Christmas 2007

This year we celebrated Christmas at my parents house. What a wonderful trip it was!! This was the first year in quite a while that all my siblings were together for Christmas. My sister did successfully make the trip. Which is so great for all the kids to get to be together. The more kids, the better at Christmas time. We saw I Am Legend and National Treasure. We were treated to some great food. And got to go sledding. We headed to the top of the mountain Christmas Eve morning. The weather was perfect!
Andie and I in our matching dresses in front of my dad's massive Christmas tree. It's 16 hundred feet tall. Sweet Dean would have his head thrown back as far as it could go trying to look at the top of the tree. They also had an average size tree in the other room. It had a remote control train around the base and the middle of the tree. That was definately the highlight for all the boys. I love that my dad has the interest and energy to go all out with Christmas. It helps make it magical for all of us.
Dean kicking back with the animal crackers from his stocking. He has quite the sweet tooth or junk food tooth anyway. Dean's favorite part of Christmas was when my brother would slide him around the carpet while he sat on a box.
We made a few unsuccessful attempts at a group shot. That is just torture for the kids. So we are all on the couch facing the tv which has Frosty the Snowman playing. So the kids aren't smiling, but we can see their faces. My brothers arrived late, I caught them in another picture that I didn't make the kids be part of.

We got to spend time with both of my grandmothers as we traveled. I am so blessed by a wonderful loving family.

And as always Santa was good to us. Thanks to all of Santas helpers.

Goings on

Well, we are going at our usual fast pace. We are loving everything to do with Christmas. We have already had 3 Christmas celebrations. My sister traveled our way over Thanksgiving. So we went ahead and exchanged gifts then. It looks like we might get to see the over Christmas anyway. My big sis is 8 months pregnant, almost 9. So she thought they would not be traveling, but she is going to brave the 12 hr - 2 day trip so the cousins can be together. We'll see how that goes. Guess I could pack a delivery pack for her just in case.

As I buy presents for people, I get all aglow, excited for them to receive their gifts. I just can't stand the waiting, I want to give the gifts out right away. My husband is calm, and is willing to wait. I have been asking him for weeks if he was curious what his presents were and, "Don't you want to open them?" At first he was a rock. But he finally broke. It was actually his idea for us to have our family Christmas last Sunday afternoon. We will be at my parents for Christmas, so there is plenty of celebrating left to be had. The reason why my husband wanted us to open our gifts was because he knew he had done good! I think this is the first Christmas gift that I have truly been surprised. We usually need a camera or furniture or something like that. We buy it and say that's our gift to each other. And I always was great with that. But man, being surprised is lots of fun!


Here's something I have not posted on: Some of you are familiar with my dining room table and chairs. I can only imagine the conversations that have taken place over the plastic I keep on my dining table. Well, we bought this beautiful table and chairs before we had kids. And we hope for it to last forever. So now that we know how destructive kids innocently are, it is covered in plastic. My 3 yr old got a hold of a black sharpie and colored my upholstered chair. And man she colored hard! AHHHH!! My husband put alot of scrubbing time in and has almost gotten it all out. I just saw that she also colored the wooden brace of the table as well. At least she is cute!

Snowy Day!

I can't believe it's been almost two weeks since the snow and I haven't posted about it! We had the most perfect snow two Sundays ago. While the kids were taking their Sunday nap, Trey and I gathered up all the snow gear so we could be ready for some serious snow play. After the older kids woke up we the fun began! We made 5 snowmen total. One for each in our family. The kids decorated their own faces. Their mouths are red licorice, carrot for a nose, and pecan eyes. Dean has gum drop eyes.
Trey could roll up the snow like it was insulation. It was crazy!
Sweet Andie loved the snow! Building the snowman was her favorite, and making a snow angel was a close second favorite. Evan loved it all. He seemed especially pleased to throw snowballs. He was a little hesitant at first. Like, "Am I reading this right? Is my momma telling me to throw things at people?"
Dean slept through it all. But we brought him out to let him check it out. He kept lightly touching the snow saying "this, this". It was a wonderful afternoon with my family. I am so thankful for my family and for the snow God made that brought such a special time.

But we made a terrible late night discovery! Some very cold hearted person pushed over our snow family! I took it very personally. How could someone destroy our special family time symbol?! Well husband to the rescue! He rolled and wheel barrowed the biggest snowballs from the destroyed snowmen and rebuilt "the biggest snowman ever" in our backyard. This way when the kids woke up in the morning excited to see the snowmen, it wouldn't be so dissappointing. It worked! Way to go husband!