Christmas Festivities - Part 1

December has been a crazy busy month and we packed in every possible Christmas activity we could think of, so I will be posting in 2 or 3 parts so the web browser will open with so many pictures! The day after Thanksgiving we changed gears to Christmas mode and off we went on all our fun extravaganzas. We started off by going to Jax Illuminations and driving through all the Christmas lights set to music. The girls absolutely loved this! 

Then I took Blakely on a day trip to Disney just the 2 of us to make up for leaving her behind on the cruise. It was so much fun spoiling her and doing whatever she wanted. We even met Santa and saw Elsa freeze the castle! I think Mommy/only 1 daughter trips should be an annual thing. :) 

We started off December with some tickets I won to have High Tea with Santa & Mrs. Claus. The girls really enjoyed having a tea party and especially loved being in the big blowup igloo. 

That evening we headed to Alicia's parents house to watch the Julington Creek boat parade, but I am pretty sure I took zero pictures. I was too busy trying to make sure no kids fell in the water. LOL

Then the next day we picked out our tree and decorated the house in Christmas decorations!  Dad did a fabulous job on our lights outside and I am obsessed with how they turned out.

 I had my girls Christmas PJ themed supper club and white elephant gift exchange. 

I had my 5th grade small group Christmas party

The girls made Christmas cookies with Gammoe

 We attended a live nativity at Crosscreek Church to remember the true meaning of Christmas and went to see the movie The Star which was so cute! 

And Dave & I went to an ugly sweater party while the kids had a sleepover! 

And this was all in just the first 15 days of December. Sheesh I am exhausted just listing it all out. No wonder my kids were misbehaving and acting like crazy maniacs. They thrive on schedule and routines and we clearly had none! Well there is part 1 for you! 

Thanksgiving 2017

This Thanksgiving was one for the books for many reasons friends. One because it was our first Thanksgiving in our new house and secondly because my Miami family came up and spent it with us.  (No telling when the last time we did Thanksgiving together) Tony and Brandi were in town... it was one big happy family. And by big, I mean we ended up with 18 adults and 7 kids if you count baby Walt who was 3 months old. It was so much fun having everyone in our home sitting around the table and kids running around like maniacs. The best part was everyone brought a few dishes so it was very manageable to feed that many people. And of course we had way too much food! The girls were obsessed with Aunt Terri and Delainey has already asked if she could fly on a plane by herself to go spend some time with her since she barely ever sees her :) We will have to get that on the books! 

 Friday night we all went to Moms for an Italian feast to spend some more time together. Look at those pics below, I told you the girls loved Aunt Terri :) Overall it was a great few days being with family from near and far and hopefully it will happen more frequently in the future. (All 6 kids are a lot to handle though LOL) We have so much to be thankful for this year and I hope everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving as much as we did.

Fun with Cousins and other November activities

November was a busy month for the McLaughlin's! After we got back from our cruise, Mom flew out to Oklahoma to get the boys and bring them back for a few weeks and the fun began. We spent lots of time playing with the cousins, going to friends' houses, celebrating birthdays, doing thanksgiving shows, and trips to the zoo and nail salon and everywhere in between. 

The weather finally started to cool down in November and the girls are obsessed with having fires in the house. (Just like their Dad) We went to celebrate Gregg's birthday one Saturday and Dave was the baby whisperer. We also celebrated Dodaddy's 66th birthday!

We babysat our cousins while Gram was at BSF so we had a party in the bounce house followed by golf cart rides and movies snuggled together. We also made our Thankful wreath to remember the true reason for this holiday.

 We headed to the zoo with Blakely and the boys and had so much fun! 

 Blakely had her Thanksgiving performance and feast that we all got to attend and enjoy Round 1 of the Thanksgiving meal. She was a little nervous at first, but then she got the hang of it and started signing wonderfully. 

 And the girls had a Mommy Daughter Date Day the day before Thanksgiving to kick of the holiday right!