Happy Holidays with the Steeces 2011

The Thursday after Christmas, we headed on down to Austin to celebrate the holidays with the Steeces! We had an absolute blast, as always!

First stop was to run through the lights of Lakeway!

Grampy, Ben, Joe, Kate, Drew, Ethan, Sav, Dan and Dani

 

 

Did I mention we were in Austin? Yah…longhorns everywhere. Naturally, Auntie Dani was “doing the horns the wrong way”~ per Savnnah.

 

 

Trying to get these crazies to pose for a group pic with Grampy and Grammy is no easy task. Especially when they are all jacked up on sugar! LOL

 

 

Perfect time to run out that energy before bedtime!

 

 

Uncle Dan lining them up at the “starting gate”…ready, set…

 

 

GO!

Now…if you have ever seen our kids run, it is quiet humorous. Sav and Ben will be athletes, no doubt. Cheech and Chong in the back, do this kind of shuffle, if you will. And our wonderful friends have so lovingly entitled this…. the “Steece Shuffle”. Probably because they are giggling the whole time they run anywhere.

 

 

Friday night, we celebrated the Steece Family Christmas!

Ben, Grampy, Andrew, Ethan, Grammy, Sav

 

 

Grammy always has a super fun selection of holiday hats to wear during the festivities. Andrew, my little mischievous elf!

 

 

Sweet little Benny Boo…attacking that Chex Mix one time.

 

 

The goofy brothers: Joe, Dan, Ed. I must say, I love watching these hoodlums playing around with each other--- its like watching the future unfold, right before my eyes. There is nothing like the bond between brothers.

 

 

Me and my Santa Cowboy

 

 

The gals: Jess, Suz, and Dani

 

 

So, the kids picked out gifts for everyone…hilarious. They had SO much fun handing them out and watching the reactions. I LOVE this picture of Andrew and Ethan…so cute!

 

 

Ethan and Andrew picked a present for Uncle Dan

 

 

AWESOME mini-highlighters!!! (bwahahaha)

 

 

Dan’s reaction was priceless…you would have thought he had just been given 1 million dollars. Acadamy Award Winning.

 

 

Ben picked out a gift for Uncle Ed

 

 

CARS pens!!!!!!! No waaaaaaaay!!!! LOL

 

 

We had Savannah pick out everyone else’s gifts. Sweet Auntie Jess let Sav practice her hand at cosmetology. 

(notice Savannah’s hair? yep, that is the piece that is still growing out from when she cut it to her scalp!!! Grrrr)

 

Sav, Auntie Jess and her Rudolph Chapstick

 

 

Aunt Dani and her heart notepads

 

 

LOVE this pic of Grampy and Sav… he received a paddle ball from the little elf.

 

 

And Grammy was given one of Sav’s favorite things in the whole entire world~ lotion. (It was from the dollar aisle, mind you…so, not the best quality! Ha)

 

We loved watching the reactions from our family! Thank you for loving our kids so much and making this so special for them!

 

 

Next up, the kids opened their presents! They got some super cool TOMS shoes from Aunt Dani and Uncle Dan! (Pretty sure Mom and Dad were more excited than the kids!) When I asked Savannah and Andrew to lift up their PJ’s to show off their new kicks, this is what I got:

God love you, Andrew- and those little chicken legs!

 

 

Auntie Jess and Uncle Ed gave the kids some awesome toys that they haven’t been able to put down!

 

 

And then, there were plasma cars! LOVE THIS PIC! What a huge hit.

 

 

I gotta admit, even the adults enjoyed a ride or two on these bad boys! Aunt Dani, the red-eared reindeer on her sleigh.

 

 

These two pictures are hilarious. The boys put the kids on their shoulders, as good luck charms, while they watched the last few minutes of the MN Timberwolves game…

 

 

…….and, you can tell from these expressions how the game turned out.

 

 

We put the kids to bed, and then it was the adults turn to open presents! This is a good time to mention that every year, at least one of the brothers will give gag gifts to the others.

 

For Dan and Ed, Joe filled up 2 nice glass Aggie pint glasses (gifts), with ice cold brewskies, secured with Press-n-Seal so they wouldn’t spill, and made them drink up.

 

 

Then they opened the letter that was attached which read: “One coupon to attend the Wolves/Mavs game in Dallas on Jan. 25th………………………...YOU PAY”

 

 

Also in the bag?… an autographed baksetball card of Ricky Rubio from the MN T-wolves…

 

 

Dan and Ed trying to figure out if the cards are legit… (Ed getting upset, thinking that we dropped a LOT of $$$ on these cards)

 

 

Nope, sorry guys. Joe bought these cards dirt, cheap; bought plastic card holders; and sharpie ‘d a fake signature of RR. Hahaha~ game on! Love you.

 

Cute Diddy in his Santa cowboy hat.

 

 

LOVE this pic of all the kids: Jess, Ed, Dan, Dani, Suz and Joe

 

 

What a great Christmas! Thanks to Paul and Kate for a family trip to Colorado this year!!! (adult only) WOO HOO! Let the countdown begin!

 

The next day we went over to some of our BFF’s house and played in their backyard while the guys watched the Aggie game on TV.

 

 

Little T-man was so nice to share his new truck with us! This picture just cracks me up with all four of them driving around. Kinda gave me heart palpitations for things to come! (Drew, the little spaz, behind the wheel)

 

 

The dudes~ Best Friends already! Love it.

T, Ben, Ethan, and Andrew

 

 

Grampy and Grammy graciously offered to watch the kids so we could go out and celebrate New Year’s Eve! It has been years…

Thank you SO much!

 

 

 

Our besties from earlier in the day: Molly and Jason! Love them. Miss hanging out.

 

 

 

Dan, Joe, and Ed~ love these guys

 

 

Me and my sis-n-law! XOXO

 

What a great weekend with family and friends! Love you all so VERY VERY MUCH!!! Christmas this year was amazing with all of our family. The kids were GREAT! So much fun. Hope you had a wonderful holiday and New Year as well!

Hugs,

 

 

p.s. I’ll be posting later today about Sav’s upcoming surgery…