Brock's 17!

    We had a pretty chill week and a simple celebration for Brock's 17th birthday. He got the exact gift he asked for and the infamous jello-cheesecake he loves, hopefully that makes for a happy young man.

A curved gaming monitor.

He's very own jello-cheesecake. (Not photographed, but it must be documented, he also got Mt. Dew, Taki's and sushi.)

    And Charlie did pretty great at her most recent basketball game, especially considering half the team was m.i.a. so she had to play nearly the entire game with only one short break.

 

    What's next? We'll see! (And lets not forget, only 125 sleeps until we're done with elementary school!)

Bonus Reese photos and a bit more

    We're still on cloud-9 after our time with Reese and only wish we saw her more often. She's just the cutest and here's most of the photos that Greg had on his phone.
    

 

Just like Harley, she loved playing with Joey's glasses.

 

 

 

 

 

    And today we had a couple hours with the '3-crazies' and I couldn't help putting in some braided pigtails.

 

 

A rare snuggle from the craziest of the crazies.

    We've made it through our first full week of school and work of the New Year and, so far so good. Next week we celebrate Brock's birthday and keep counting down the school days at the elementary level. (Only 132 more sleeps.)

    And, no photos yet, but basketball season has officially started for Charlie and McClane.

A great start to 2025

    We had a special start to our year. We got to watch baby Reese for nearly the whole week and it's been so fun and memorable. (Sad she won't remember.) Here's most of the photos and one video from our 'Reese-week'. 

First, I got a cute set of winter nails. Another fun set!

She's the cutest and very popular.

She wished she could get her hands on that cat.

Meeting the Great Grandparents.

Fun times with Rachel.

A 'mini-Rachel'

Fun night putting together personal puzzles.

Meeting Great Aunt Ann and Great Uncle David.

Walking everywhere.

Matchy-matchy.

 

A fun visit with Grandma Karen

Final snuggles before little Reese heads home.

And one last 'out-back adventure' with papa.

    There are more photos on Greg's phone that I'll share next week. We're beyond happy for the opportunity we've had to spend these last 4 days with Reese. She's the sweetest and it was worth a few hours of lost sleep to have her stay with us.

    And here's a couple photos that are proof we did celebrate the New Year, well some of us. And a random bonus photo of Greg and Georgia, who is 5 years old today.

 

 

    Now back to real-life in t-minus three sleeps!

Christmas 2024

    Another successful Christmas for the Alpine Kmetzsch's. I'll caption what I need to but mostly the photos speak for themselves.

Christmas came a few days early for Greg from our sweet friend, who's a generous and thoughtful gift-giver!

Christmas Eve PJ's.

Christmas morning line-up.

We went with the 'utter-chaos' technique for opening gifts.

Lots of happy kids.

Maybe one inappropriate gift, I can't help myself.

 

 

 Brock was really enjoying the cool rain-drum from Rio & Mark.

Beau got a bonus gift of gum, lots of gum, for sticking to her guns and calling me Joey and refusing to fall for her dads tricks of calling me, Grandma Joey. 

Kayli finally harassed me enough, over the last 7 + years, into filling her stocking and buying her Christmas Eve PJ's.

The girls love the giant "Connect 4" game, courtesy of G & G Baker's Christmas cash.

Now time for the sibling gift exchange.

Fun stuff and a few jokes and one actual mistake.

 

 

 

 

Overall a good time and happy siblings.

Carter's gun-safe. (Isaac got the same thing but he's going to wait and set it up once he's married & moved out.

In the Christmas chaos I didn't get any photos of the girls opening their gifts but here they are wearing the matching overalls I gifted them. Adorable!

    A great Christmas and now we can relax a bit before ringing in the New Year. We've packed Christmas away and nothing feels better then having the house back in order and getting back into our routine.