howard/skiver christmas

melanie and i met when we were both attending western way back in 1995. we were in the same english class with a super hot teacher and then eventually she moved in to the room across the hall from me in my dorm. melanie was in my wedding and i was in hers. we don't get to see each other nearly as often as we'd like, but she's still my bff and we try to get together about once a month...this year it WILL happen!
we have tried to get together for a howard/skiver christmas every year since the boys were born. many years it seems as if the odds are stacked against us and this year it happened again.
the day that we were supposed to get together we had a huge snow storm. and with the howard's living in fenton and having to make a 45 minutes drive to our place, it just didn't work out.
we ended up just letting the kids open their presents before the howard's headed home when they came over for hayden's birthday party. the kids didn't seem to mind and we'll be getting together with them soon to just hang out now that all of the holiday chaos is over.
when they were leaving, lorelei came to give talan a hug goodbye. we told him to give her a kiss and then he was hooked. we kept telling them to do it again so i could get a picture, and they both had no real problem obeying. when they weren't kissing, talan would stand there looking at her puckering his lips and making the kissy noise. lorelei is not an orphan, but i would not mind my boys marrying into that family.
thanks for the great gifts melanie, chadd, ashton and lorelei!!! we'll be seeing you soon!

opening presents again!:
lorelei and her ugly dolls:
talan's first wallet, complete with a tricycle drivers license:
ashton:
chadd and lorelei:
talan and one of his favorite gifts EVER:

back to the video games:
kissin' time:

rainah turns 2!

on december 29th, the family packed up and headed over to the petersen's house in grand rapids to celebrate rainah's 2nd birthday! unfortunately, dave had to work so he wasn't able to make it but don's sister lynn from arizona was there and his other sister kris and her family came to help celebrate as well.
rainah had a cupcake themed birthday party with a giant cupcake for her birthday cake and lots of regular cupcakes that the kids were able to decorate themselves at the cupcake decorating station that jenn had all set up.
rainah opened her presents saying and signing "more" after each one. when she was done opening upstairs, everyone went downstairs where rainah had a bounce house set up. i held the boys back so that rainah could have a chance to bounce in it alone for a bit and talan started screaming. when i finally let him go, we saw that he wasn't trying to get to the bounce house at all, he was trying to get PAST the bounce house to the drumsticks that he saw. that's talan.
we hung out for the rest of the afternoon and then we all headed to dinner before we took off for home. jessica and justin had to get home to pack as they were leaving for alaska the next day and we had to get home and start getting ready for hayden's birthday.
we had a great time and cannot believe that rainah is two years old already! we love you, rainah!! happy birthday!!!

careful, he'll bite that finger right off:
fun with balloons:
mom, rainah and jenn:
cupcake decorating station:
the cake:
cheyenne brought rainah a present too:
jessica and talan:

present time!:


he holds it up to his mouth and says "cheese!":
justin taking after talan:



rainah's new bounce house:

the boys came in and rainah wisely went out:

um, i have no idea what to say about this. at least he didn't put the drumsticks down?!:
happy birthday, rainah!:
grandma helping rainah make her cupcake:
wondering how in the world she is supposed to eat this thing:
she found a way:


talan liked the cupcakes too:
"more":

justin and his turd cupcake:
isabelle and stephen:
hayden making his cupcake in which he really only ate the top of:



isabelle and her cupcake:
one of rainah's favorite presents was her parachute:

don, rainah and jenn:
while buying hayden new video games for his leapster this year, i realized i would most likely be buying him a nintendo ds in the next year or two. this confirmed it:

stephen was nice enough to let hayden play with it while he went to have his picture taken:
kellogg/petersen/most of skiver/cox families: