New Year's Eve

[Kendra AU]

Ooo Jackie, I bet your Micah must be very excited to celebrate another "first" with you! I love his thumbs up in your Christmas photo. Makes me laugh each time I see it.

[Michele]

I wanted to share one of our bag ideas! It's getting so hard to think of something novel because we have the same group of kids every year (teammates from gymnastics). In one of the bags, we're going to have calendars! I'm printing off the months (one set per child), and a blank page for the cover. I'm going to bind them and let the kids decorate with markers and stickers!!! Just wanted to share!!

[Leslie Nelsen]

Here is the link to our bags this year! I am so excited! We have a Disney theme going on!

http://themullislife.blogspot.com/20...-eve-bags.html

Can't believe you are SOOOO prepared! I'm impressed! Do your girls not peek at your blog? I think mine would.

I'm still working on my clues. We pretty much do the same things every year - and most of the things y'all have mentioned.

Making noisemakers and signs for the New Year (for pictures)

A game

We usually make homemade pizza but this year are trying tacos. Will be easier to do gf and also help with a couple of diabetics.

Decorating gingerbread people

Answer questions about the past year and our hopes for the upcoming one. This is actually my favorite part of the night. Its a wonderful keepsake!

Watch a movie

Pray in the New Year. We ask each person to write down a prayer request and then we draw a slip and take turns praying. We started this last year and it was a sweet time!

Toast the new year!

We've been doing this for a number of years now too and its become a family favorite celebration. I love it and so does my family!

[Kendra AU]

Well, we're set in the end with most of our old ones in and just a couple new ones for what we dropped:

• Swimming {seriously hot here today & we've all got new rashies to try out}
• Lunch {we're hoping to hit our fav. cafe if they are open for fixing anything besides tea and coffee}
• Board Game {new one from Christmas we haven't played yet}
• Homemade Fudgesicles {sugar free & dairy free can't wait to try them!}
• Video Game {Mario Party}
• Pizza for dinner {homemade or order out, we're not sure yet}
• Calendars & Devotions {I give the kids a new calendar each year, this year I'm including a devotional now that they both can read well on their own! I'm giving my mil a calendar at this time too..}
• Movie {Planet 51, we've all ready seen it the guys enjoy it}
• Celebration "stuff" {sparklers, GIANT party poppers}
• Fireworks {city is doing some at 930 for kids and then again at midnight for the late crowd, we're going to the early session so the kids can be in bed by 1030 or so}

Now I need to go put things in the bags which I can't find since we moved. Yep, I use the same ones every year, but they are made from cloth so they last.

[Jen in SC]

Leslie,
I am posting our poems on Facebook this evening as we go through our bags. I totally stole some of them from your blog from last year. Hope that's okay!

We do go til midnight but we don't start until 5pm.

5:00 - make Happy New Year signs
6:00 - pizza making and baking and eating
7:00 - Pictionary (new game) on the wii
8:00 - Get to know you games because another family is joining us
9:00 - Ice Cream Sundaes
10:00 - Movie (Voyage of the Dawn Treader) and popcorn
midnight or whnever the movie is over: Sparklers and sparkling grape juice

[Leslie Nelsen]

Glad they were helpful!

I'd love to hear what you think about the Wii game! We love playing Pictionary (and often do it on NYE) because its one that everyone can play!

You should have come over here. We are doing the same movie too!

Have fun!

[Jen in SC]

Our UDraw seems to not be working so we are just going to set up an easel and play pictionary that way. We are getting our words from this site. Totally messed up my poem!

[Kendra AU]

Aww, bummer Jen. BUT, I will say we play pictionary with a white board and we just draw the pictures and let people guess, no rolling and moving around the board. We play for x time. It's especially fun on Australia Day to pull out the Aussie Expansion pack.

[Mary FL]

We left the tea at 8:30 ish. The kids were happy to work on a large Lego set when we got home. We had a toast with sparkling apple cider. It was a quiet rest of the evening, and I was in bed by 10:30! This morning I thought "we missed out" but then thought "we can do fun evenings anytime, not just New Year's Eve!" So for anyone who didn't get a chance to get together their bags and schedule, it's not too late to plan a fun family evening!

Happy New Year!

[Kendra AU]

Mary, some people do them from xx time in the morning until 12 noon .