. We all spent a lot of time looking down from the balcony.

GG, Aunt Girl, Sadie, and Mister Anthony waited patiently to open some presents.

Unfortunately, Henry was the one who picked me for Christmas. Looks like I'm stuck with him.

Once present time started, it was 13 minutes of mass chaos. The kids got to open theirs separately because the grownups take FOREVER.

Henry used to be a slow poke opening presents but has now perfected the technique of "Rip, wow, thanks, what's next?"

Following Henry's lead, I roared through my gifts and immediately was more interested in what Henry and Sadie got.

Henry got a real motorboat and spent the rest of the afternoon in the bathroom with a select group of people (that did not include mama) watching it spin around the bathtub.

We managed to get a good group shot of everyone at the party. Everyone was there except PawPaw, of course, but we were glad that he got to video conference with everyone during the party.

The party officially ended on Sunday night, but mama and papa couldn't fathom getting back in the van to drive back to Marion, so we stayed in Cleveland for the night. In the morning, I showed off my new jammies and my cool shades.

We went to Grams' house on Monday and spent the rest of the day as blobs. We napped, sat around and played with toys in the basement. On Tuesday, we went to Aunt Katie and Uncle Adam's house. The ladies had a cookie party and made 4 batches of cookies. During our naps, they snuck out to try on dresses at David's Bridal. When they got back, mama and Aunt Katie took us to a friend's house for another cookie party.

At this party, we got to decorate cookies!

Then we got to eat them!

We each decorated 5 cookies and got to eat 2 of them.

Then we tried to get away with just eating the sprinkles before we were banned from the table.

After supper, Unkie and Papa took Sadie and Henry to the Columbus Zoo to see the Christmas lights. I got to go with the girls back to David's Bridal to keep looking for bridesmaid dresses for Aunt Girl's wedding (we found one). Then we went shopping at Old Navy. I sat in a stroller and was a very good girl even though we were out until after 10pm. It was 11pm by the time we got loaded back into the car and midnight before we made it back to Grams house. What a night for 3 little kids!