the plague.

Christmas break started out awesome on Monday. We were able to get some great photos of the kids in their matching jams. The boys got to entertain themselves with play doh for a couple of hours. Jeremy took the boys shopping for me and left me with a quiet house. I started dinner when they got home. It was going so well.

So well! Until one little boy scream-yelled at us, "I needa poooke!"

Rush two year old to the bathroom where he does, indeed, puke. Strange. Brush it off as a one-time thing and sit down for dinner. When Graham didn't eat his dinner (which just happened to be a favorite of his – breakfast!), we started wondering if he was sick. And then that worry was solidified when he asked to go puke again. And continued to do so throughout the night.

At 3ish in the morning, I joined in with the puking. Great.

Thankfully, that one time was it for me (& good grief, I'm glad – it was violent!). But I felt terrible all day Tuesday. And Graham continued to puke until mid-afternoon. We thought it was all over; most people assured us this bug was a two day thing!

Woke up Wednesday morning and Graham was sporting a 101º temp. Kept an eye on it and ibuprofen took care of that. Awesome! We beat the random fever! We even went to Nana's house to help her make cookies. We were confident we were done!

We were wrong. Cayden started puking Wednesday afternoon around 4ish. And continued through the night. Thankfully I felt pretty good again (minus a cold that showed up post-sick). Graham was no longer puking. Whew.

Thursday was looking pretty good! No throwing up! Christmas might not be a disaster after all!

And then this morning came. Cayden threw up again. And Graham has now thrown up twice today. Thankfully Jeremy, Sawyer and Tatum have missed out on the fun. And now I'm beginning to wonder if our little bit is ever going to get over this. No fun, y'all! But thankful for a toddler that knows what's about to happen and can (usually) make it to the bathroom.

Will everyone say a small prayer that this ends now? We really, really want to go see Jeremy's family in the morning. And we really, really want to see mine on Christmas night. The holidays just aren't quite right without our family in the mix. Amen.

christmas jams, 2016.

This is the first year in a while that we've documented some matching Christmas jams – in fact, it might have last happened when Sawyer was a toddler. This year might have a little something to do with that little one in pink, but mostly because all of our kiddos are adorable. And because Monday was the perfect light day to make it happen.

Also, let's go ahead and note that Tatum's eyes are turning dark... Cayden will be our only blue-eyed baby. Which makes me a little sad, but also happy that this green-eyed girl and dark-eyed husband were even able to have a blue-eyed baby!

The cool thing? After I got done taking the Allen Four's photos, the oldest three took turns for at least 30 minutes taking pictures of each other on their little camera. It was hilarious watching them come up with poses. And once I through out the term "art director," you should have heard them taking charge and giving direction. Hilarious!

Here's hoping you and your family enjoy the merriest of Christmases on Sunday

a small craft.

Pretty much every day, from the minute he wakes up until he falls asleep again, Graham is asking for food. As soon as he's done with breakfast, he's asking for a snack. And literally, the minute he's done with snack, he's asking for his lunch. Some days I'm able to ignore it, and others... not so much. When he'd asked for lunch one too many times one day last week, I decided he must be doing it out of boredom. To solve that boredom, I looked through our arts & crafts bucket, remembered that we had a ton of cotton balls and voila! craft (& problem) solved!

I think I can remember making something similar to this when I was younger. Graham couldn't have cared less about coloring Santa. If he'd had his way, the picture would've been a giant cotton ball, ha! It still kept him busy for about 15 minutes and distracted him long enough to postpone lunch for almost an hour. Whew!

It also led me to emailing Sawyer's old preschool to see if they had any openings for the 2k class in the spring semester. Thankfully? Yes, yes they do.

santa, 2016.

I think every year that we go visit Santa, there's always that split-second moment where you wonder if and which kid might start screaming their head off. And with four kiddos to sit with Santa now, the likelihood of that happening seems like it should be greater. Except... we somehow managed to get a photo without anyone crying this year! Tatum loves everyone right now though; she might be telling us all a different story next year. Graham has never once cried for Santa. He was a little unsure of him last year (and also wearing the same shirt apparently!), but no tears. This year he sparked up a conversation with Santa – so much so that we had a hard time getting him to look at the camera. Cayden and Sawyer are at their peak fake smile season; they almost literally need to be laughing to get a genuine smile these days. But it's all good – we're excited to add this one to our collection of Santa photos.