North Pole Breakfast

The first Saturday in December our elves, Elfie & Cocoa, arrived for the holiday season with breakfast from the North Pole and little treats for Elle and Ollie. Elle was SO EXCITED when she walked into the kitchen. 

Our elves had a letter for each kid...

a new Christmas countdown calendar (which was a huge hit with Elle!)...

mini donuts and yogurt...

and a new book for each and ceramic Santa to paint. 

Check out that bed head!

It was a really fun morning!

Later that day they painted their Santa's and I love that we have a little decoration to remember Christmas when Elle was (almost) 5 and Ollie was 2!

Christmas Decorations!

Every year I get so excited to decorate for Christmas! I just think it's such a fun day.

This year we decorated on a Saturday, Eric worked the night before so he slept during the day and the kids and I put up a tree in each of their rooms, the dining room and a tree in the kitchen.

On the kids trees they had free reign to decorate how the wanted with their ornaments, besides telling Ollie to actually leave his ornaments on his tree (he thought they were "guys"). And they were sweet enough to let each other help decorate the others tree. 

We actually ended up rearranging Elle's room to accommodate her tree and we both love the change. Seeing their little trees in their rooms is one of my FAVORITE things about Christmas decorating!

This was our first year putting a tree in the kitchen and I loved it! Will definitely always have one in their from now on!

When the kids laid down for naps I set up the big tree and strung the lights so it was time for ornaments when Eric and the kids woke up. Mind you, at this point I was exhausted!!!

The kids took baths, we ordered pizza, I surprised them with new Christmas pj's and we got to work decorating the big tree.  

Sissy wanted to hide the pickle. Ollie could care less but I have a feeling next year we will need a second pickle. :)

By the time decorating was done and I had vacuumed (for the 100th time that day) and cleaned I think I literally collapsed into bed.  But it is the best feeling in the world to wake up to twinkle lights and Christmas decorations!!

Thanksgiving

This year we had a really low-key Thanksgiving. Eric had to work the night before so he came home Thanksgiving morning as we were making breakfast. After running around with the kids and playing for a bit he headed to bed and the kids and I settled in to watch the rest of the parade.

We had a really lazy day, played several rounds of candy land and the kids took naps.

Then we got ready to head to mom and dad's for dinner. Of course she needed to bring Ashlynn with her.

When we arrived Ollie was ready to EAT!

After we all stuffed ourselves silly the kids layed down in the living room to watch The Grinch and the new holiday Trolls short. Despite what this picture depicts they were pretty loud and crazy during the movie. :)

After the movie the kids played with mom, dad headed to bed and the rest of us played the completely inappropriate game "What Do You Meme" and laughed uncontrollably.

Such a fun night!

Preschool Thanksgiving Feast

The Monday before Thanksgiving Elle's preschool had a Thanksgiving Feast. I LOVE stuff like this so I was so excited to head to Sissy's school to celebrate.

Each family was instructed to bring a specific dish (we brought turkey sandwiches) and it was truly a feast, so much food!

The parents all sat down at their kids place-mat and the kids came in the gym, sang a really cute song then found their parents and we had lunch together. We had so much fun having lunch with our Sissy Girl at school!

When it was time to leave we let Elle play hookey and took her home with us instead of finishing out the day. I'm that mom. ;)

Mizzou Game

I got tickets at work for a Mizzou basketball game on a Monday and since my crew is always up for cheering on the tigers we headed to Columbia.

Our first stop was dinner for my favorite meal when we are in town watching Mizzou.

After dinner we headed to the game.

Ollie poses with his tongue out all. the. time!

We stopped court-side to see Truman of course. This year, Ollie was a fan!!

My tiger babies.

And it wouldn't be a Mizzou game unless we got Miz Cookies and Cream dip n' dots.

Ollie made himself right at home and took his shoes and socks off, because when a Dude is tired those are the first things to go.

It wasn't the best game but we had a fun night cheering on the tigers!

Camping

I realized the other day that I never shared pictures of our camping trip and we had too much fun to not post them! 

At the beginning of August the Hylton's packed up and headed out on our first camping trip together. Elle had been asking to go so we decided to squeeze in a trip before school started. We picked a camp at Mark Twain Lake, loaded Eric's Jeep to the absolute max and headed out.

We grabbed food on our way out of town and I put the kids food in these buckets to contain it and thought I was a total genius while they ate. #momwin

Our first stop was Hannibal to walk through the Mark Twain cave. 

My little Tom & Becky.

Sweatshirts on and about to head into the cave!

We spotted some "Ollie" graffiti from 1921.

Elle thought the cave was fun and a little bit spooky. 

Perfect combo!

After the cave we stopped to do some fence painting...

and panned for gold.

 After the cave we drove the rest of the way to our campsite and these 3 started getting everything set up. :)

We were right next to the playground which worked out perfectly. The kids would take little breaks but played here 90% of the time.

Look at these two. :)

After cooking hotdogs we had smores for dessert.

Sissy LOVED it!

Dude preferred being in the tent. 

Ready to get in jammies and start telling spooky stories.

As it was getting dark Eric pointed out some bats in the sky. In the middle of the night when we walked to the bathroom Elle was SO SCARED a bat was going to come down and bite her. She thought she would turn into a "grampire".

We woke up the next morning to a shredded trashbag and trash everywhere. Something enjoyed some remnants of smores and hotdogs. 

That morning we headed out to fish.

Please notice the sweatshirts in August. The weather this weekend was AMAZING.

He just tapped his fishing pole in the water, scaring every fish away I'm sure. 

Ollie's first time fishing!

Sissy loves to fish and Ollie started to get bored so we went to the car and got his guys while Eric and Elle walked to the other side of the pond.

Sissy walked back to bring me some flowers. :)

After fishing we went to a Mark Twain museum which had the house he was born in. 

Look at Ollie's face...he is done being outside.

Finally a smile!

Back to camp for lunch. 

And nap time.

It was warming up and the curls were out in full force!!

Ollie was a little nervous cooking his hot dog.

After showers at the camp bathrooms (yikes. not our thing at all.) it was bedtime. We FROZE this night and woke up ready to go home!! As soon as Ollie woke up he wanted in his car seat and sat there buckled in the entire time we packed up. He's not a camping guy but Elle Belle is all in on camping!! She would have stayed 2 more nights and has already asked to camp again this spring. :)