Sayonara Ken-kun & Riki-chan!

Keni & Riki left for Japan yesterday, but we made sure to fill their last few days here with Christmas festivities.  On Friday night the three boys got to open their stocking stuffers from my parents.

Instead of stockings (not yet unpacked), Santa used festive plastic bags from Longs Drugs.  

Thank you for the candy canes, Santa!  (Next time, bring him some insulin to go with it.)  

Later that night the boys invited Ryan over for his first sleepover with them (since my poor innocent brother and sister in law still had no idea about how hyper he gets at night when camping with his cousins). They know now though...because Ryan outlasted all of them that night.  Although my brother reported a few tears and sniffles around 11:30pm, Ryan toughed it out and stayed over the whole night!

The next day it was time for the annual Christmas parade!  Though they were all slightly delirious from the late night sleepover the night before, Ryan & his cousins met a few of his friends there early to stake out a spot...look how cute and festive they all look!  [Please feel free to also admire the cute popcorn boxes I ordered from Amazon too!]

It's kinda funny looking at pics of a Christmas parade when everyone is wearing shorts, tank tops and slippers!  :-) 

After the parade, we took the three (wired on parade-candy) boys out for their last spam musubi dinner (for a very long time)!

Of course we had to get a few silly photos in...

It's just how we roll.

The next morning we got up early to host a goodbye breakfast for the boys (per Mika's instructions- oil-free for reduced vomiting on the flight).  The poor girl has two boys who despite flying internationally quite regularly- suffer from motion sickness.  :-)

Right after they left for the airport, we hit Macy's so Rich could get a few things he needed.

Ryan got bored waiting for daddy so he found a fun place to hang out and have a snack.

After returning home for our annual pre-Christmas cleaning throughout our cluttered home, I did a quick Sunday long run (though not so long this weekend, only 11 miles) and met the boys at the pool before baking five batches of banana bread.  This is only about a third of what we baked!