OK ... just a few more ... I can't help it ...

A few more of crazy Christmas at the Finley household. Here are M and H after we played in the snow. They were warming up on Granddaddy ...

Aunt Sarah and Caroline ... Sarah and her Mom were so helpful with Caroline while I got prepared for a little drop-in we had for my Mom's side of the family (my parents are both from Charleston and many of my Mom's kin still live here) ... Caroline clearly felt very comfortable with Sarah and her Mom.

spoiled, spoiled girlies =)

I wish I could hire him ...

Caroline's sassy outfit from Aunt Kristi ... I love that we are always on the receiving end of the fact that she only gets to shop for boys! Love this outfit (and the sweater that came with it) ... and it is so true. She is very huggable. She was such a stoic little baby but her personality has gotten almost too big for her body! When you sing, she sings and dances ... when you yell, she yells ... when you laugh, she laughs (earlier today I called "Hannnnn-NNNNah!" up the stairs and right after she yells "Ahhhhhh-Ahhhhhhhhh!")... when you blow on her hot food, she blows with you ... it has been so cute to watch her personality come out.

Christmas dinner ... it is strange that instead of sitting at the kid's table ... my KIDS are sitting at the kid's table ... it all comes full circle, I suppose!

Meredith and Grayson "reading" ... well, Grayson is reading and Meredith is wishing she could. She has gotten to where she gets very frustrated if she does not have a book memorized ... she gets so upset and says "I don't know what the words say?!?!" and I need to do some research on how to help her learn to read ... if anyone has tips, let me know. I plan to get her a Tag but other than that ... I'm all new to this.

One of the girls favorite gifts ... a stamp, paper and colored pencil set (thanks to Aunt Sarah and Uncle Ryan) ... I have been impressed by Hannah's artistic abilities these days. They are taking an art supplementary class at school and I guess this is where she is learning but she will draw people and flowers and houses and blocks ... and it is really clear what she is drawing ... she doesn't have to tell me what it is ... it will be obvious to me. I don't know what the "norm" is with 3-4 year olds but I think she is pretty good!

caught up-Christmas Part 2

OK, I may have gone a little overboard with the photos and I still could have very easily picked 25 more to post. Here are a few of our goings on the week after Christmas. The past few weeks we have just been picking up the pieces and trying to get all the new things organized with the old things! Trying to get back into the routine of work, school and dance and trying to gear up for Caroline's birthday and our trip to Disney! New Years Eve was not eventful though I am proud to say that we did stay up to see the ball drop (and bonus, the fireworks around the 'hood did not wake the kiddos!)

the boys and the girls joggling ...

the whole she-bang ...
coloring ...

watching A Bug's Life ...

... jump castle

Grayson reading to Hannah (who applied her own lipgloss here) ...

... Hannah's new fancy blocks ... by the way, we split up the twins' rooms and they are loving having their own rooms. It has really helped out with them getting along with each other and sleeping better and going to sleep without the fight. I thought it would be tough on me (can't explain it ... maybe a twin Mom thing) but they have been so happy with the change that I am just happy for them.

Brayden and Mer Bear in the tent

Hannah riding on Caroline's new rocky butterfly ...

Sarah being Uber-Mom ... she could do twins ... piece of cake ;) These two were fighting over Little People Animals ... it was funny for the tables to be turned on Caroline ... she is usually taking stuff from the twins ...

Again ... Uber-Mom ... Caroline and Sylvi with Auntie Sarah ...

Aunt Kristi and Caroline ... it is SOOOOO nice to have a baby who will go to someone other than just me! Alan even put her to bed tonight ... ahhhh a little taste of freedom!

I'm telling you ... always wants what they have ...

Rub a Dub Dub ... three girls in the tub! This was the first time for all 3 in the tub! Caroline is hilarious in the tub ... loves it ... will stick her face in the water and blow bubbles and stick her whole head in the faucet stream when I am filling it ... the twins STILL freak out when I am just trying to rinse their hair!

On their new scooters in their new PJs from Aunt Tricia ... they had to put the new PJs on right away then would not get in "real" clothes all day ... who can blame them ... PJs are pretty comfy ... funny that they did the same exact thing last year with some new PJs from Santa.

We spent one of the afternoons while we were in Spartanburg in Fort Mill visiting my sister and her family ... this is Grayson, her oldest, being very sweet to his baby cousin (he always is so sweet to Caroline!)

Six kids ... no problem!

At my parents house ... my parents have PLENTY of toys as they have 7 grandkids 8 and under but the girls can seem to play with just about anything ... their imagination and their pretend play is fun to watch develop. Here they were "kitty cats" in their kitty cat beds. They would even lick each other on the faces (gross =)

the cutest elf ever ...

making smores with Granddaddy ...

my three girls with their Great Granny ... well, two girls with their Great Granny and one kid playing in the trash can (yuck)

we took the girls to Monkey Joes in Spartanburg and they all had a blast ... all the pictures are terribly fuzzy as they were all running mach speed ...

Hannah was grumping here because Meredith had gone to the bathroom and she kept saying "I miss Meredith" ... she was gone all of 5 minutes ... crazy girl ...

Caroline's first bouncy house experience ... she loved it ... clearly ...

this was my gift from my parents ... what an awesome idea ... and the girls love it ...

catching up-take 2-Christmas Part 1

I went to Spartanburg the week before Christmas as the girls were out of school and Alan had a busy work week. They loved being at Grandmama and Granddaddy's house and it was nice for me, too, to be able to go "home" for Christmas. My parents came back with me on Christmas Eve and spent about a week at our house. The rest of my family (brother and family and sister and family) came on Sunday and we had a lot of family time and a LOT of presents! Here are just a few pictures of Christmas Day and Sunday morning and I plan to post a few more tomorrow that are from various other people's cameras ...

