One big sleepover in one not-so-big house

Before I get to the pictures from our weekend sleepover, I have to share that today Matt and I are celebrating 8 years of marriage. I posted a different shot from our honeymoon on Instagram, but this one makes us look even more like babies:

Goodness we were young!

These past 8 years have honestly flown by and have been filled with so many great memories. I can't imagine doing life with anyone else. :)

Okay, now on to a recap of our weekend celebration.

Saturday was my sweet mama's birthday, so we decided to celebrate with a big sleepover at our house.

Our house is not big by any stretch of the imagination, but we wanted to make it work and we did.

Well, sort of.

My parents stayed in Baby Girl's room, where we were thankfully able to keep a bed when converting it to a nursery.

My sister stayed on our couch with her two boys on an air mattress next to her on the floor. (Her husband was out of town, so we didn't have to work out space for him.)

Now this air mattress we have is actually really comfortable. Matt used it in the hospital when we had Ryan and we've let a number of friends borrow it for the same purpose. I honestly sleep great on it and so does everyone else... except for when there is a tiny hole that goes unnoticed.

So around 2am, both boys woke up my sister to say that they were laying on the hardwood floors- the mattress had completely deflated.

Thirty minutes prior to that, Ryan, who has been fighting a double ear infection and bronchiolitis, was up crying, but I tried to get to him quickly to minimize the wake time for everyone else.

Then from 2:30-3:30, there was apparently really loud music playing either at one of the houses or at one of the bars up the street. We live in the city, so either of these scenarios are common, but Matt and I never hear it back in our bedroom since it's in the back of the house and we sleep with a sound machine. But for our guests who were sleeping in the front of the house, they heard every last sound!

One hour later, at 4:30, our party animal who must have remembered that his favorite people were staying at our house, decided he was ready to start the day. Colds do not hold this guy back from a good time.

We were able to keep him in our room until 5:30, when our other child (the furry one), also remembered we had a house full of his favorite people. Straight to our door he went. Matt and I were ignoring him, but Ryan (in a moment of Matt and I not looking) walked right over to our bedroom door and opened it for Tally.

Off he went to greet Noah, Maddox, and my sister with morning kisses with Ryan trailing quickly behind.

Thank goodness our family loves us so much. ;)

And thank goodness they are the sweetest about a terrible night's sleep and a way-too-early wake-up call.

We started the coffee and I started the biscuits and gravy casserole (recipe here) and cinnamon rolls and we laughed about the comedy of errors that occurred throughout the night.

After breakfast, we all went on our runs, showered, and headed to the mall to visit Santa and eat lunch.

We planned on Ryan just waving at Santa and watching Noah and Maddox sit on his lap, but my sister offered to let Ryan do a dry run of the "sitting on Santa's lap" experience thinking he might do better if the boys were with him. Since we were anticipating a hard cry for this year's Santa visit, Matt and I thought it was a great idea to let him go with Noah and Maddox first.

This was right before they went. Ryan was really excited about waiting to see Santa with the boys and seemed to really get that he was going to get a turn to sit on his lap too.

Walking up to Santa he seemed happy and intrigued.

And then he got on his lap.

Poor guy!

But how about these two cuties?! Love them so much!

We weathered the storm and still ended up with a Christmas Minion hat ;)

And then we headed to the Cheesecake Factory for some lunch.

Singing happy birthday to Nonna!

On the way home, my sister sent me this text of her boys:

Sweet guys were passed out! 

THAT is what a sleepover at the Nelsen's will do to you. ;)

The Usborrne Books & More Party will stay open through Friday, so if there are any books you'd like to purchase to wrap up for the holidays, be sure to get your order in before Friday at midnight! You can click here to shop the party online. And click here to enter the giveaway!