Organized Chaos

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Christmas 2013 with the Riddles!

I can't lie, I'm sad Christmas is over. All of my siblings (except for Aaron & Stacy) were able to come to Greensboro for a good chunk of the break and Aaron's siblings all live pretty close to us. Aaron was able to take 2 weeks off work since December is the slowest time for the youth group so it was FABULOUS getting to spend so much time soaking in the family time! Have I mentioned that I love time with family?! :) Here are some of the pictures from our break...

4 stockings this year... :)

We debated whether or not Davis would demolish a real Christmas tree...
we ended up getting one & he did great with it!
But this was his own tree that he was allowed to play with (velcro ornaments).

We saw Santa at Chick-Fil-A and Davis was not a fan.

Aunt Ziza came back from El Salvador and Davis WAS a fan. :)

We went to the Christmas lights walking trail at Grey Gables with some friends!

Yum Yum's date was a must.

Someone liked his first Yum Yum's hot dog. Probably because you barely have to chew. :)

Aaron & I went on a Christmas date while Davis played with Nana & Pops!

Christmas Eve service at Westover

The O'Hares and Stephen :)

Micah & Virg!

We celebrated Advent this year
and Davis put his last ornament on the top on Christmas Eve.

Christmas morning we celebrated at our house!

Don't worry, he's not bleeding!!
He was playing with his red finger paints that he got for Christmas in the bathtub.

Then we went to Nana & Pop's for the Riddle Christmas!

He was more interested in the puppies than the gifts. :)

Christmas afternoon, we went to Grandaddy Rick & Mimi's for the O'Hare Christmas!

Davis loves the fireplace.

Playing on his new chair.

So many stockings!

Christmas evening!

My favorite!

Siblings. :)

Bahaha. :)

On December 27, we got to hang out with some of Aaron & my friends from middle school (or earlier!)

So fun to think of our kids being friends one day!!

That evening we went to the Duhan Cousin Christmas at Grandmother & Pops!

Davis was LOVING having Aaron home to play with him!! (I was too!)

Sweet boy!

Then we said bye to Micah & Virginia and Isaac & Caroline. Boo.

Another great part of the break was that Emily was in town!!!

And last but not least, we had Cousin Christmas with the Busters! :)
Whew, so many festivities!

Merry Christmas from our family!

And the angel said to them, 'Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord."
--Luke 2:10-11

Monday, January 13, 2014

Celebrating Advent - - with a Toddler

Neither Aaron nor I celebrated Advent growing up. But we love the idea of using the month of December to prepare for the birth of Jesus and for His Second Coming! We would really like to celebrate Advent with our kids in order to keep our family's focus during the holidays on Christ. So we found some very simple things to do with Davis this year:

1. Each night we read one of the stories from the Jesus Storybook Bible; the order of the stories was outlined here so we just read 1 story every night, starting December 1. Was he old enough to understand the Bible stories?! Probably not! The Jesus Storybook Bible is a fantastic Bible for little ones (and adults too!) and it does a great job of explaining how the Old Testament stories relate to Jesus and the Gospel, which is what we love about it! But the stories are a little longer for a very busy 18 month old. We usually read to Davis while he was eating dinner or we'd start with him on our laps & he quickly migrated to the floor to play while we read. Either way, it was a good refresher for Aaron & me and he listened to some of the stories!

2. Then we gave him an "ornament" to color that went along with the Bible story we'd read that evening. Davis is kind of new at the coloring thing, so some nights he wanted to do more eating of the crayons than actual coloring... but by the end of the 25 days, he seemed to really be getting the hang of it! When we let him get down from the table & handed him his ornament, he would excitedly walk into the living room & tape the ornament to his Advent Tree. It was pretty adorable to watch! A couple times he wanted to take the ornaments back off the tree, but we were surprised at how much he left it alone! PS. The tree was just made out of green bulletin board paper & I had it laminated for $1 at EduPlay.

His Advent Tree on Christmas Eve!

I am really excited to continue this tradition as our kids grow up. I thought these ideas (all taken from this website!) may be helpful for you, as well, if you're looking for kid-friendly Advent ideas for next year.

Sunday, January 5, 2014

Krispy Kreme Gender Reveal...!!!!

Little Riddle #2 is a BOY!! We're so excited to have ANOTHER precious boy for Davis to play with!! We found out during the ultrasound on Friday morning & we told our families on Saturday. Because so many of my siblings are out of town, we decided to use Krispy Kreme donuts to tell everyone if it was a boy or girl (the donuts are filled with either pink or blue filling). We were able to order some in Tennessee for my brothers & sister-in-laws who live there (they just went to the store & picked them up) and we got some in Greensboro for Aaron's family & the rest of my family. The only people I wasn't able to order them for were Aaron & Stacy... I wasn't sure how to get in touch with the Krispy Kreme in New Zealand (boo!). ;) But it was so simple & worked perfectly for us... and who doesn't love a Krispy Kreme donut?!