Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! Ours was crazy, but good-crazy. We stayed the night at Bryce's parents' house on air mattresses. So fun! But we forgot to bring a few things with us. Like Avery's inhaler and like our camera. So, unfortunately, we don't have very many pictures and the ones we do have are camera phone pics (bad). Oh well. We'll always have our memories, right?

I don't have any excuse for these first two.  They were taken back at home, but still with my phone.  Lazy.

Ethan had kind of a hard day.  He had to learn that you don't always get everything you want.  And it's not okay to be a brat about it.  To be fair he had to go an extra long time without playing with any of his toys.  I'd be mad too.  Poor kid.

 Caitlin had a Monster High Christmas.  What? You think you're having deja vu?  No, you're remembering her Monster High Birthday a month ago.  Yeah.  She's in love.  Only 3 of these dolls were actually from Christmas, but she loved to line them all up.  What a happy girl.

Avery got a Lalaloopsy and a book that goes with it.  She had a great day.  She was so happy.  4 is a really awesome age for Christmas.

 Noelle didn't care too much about opening presents.  She did want everyone else's after they'd been opened, though.

And Preston didn't know what was going on.  He was happy to be held a lot and look around.  Happy 1st Christmas Preston!

I got spoiled again this year and will hopefully have better phone pictures from now on (new phone).  We had a great time, but I'm always ready for the new year to start and Christmas clean up to begin.  I am so so thankful that we have been so hugely blessed.  The real gifts in the above pictures are those adorable kids.  I love them to pieces!

Christmas Love From the Dopps

Jingle Jog

I love my kids' school. They do a lot of fun activities. They do a Jog-a-thon in the spring, but this is the first year that they've done the Jingle Jog. They got to wear jingle bells and run around the back of the school. Each grade had a half hour to run around as many times as they could. Parents could run, too, but we didn't. Yeah, poor sports. I probably should have. It was freezing, it would have warmed me up. I was so glad that Bryce had started his Christmas vacation and was able to come. He usually misses all the school stuff.

This is Caitlin with the Kindergarteners, getting ready to start.

And Caitlin running, she ran 3 laps.

 And the 2nd graders at the starting line.  They were much more into it than Kindergarten.  You can't even see Ethan in this picture.  He was back with the girls.

And Ethan running his 6 laps.

I was glad that they could do this.  I know they don't get as much active time as they should.  I would love for my kids to be in good physical shape.  I was always one of the slowest when we had to run the mile in school.  I've got to make sure I don't pass that trait down.

Repeat after me:  Exercise is good.  Exercise is good....

The Dopps Visit Santa Claus

Thank you Bass Pro Shops for offering pictures with Santa for free.  You made it worth the three hour wait, missing spouses, skinny Santa, snowball fights, and one bloody nose.  I think....

School Sing

Ethan and Caitlin had their School Christmas Sing.  Ethan sang Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree and Feliz Navidad.  Caitlin sang Jingle Bells, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, and Jolly Old St. Nicholas.

It's always hard to get pictures of school performances. It's just a bunch of little heads in the dark. Especially since my kids are so tall and they're always on the back row. Luckily they let us get some close-ups before the kids left. Here's my best efforts:

Caitlin

 Ethan

And Grandma Allred was able to come to see the show and to help me wrangle kids.  It was much appreciated!  And isn't she beautiful?  It was so fun to see the kids sing.  I'm so proud of them for singing and doing the actions and not being mopey, like some other kids.  Great job Ethan and Caitlin!

Christmas Lights

Bryce worked so hard on our Christmas lights this year.  Our old house was a one story and was not too difficult.  It was crazy how hard it was to get to some of the corners of our new house.  I'm glad I have a hard working husband, hard working brothers-in-law, and access to a 20 foot ladder.  I love Christmas lights so much.  It wouldn't be the same without them.