Before we celebrated Christmas weekend at home, we actually spent a week in Conroe with my family & we had a great time! It was nice to get away, sleep in, stay up late, eat a lot & let the kids play. My mom had several activities planned for her grandkids & they loved every single one! Our first day there, we decorated iced sugar cookies:
Later that night, we decided to kick off the week by opening presents:
We pretended like it was Christmas Eve & made everyone's favorite appetizers & desserts to start with & then the kids couldn't stand it anymore - they were ready to open gifts!
We thought it would be fun to let the kids have their gifts so they could spend the week playing with them. My sister surprised them with mermaid tail blankets & I think Sadie has slept inside it every single night since:
All 3 girls were spoiled with dolls & doll stuff:
Sophie got her first Wellie Wisher doll with the most adorable backpack that she can carry her doll in:
And Sadie got the American Girl salon chair & hair caddy that she has been dreaming about:
All she wanted for Christmas was a real American Girl doll with hair so she could fix it so she was excited to get the set even though she didn't have the doll yet. Instead, she played with one of my mom's old dolls until Santa brought hers:
By the way, did you notice the girls' hair? They were so proud to have all of their hair matching in French braids:
I think Mimi & Aunt Natalie played beauty shop all week! I really need to learn how to do that :(
The next morning, my mom had an extra special surprise for the girls while the guys went & played golf. We drove into Houston & saw a Fancy Nancy Christmas Musical:
To be honest, my girls didn't really know who Fancy Nancy was so I asked a friend to give them a book for their birthday & then after the play, they were hooked! The show was really entertaining & all 3 of them were mesmerized. Afterwards, they got to meet all of the characters & get their autographs:
Thank you Mimi for taking us - we loved it & it was a fun Christmas surprise!
When we got home that afternoon, Mimi had another surprise for the kids - she bought a gingerbread village so everyone could decorate their own gingerbread house:
Look how cute it turned out:
Our final day there, we had one last surprise for the kids - ice skating! We thought it would be fun to do something different with the kids & something that felt more "Christmasy". We have never taken the girls before so they were so excited, especially Sadie. As soon as we got there, Sophie was a little timid, so we got her on the ice, but it didn't last long:
She spent the rest of the time playing with Mimi, Doc & Aunt Natalie while we skated with the big kids & they took turns hanging out with Max:
We started skating with Sadie on the little rink, then we moved to the big rink. She started with the ramp but before we left she was a pro without it:
Bryan & I even had fun learning to skate again:
We skated with her for a while & then she was confident enough to skate by herself:
But she had the most fun skating with her cousins:
She literally had so much fun that she cried when it was time to go! We only had a 2 hour pass & the rest of us were hungry & ready for lunch but she could have skated all afternoon. Guess we will have to go again some time!
You know who else made the trip to Conroe with us?
Before we went to Conroe, Sadie called my parents & asked if they had an elf. They explained that they didn't since they didn't have any kids that lived at their house anymore, so Sadie proceeded to tell them that her elf would probably fly down there, so thank goodness she did! She showed up on Mimi & Doc's Christmas tree our first morning there. And on our last morning, she was sitting in our gingerbread village eating candy:
Silly Ellie!
On our way home from Conroe, we had one last surprise. We stopped at Bucee's to get gas & a snack & while we were there, KPRC channel 2 interviewed our family. I was horrified because there I was traveling in my exercise clothes with no make up on & a dirty pony tail. But we made a 3 minute segment that actually aired later that night on the evening news & they showed the cutest clip of Sophie singing her ABC's so it was totally worth it :)
It was such a fun week & I am thankful that we had the extra time to get away & spend it with them. Thanks Mom & Dad for opening your home & being such great hosts!
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