Rat Snacks & Sneakers: What a busy last few days!!!

Well, I can honestly say that the last 4-5 days is just a big blur...A lot of time spent in the car traveling to different parties, cutting down the tree, decorating cookies at Grandma's, etc. Here's a quick glance into our lives the past few days. Enjoy!!

Thanksgiving was a wonderful day. We had a party with my mom's side of the family in Tinley Park, and then we had to travel to Ryan's mom's house in St. John. The kids did really well with all of the traveling around. Needless to say though, we were pretty tired by the time we got home.

Unfortunately this is the only picture of my kid(s) on Thanksgiving. The boys had cute matching sweaters, and the only one that I could get to pose for a picture was Chloe, of course. Thanks to Jen for making the adorable bows! I got tons of comments on them!

Chloe spent the night at Grandma and Grandpa's house, so we went there the next day to do our traditional decorating of Christmas cookies, and to decorate their tree. The kids had a blast!

As you can see, Brett did more eating than decorating...that's the fun of it though, right?!?

Chloe never misses an opportunity to model!:)

The finished product...

And all the kids after they decorated the tree ~ Chloe was pretty crabby by this point ~ lack of sleep, and she didn't want to go home.

The next morning, we got up pretty early to go to Michigan to cut down our tree. Why Michigan? you ask? Well, it's more for the fun of it than anything else. We make a day out of it. We start at Cracker Barrell for breakfast, get our tree, hit a Christmas store if we've got the time, and then go for dinner. The kids have an absolute blast, and that's why we do it.

Here's the group on the tractor, to bring us to the field to get our tree.

And here's the "Perfect Tree." (My husband's a dork!) :)

Here's "my boys" cutting down the tree.

Here's the kids pulling the thingy(?) that holds the tree.

Owen was awesome the entire day!!

And boy, do the trees look much smaller in the field, than when you get them into your family room. You'd think we'd learn to bring a measuring tape. Last year Ryan had to bring a skill saw into my family room because it was too big...see picture below.

Thank God no skill saw was required this year. We did have to cut a little off the top of this year's tree, but other than that, it was perfect!!

Once we got home, I put the lights on the tree, Chloe put the angel on top, and the two older ones got to work putting all of the decorations on the tree...