GWE, Christmas & NYE 2010

So behind on blogging yet again...I'm going to skip right past November and talk about crazy December.

The "Greatest Weekend Ever (GWE)" crew drove to Buffalo, NY this year for our 5th annual GWE. It was very wet and very cold, snow pants and parkas were the clothing of choice that day. I thought since it was our 5th anniversary I would share pictures from past years. We didn't take a group picture from GWE III: Washington D.C. for some reason, but everything else is here. 

    



GWE 5: Buffalo, NY

GWE 4: Detroit, MI



GWE 2: St. Louis, MO



GWE 1: Atlanta, GA

The girls were thrilled to see Santa this year at the Stammen Christmas. Nora was a bit hesitant of him, but she was really excited to get a gift from him. All the kids got a Washington Nationals t-shirt and hat that they all proudly displayed together. Thank you Craig for thinking of the kids - they loved it!

Nora hated wearing the hat and Nolan is missing...

Michigan Christmas was a lot of fun as always. It's great to spend time with my sisters b/c we don't see each other very often. We typically get very silly and annoy the guys, but that is what sisters do. Shannon and I couldn't pull it together enough to beat Joel and Brian in euchre, but we really tried to focus as well as we could. (Digress...moving on).

Dad & The Girls

Mya & Scrabble Flash (awesome)



Nora's new laptop - she absolutely can't get enough of this one!



 We celebrated at our house this year a few days early before we left for Michigan. Nora got Mya an Our Generation Doll - Eva and Mya got Nora the Dance Star Mickey. Both were a big hit, but Nora is still kind of afraid to turn him on herself. When we got home from Michigan the girls had a Santa gift too. They were springtime gifts this year, so we can't enjoy them now - hopefully Spring will come early this year. Mya is all ready to practice her goal making skills with a new soccer net, and Nora has a shiny new wagon to go for walks in. They both can also enjoy a new swing set this Spring. Our old one came with our house and it's falling apart - no joke. So Santa decided it was time for a new one - as soon as they go back on sale, he'll be delivering it to the house!

Finally, NYE. We held the 2nd Annual Gameapalooza at our house again. It was everything we wanted it to be and more. The first game of the night was Fact or Crap, I may need to play that again - loved it! The second game was a series of 3 Minute-to-Win-it games. 1) Get 6 ping-pong balls out of a Kleenex box attached to a belt worn around your waist. The amount of moving and shaking going on was quite amazing. I wish we would have gotten out the video camera - but no one thought about that until after the fact.
2) Moving M&Ms from the table to a cup using a straw.

3) Moving a cookie from your forehead to your mouth using nothing but your face. Good times.

The last game was Family Feud done in a crazy tournament/bracket/teams type of way. By the end of the nigh the Stammen's maintained control of the winners' trophy. It's kind of a tradition.

The most amazing part of the night however, was the work the children did. We had a total of 22 people, including 8 children. Those 8 children did something I can't even be angry about. They turned the toy room into a room that could have been part of a tornado disaster. It was incredible. The day before the party Nora and I cleaned the entire room, making sure all small objects were up high and that everything was in its place. We of course had no intention of believing the room would remain in such a state, but it's a nice presentation. The next day we cleaned it again back to it's original state.

As you can see, the kids all worked together and did a great job making this room into what it became.They truly did their best work here. One thing of note - with an entire table and bar full of food - there was zero presence of food, wrappers, plates, napkins, or utensils found; I give credit to the parents on this one.