Oh, hello there. And happy Saturday!

Today is a big day for many reasons.  It happens to be Alex’s birthday, his first day off in over 30+ days, and the day of the annual Christmas Run, where his best buddies and their fathers run five miles on the beach (because that makes complete sense in New England in December) and then spend the rest of their day on bar stools at a creepy pub where they usually end up dancing on the bar.  It seems like the perfect trifecta of a sloppy night for the birthday boy, so I’m trying to squeeze in as much celebrating this morning before it all goes downhill.

But before any celebrating, running, or sloppiness begins, I had to share some photos with you because I know a certain family that are dying to see these!  You already know from my previous posts that I happen to work with the world’s most amazing group of teachers, and included is my friend, Krysta.  Krysta was new last year, but fit in so nicely it feels like she was always a part of our school.  Krysta had mentioned an amazing plan that her boyfriend’s sister, Blakely, had concocted that included surprising her mom with family photos for Christmas, a tradition they had done in years past, that she wanted to recreate.  And somehow, Blakely managed to convince all three of her brothers, and her boyfriend to participate in the picture taking and to color coordinate…genius.  We headed to a Christmas tree farm the day after the snow storm which made for a gorgeous backdrop for this fun family.

Little Nicholas in the front there is quite the comedian.  He had us in stitches the entire time.

Awe…here is Krysta and her boyfriend Justin.  Aren’t they the cutest?  They have single handedly depleted my bank account by getting me hooked on Whole Foods. They will also probably be my roommates in about two months when I’m forced to sell my home in order to maintain my diet of freshly ground organic peanut butter and local raw honey for $20 a pop.   Thanks, guys!

“Little” brothers, Jonathan and Nicholas.

And below is Blakely and her boyfriend, Jeff, who had the difficult task of being heckled by all three of her brothers while posing.  I think they killed it, don’t you?

Troopers.  Literally.  The snow was so deep that I ran all over to make tracks and then had everyone trudge around in them to get complete use of the farm.  I’m lucky their hands were frozen, otherwise I’m pretty sure one of them would have punched me in my face.

The mastermind, Blakely, and her big brother, Justin.

 

Have I mentioned Blakely’s ability to get her brother’s to do anything?  I swear, the girl is brilliant.  She somehow convinced her two little brothers that their mom would want a snowball fight picture and had them line up to be the targets.  Nick’s face is priceless.

If you turn up the volume on your computer, you can probably still hear their maniacal laughs.

It’s a really good thing for Nicholas and Christopher that their photographer has lots of experience being manipulated as the youngest child and made a deal to only capture the snowball terrorism if they got to retaliate.

I left the farm with a huge smile frozen on my face, not because of the weather, but because this family was so fun.  (OK…and probably because it was negative ten degrees and my pants were soaked up to my hips.)

I miss you all already.  What time should I be over for Christmas dinner?