Rockin' New Years Eve

We had a pretty awesome New Year Eve this year - at least it was for OUR family!  Our typical New Years celebration consists of a dinner at a Chinese restaurant, a rousing game of Go Fish or Memory and staying up to watch the ball drop...in NYC...at 10:00 p.m.  That's very late for our little family!

This year wasn't too terribly different from our typical celebration, but it felt different.  First of all, David went skeet shooting with Evan, and Shawn in the afternoon. Some of the nieces and nephews came, too. He LOVES shooting, but only gets out to do it when Evan's around.  He had a great time and decided that he loves his gun, but wants another one as well.  He also wants to buy a smaller gun so he can take the kids out.  Alison is totally appalled by the idea.

Nolan, Shawn, David, Caden, Evan.

Pull...

That evening, we went to Grandma and Grandpa Gee's house.  They hosted a party for us, Sue, and Jodi's family.  We ordered a LOT of Chinese take-out.  Yum.  I love Chinese food (of course, I love all food).  Then, we played games.  We even got Grandma and Grandpa to play Mad Gab for a while.  The kids went downstairs at some point to watch "Kung Fu Panda 2."  Then, I kind of bullied Sue and Grandma to join Jodi, Evan and I in a board game.  I felt really bad about it afterwards - they weren't too thrilled.  But they were good sports about it anyway, and they're still speaking to me.  I guess they have forgiven me.   At 10:00 p.m., we all went downstairs and watched the ball drop in Times Square.  We didn't stay too long after that.  We packed up and headed home.

Playing with their chopsticks.

Josh really liked all that food!

Nice dress-up outfits!

Bronson went straight to his crib when we arrived home, but the rest of the kids stayed up and toasted the New Year with sparkling apple juice in fancy goblets.  By the time they were settled in bed, it was 11:00 p.m.  Insanely late!!!  Alison said that she was going to stay up until midnight.  I told her that we weren't, but she insisted that she'd just lay in bed and watch the clock until midnight.  Dave and I had to do a few things to get ready for the next day at church and Ali came out a couple of times to see what we were doing.  By the time we were ready for bed it was so close to midnight that I decided to stay up a few more minutes - it's been at least 5 years since I rang in a new Year.  At exactly midnight, I kissed David, then went into the girls room to wish Ali a happy New Year.  She was sound asleep.  I tried to rouse her and tell her that it was midnight, but she wouldn't stir.  I think she only missed it by about 5 minutes.  Oh well - there will be plenty of other years to stay awake.

Cheers!

Happy New Year!

What a fun, crazy, WONDERFUL year 2011 was!  We've had many adventures and a few heartaches, but throughout them all, we have felt incredibly blessed.  I'm sad to see 2011 go, knowing that our kids will only get bigger and our bodies will only get older (or vice versa), but I have great hopes for 2012 too!!!

With kids like these, how can you help but be excited!?!?!