New Year's Eve

No babysitter for NYE means another bash at the Rudd's.  This year the kids all stayed up until midnight with us!  They got to play Jr. Basement Olympics and do a countdown at 9:00 before settling in to watch Madagascar 3 in the family room while the adults had their own Basement Olympics downstairs.  Everyone had so much fun!  We love ringing in the new year with our best friends!  

My favorite part of the night was when I declared that, "I love it when Krista gets bawdy!" resulting in Ness spitting out her drink and Josh yelling, "Somebody puked! Somebody puked!"  Not so funny when I just reread it but, trust me, it was hilarious if you were there and a little tipsy :)

The Bhooshans ended up winning the last Basement Olympics at 3470 Manassas but left too early to be awarded the coveted $10 Panera gift card, so the Dickempers claimed it.  Brian and Krista have promised that they will somehow incorporate a permanent Bounce table into their new house plans.

Some of the kids doing Just Dance upstairs.

Allan shows off his mad Pop-a-Shot skills while wearing his hot athletic clothes, including wristbands!

Allan takes his role as line judge seriously when Josh and Erin are up at Bounce.

Craig and Ness got first place at the Wii Dance Off!

It was pretty much a free-for-all for the kids upstairs.

No luck at getting Delaney and Harper to fall asleep during the movie.

I couldn't believe they made it up until midnight!  This would either be very good or very bad for us in the morning :)

Happy New Year from the Cochrans!  God's Blessings in 2013!

Party, Party, Party!

It was a day for parties today!  First of all, Claire and Luke had a combined Rock n Roll party at the Y. The kids got to rock climb for one hour then roller skate for an hour.  

Allan and the big kids listen to the climbing instructions.

Delaney wasn't feeling very brave and actually only climbed as high as the non-harnessed little kids could climb - about 7 feet off the ground.

Claire

Tyler earned $5 from Brian by climbing all the way to the tippy-top.

Just hangin' around.

Harper had fun. too!

Landon

Another picture of the gang.

Bouncing down is the best part.

Claire had a Justin Bieber cake.

And Luke had Spiderman.

While the kids were busy with cake, Allan talked me into taking a turn on the rock wall, skinny jeans, boots and all!  Craig "helped" me :)

I made it to the tippy-top, too, but Brian didn't give me $5 :(

The next party on the schedule was Delaney's first sleepover party to celebrate her 6th birthday!  She invited a few of the neighbor girls and Claire.  Allan, Craig, Andrew, and Rachel hightailed it out of the house to  eat at Bandana's while Ness stayed with me to chaperone the party.  After pizza, the girls all played Barbies, hide and seek, and colored while Ness and I took a trip down Memory Lane and looked at old photo albums.  At about 7:30 we had cake then I put it Barbie and the Popstar movie for the girls to watch and (hopefully) settle down to sleep.  Not so much.  The movie was over by 9:15 and the girls were way to excited to sleep, so they chose to color at the kitchen table for a little while longer.  Alayna decided to go home to sleep in her own bed at about 9:30 and the rest of the girls finally fell asleep at 10:30 with only minimal yelling/threatening by Allan and me :)  Harper was the first one awake at 7:30 and the others soon followed.  I made them cinnamon rolls for breakfast and they played a little more hide and seek.  Their parents came to pick them up by 8:45 am.  I'd say it was a success!

Claire and Delaney were twinkies in their same PJs with the same Brave doll.

Claire

Alayna

Delaney

Sami

Emma

Harper

Snuggled in to watch the movie.

Andrew and Rachel gave hugs good-bye before bed because they would be sneaking out to catch their flight at 4 am!

Just a little bit more coloring before lights out.

Nighttime Snow Fun!

All week long Rachel had been asking for snow.  It didn't look like she was going to get her wish until it started snowing on their last day here!  It came down steadily all afternoon and a nice inch or two blanketed the ground by evening.  Paul and Liz came over for dinner and after the left we all donned our snow gear and got outside to play!  It started off with a family walk to (where else?) Gavin's house to see the lights (which Andrew loves, by the way!) and ended up with a snowball fight and a snowman.  We made some great memories and I know Andrew and Rachel were thrilled.  At least they were thrilled until the next morning when they found out that their flight to NYC was cancelled and they couldn't get another flight until 6 am the next day :(

Andrew

Our pretty house

Harper-girl

Delaney's coat brings out her eyes!

The happy couple

All snowmen have broccoli for eyes and baby carrot noses, right?

Of course, we all had some hot chocolate when we finally made it back inside.