So, I guess a lot of people would laugh that I would even call this "playing in the snow" as it was really more just flurries and rain ... but it is as close as we may ever get to a "White Christmas" ... we donned rain boots and went splashing in the melted snow puddles and caught a few snowflakes on our tongues then went inside for hot cocoa ...

The view from out the family room window ... it was really pretty and it lasted pretty much all day ... too bad there was zero accumulation as the girls were dying to make a snowman.

Well, these are in backwards order ... but here are a few of the things the girls got from Santa ... they got tons of gifts from Santa, Mommy and Daddy, Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles ... they are very fortunate girls.

Santa came!!!

... hmmmm ... what else is in here? She got the hang of the gift thing pretty quickly!

... as usual, she wants everthing that belongs to the twins ... even before she knows what it is (PS I think this is a GREAT photo of my Mom ... beautiful ... and it was first thing in the AM?!?!)

I guess ... who could really blame her for wanting the twins' packages ... she did sort-of get sold short ... I (I mean, Santa) thought she wouldn't know the difference ... but you know ... I think she DID!

Girls being silly girls ...

Looks like Caroline has the same general feeling towards Santa that the twins do (they still refuse to sit in his lap and I don't try to force them to.)

Last, but not least, you know I had to take pictures of my cookies! They came out pretty this year. And tasty if I do say so myself =) I made 150 of them! Took me 3 or 4 nights of staying up way past midnight but it does put me in the holiday spirit!

catching up -take 1-Thanksgiving

Wow ... what a busy holiday season! Wonderfully busy! We got to see just about all of our family and it was really nice. The twins are finally happy to go and visit as opposed to just saying over and over that they "just want to go home." Caroline, in true form, is happy if her sisters are happy. She seems to take cues from them on whether or not a situation or person is "OK." She seems to have a bit of separation anxiety but does not suffer from stranger anxiety at all. It is really nice. I don't feel like I have to go and sit in a room with her by myself so that she will not scream like a banshee ... it is nice to have a much more "chill" baby. Let me think ... well, we started off the season going to Alan's parent's house in Sumter, SC. The girls had a great time just playing at the house and out in the backyard. On Friday after Thanksgiving we went to Alan's sister's house in Columbia, SC for a birthday party for cousin Kate (2) and a trip to the zoo! After that came the crazy roller coaster of Christmas ... I will let the pictures take over ... these are mostly Thanksgiving up to a few weeks before Christmas ...

Caroline loves Cooper and I think the feeling is pretty mutual (until she pulls his hair.) I think, for the most part, he is just glad someone is paying him some attention and feeding him some junk food. Here she is playing with him with his toy and he is giving her some doggie kisses!

... come on, you know you want to play with me!!!
... the stockings were hung by the chimney with care while Pinky Dinky Doo played on the TV up there ...

Barbara found one of those great things that I wish I had thought of ... a gingerbread house that is plastic that you just do the fun part (decorating) then clean it off and use it again next year ... the girls had a blast (decorating it and eating the candy off it for days) ... here is Hannah's side ...

Meredith's ...

... getting started ... one for the house ... one for my mouth!

Caroline is always doing the hand and knee crawl for a while now ... no more army crawling ... she is cruising all around the house now holding on to this and that and hopping from this to that and she has even taken one or two unassisted steps ... won't be long now ...

... in the girls' classroom after the holiday program ...

Oh my goodness ... the cutest thing ever ... the girls' holiday program. I was amazed that they participated and just how many songs they sang! They must have sung at least 15 songs! Here, they are doing Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer with the antlers ... they are in the back row and both are actually beside girls in green dresses ... Meredith between a girl in green and a girl in red and Hannah between a girl in green and a boy in navy.

... hilarious ... Caroline fell asleep in the car on the way to the holiday program ... though she woke in the middle of a crowd of people (has to be weird, you know?) she was really so well-behaved.

Though there were many, MANY things that were tough about the twins as babies ... they really weren't babies who got into everything ... can't say the same for Caroline ...

Happy girls ... they were just such giggly girls getting ready for school one day that I had to snap a picture!

The twins love to strip down to the undies immediately upon coming home from anywhere ... this particular day they decided to play dress-up ... Alan laughed and said they looked like Victorias Secret angel models with the wings, heels & undies.

Caroline and Daddy at Kate's party.

The twins and Kate the day of her party ...

Barbara was hoping to get a photo for her Christmas card while we were at their house for Thanksgiving so we launched a photo shoot ... I put them in their Clemson and Carolina T's (that she got for them ... I was so impressed that she got a Clemson one so I wouldn't be left out ... just for that I put Caroline in a Carolina one to skew it her way) and we went to play in the yard ... beforehand I snapped a cute one of Caroline in the high chair ...

... the best we could do ... though I was a bit sad we didn't get a cuter one of Caroline ... I guess the more kids you have the lower the chances of getting a good one of all of them!

... checking out the dogs in their cages ...

... still checking out the dogs ...

The twins are so lucky to have each other ... they are very best friends and play so well together ... I hope once Caroline is able to play better with them they will be kind to her. At this point they shun her a bit and just act like she is a big annoyance ... I can tell how much it hurts her feelings ... sometimes when they run from her or close a door in her face (after she has worked so hard to get to where they are) she just cries and cries and it breaks my heart. Every so often they will throw some love her way ... hugs or kisses ... and she loves it.