We are not ready for Christmas to be over on Dec. 25, so we have Old Befana come on Jan. 6.  Colin put out his boots, hoping for lots of goodies. 

 Jane got a magic teapot.  We were downstairs, but my mom said she said, "what the heck?" 

 We are in a big Beyblade phase. 

 And Brian made a French Epiphany cake, very yummy!  We had some friends over that we met in Rome to eat it. 

 Jane made a big tower all by herself, so cute. 

And Brian put the tree outside so he could see it with snow on it.  It was fun the first couple snow storms, but not fun after all the snow we got.  It was a brutal winter. 

 This was the day we let the kids eat their gingerbread house. 

 Crazy kids. 

After our second day at the Science Center, we got some pizza.  We tried to go here two years earlier, but there was a 3 hour wait!  No pizza is worth three hours, especially when Brian makes awesome pizza.  But we got a table right away.  It was fun and we were hungry. 

The big kids love to play with Kate while in the stroller. 

We spent the night in Las Vegas coming home to break up the drive.  Sadly, we missed a turn and got into town about an hour later than we could have.   We stayed in the New York New York, got some fish and chips and headed out onto the Strip. 

We had fun pointing out how Las Vegas is a fake city to the kids.    

I do love the fountain shows! 

Colin's cute little head watching the show. 

 

And he was asleep in the stroller, but we woke him up to get a photo with Bumble Bee.  How did he get so big?  (Colin, not Bumble Bee.)  We also learned to NOT go to the pirate show at Treasure Island.  It used to be fun and piraty, but alas, has gone very tasteless.  Seems the ladies who probably work inside the casino without shirts on cover up, come outside and do a siren show.  Brian thought their target audience was 12-15 year old boys.  It was super dumb, and Colin even thought so.  He wondered why they did not talk like pirates, and why they had to make it "romantic".  Below, we had very tired kids.  Kate was asleep strapped onto Brian, and although way too big, the big kids can still sleep in our phil&;teds!  Brian and I walked about 4 miles on the strip and got back to the hotel super late.  Who were those irresponsible parents with their kids out so late?