Winter Wonderland

Merry Christmas from our family to ours!!! I hope everyone had a safe and fun holiday...

If we did Christmas cards, I'm pretty sure this picture might win.. we are pretty stylish.

So my Christmas began with heading down to Kansas City. I made it in Monday night and managed the obligatory Gate's BBQ stop (yummmm). Then Tuesday was cookie making at my Aunt Tara's (as has been tradition for many many years). This year we had the help of two of my littlest cousins - Gia and Kaylie. They were very... helpful. haha. But they seemed to have a great time.

Wednesday was Christmas shopping. We like to get it all knocked out in a day for all the kids and our secret santa gifts for the family. It's so much easier because then I don't have to worry about either carrying gifts with me or shipping them in advance. I'm not quite as streamlined as my Aunt Kelly. But, we managed to get everything together and buy for the 5-million some odd kids that were at our Christmas Eve bash. :) John actually got in on Wednesday night, despite the afternoon flights all being cancelled and the apparent "fog" in KC.

Thursday (Christmas Eve) is where the fun begins. Everyone gets together and opens the presents. The kids get presents from everyone, but once your 18 you start drawing names. It's a great tradition, until you turn 18.. haha.

Me and my incredibly beautiful cousins.. Love them!

John and me

This year Christmas Eve came to my grandma. We all went over there and had her open her presents and we took a plate of goodies over to her.

The family...

The fun part of the holiday was apparently getting OUT of Kansas City. When we got back from my grandma's we had a message waiting that said our flight on Christmas Day had been cancelled. KC was getting this crazy storm... we already had 1/4"-1" of SLEET accumulation. It wasn't even snowing yet... We were supposed to get something like 4"-6" of snow overnight and the airlines were kind of freaking out. So, we booked on American Airlines, hoping that somehow we would make it to Chicago on Christmas Day.

The next morning, we were awakened for Santa Claus and with a message that our American Airlines flight that we had booked was also cancelled. Grrrr... My Aunt Kelly and Uncle John were scheduled to be flying back with us too, but they decided to just stick with the "sure thing" of Saturday morning. John and I decided that we were going to try and get out of Kansas City... try our shot at standby. Here is what we woke up to:

Looking out the front door of my grandma's house....Yikes!

So, we decided to hang out at the airport... we LOVE the airport... there are like chairs..

Yaaay airports!!!

This is what made us a little nervous.. They had snowplows out there so the planes could back out of the gate... Yikes!

But, we finally made it to Chicago. We were number 3 and 4 on the standby list, and they let 5 people on. Phew. It was definitely a Christmas miracle. We escaped the "blizzard warning" and are now hanging out where the snow is coming down with a good couple of inches on the ground. Apparently we can't get away from a White Christmas this year...