December Birthday Boys + New Years

We returned home to Wisconsin {No flat tires this year - all of the praise hands!} and promptly celebrated our December birthday boys. 

This year Dan is 43 and Leo is 4. Can you believe that our littlest guy is going to be headed to 4K this fall! He wants to do everything that the big kids do but still says words like, 'Ax-cadent' for accident and 'Cone Fall' for phone call. I have a hard time correcting because it is so dang cute!!

We feasted on pheasant for dinner.

Dan and Leo opened a few gifts - Leo was pumped to play some electric guitar with his brother.

We had one more day of fun planned for the birthday boys - we met up with the Cihaceks at the indoor gym in Hudson on Friday morning. It was our first visit to Hudson GNG and the crew had a great time. 

There was so much to do! Lots of jumping pits, crazy slides, swings, etc.

We had one very happy boy.

Love this pack of kids! Overall I would give Hudson GNG a positive review, it was packed but very clean, there was a nice spot for parents to hang out and have a cup of coffee, I am sure that we will return for some winter play next season. 

After a morning of play we went to Barkers Bar & Grill for lunch. I had a delicious Nashville Hot Chicken sandwich - 10/10 recommend!

Our birthday guy with his sister!

It was an older bar with a long and skinny footprint so we had a table and a booth back to back. We had all of these feral children sit in the booth! Haha.

It was a great day in Hudson - love this city!

We got home and started packing up holiday stuff. Lucy found this fun Harry Potter Christmas shirt that she neglected to wear all December. Doh! She wanted me to take a picture when she wore it on December 31st. ;)

On New Years Eve we went to the movie theater to see Puss in Boots. Leo was excited to sit in the Batmobile ride in the lobby. ;)

We said cheers to a New Year! All of the years since 2020 I feel like I am kinda holding my breath to see what shakes out but, buckle up, we are here for another one! Yay for 2023! We have some awesome things to look forward to in the new year - can't wait to share them.

On January 1 we put on our Sunday best! ;) The Packers played (and beat) the Vikings so our boys were eager to don their Green Bay gear. 

Whew - it always seems like Christmas break is such a whirlwind with multiple holiday celebrations, a couple of birthdays, and lots of travel! Glad to get these kiddos back in school and back to our regularly scheduled programing. :) 

Christmas Celebrations in SoDak - 2022

We hit the road to SoDak for some sweet Christmas and birthday celebrations. 

We arrived in time to do some decorating for a very special 4th birthday party {Leon Henry!}. Grandma Sharon helped secure a bowling alley reservation so we got all kinds of goodies online to prepare for the event. I mean look at these cute cupcakes. 

Lucy and I assembled party favor bags - I got a big pack of bowling stickers from Amazon and good thing that I combed through them before handing them out to the nieces and nephews because some were inappropriate. Ai yi yi. 

We played games with Grammy and Grandpa - Rummikub is always a fave! 

After Rummikub the table quickly changed into an arm wrestling mat. Haha! 

You know that this Mama had to take one last picture of her sleeping 3 year old. Precious Leo! 

We woke up the next morning to Egg Kaka - the best breakfast - and greeted our brand new F-O-U-R year old! 

You can see that Ranger was thrilled to have Dan at his paws for extended periods of time during Christmas Vacation! 

These four year olds were ready to party. 

Look at this cutest lil bowler!

He loves pushing the ball down the slide. 

Everyone had the best afternoon!

The owner was so kind and even gave the birthday boy a behind the scenes tour. 

Bowling = the perfect winter party! 

Of course we had special drinks and treats too! Thanks to everyone for celebrating with our special guy.

After our bowling party we pivoted and started our Christmas celebrations. 

Here is the whole fam - my favorite part of this photo is Paul with the 2 little guys on his lap! 

We ate, we played games, watched the children sing and perform for us, and opened gifts. 

Grandma sewed the big girls matching jammies. Love it!

We got Elijah a volcano lamp! How fun is this? 

We made our annual winter trip to Midco Pool. Everyone loves this facility! :)

Such a great place for these kids to burn some energy! 

While we went swimming, Dan and Ranger went pheasant hunting near Mitchell. They were successful! 

Happy holidays from South Dakota! 

Merry Christmas - Wisconsin 2022

We celebrated our first Christmas at Ken and Nola's new house in Eau Claire. 

We spent Christmas Eve day baking. 

We greeted the cousins and got ready for church in the afternoon

Candlelight services are just magical! Leo was so excited to hold his own candle at Hope Lutheran this year. 

Merry Christmas from the Storm family!

Here's the grandkid crew - can't wait to add a new little Cihacek baby to the mix in 2023. 

Of course we always need a silly pic! Poor Grandpa is crowded out by these crazy kiddos. 

Here is Leo's happy little face before we started gift opening. 

I have exactly zero pictures of the present chaos but it was so much FUN! 

We returned home and waited for Santa Claus to come. Here are the Storm kids on Christmas morning, we told the children (mostly Roman) that they were not allowed to leave their rooms until 7:00am the next morning. ;) Also - I love buffalo plaid so much! 

Again - I am lacking in the photo department but I did get this one - Roman was so pumped to get a KISS calendar. It was a last minute stocking stuffer and Mom AKA Santa's elf was so thrilled to find it at an extremely cheap price. Well ... upon closer inspection I realized that it was a dang 2022 calendar!!! Ugh. Literally good for 6 more days. Good thing that Roman did not care one bit! He couldn't wait to hang an outdated calendar on his wall. LOL!

Speaking of photos - a Christmas miracle did occur when Brad snapped a picture of our holiday pups. All 5 of these good boys and girl sitting still. Don't they look festive? 

After going through stockings we did a lot of lounging throughout the day ...

With a little bit of wrestling thrown into the mix. Haha!

Then we got ready for our annual trip to South Dakota to celebrate Christmas with the Hoekmans!