The End of Break

Sending the kids back to school was hard. My parents left the day after Christmas, but Dustin took the next week and a half off. We played, ate out a lot, slept in, read books, watched too many movies to count and did about zero chores. It was exactly how I remembered Christmas vacation growing up and FINALLY my kids are old enough to let it happen.

We did find a few reasons to get out of the house. Like when we finally made it to the movies to see Catching Fire.

One night we took our kids ice skating for the first time ever.

 

It was not our most successful outing, but the boys ended up loving it.

 

Afterwards we went out for my favorite burgers ever -- Five Guys

  

I cheated and threw Sadie a birthday party 3 weeks early (more on that later)

 

Nate and Dustin took his best friend Travis out for the day to celebrate his birthday with football, Pei Wei's and bowling.

Ellie got highlights in her hair (Christmas present)

Our typical New Year's Eve with at the Christensen's with a rousing game of headbandz. This game is surprisingly hard!!!

And Ellie started her first regular babysitting job. I cannot believe she is getting to be this old.

 Things we didn't do -- laundry, yard work, housecleaning, cooking, piano practicing, school work. . . it's was perfect.