Seeing Santa

We started off our day super early for some reason this morning.  All three kids were up by 6:30.  I usually have late sleepers, but they have all turned into early birds lately.  It really is kind of nice to get things going a little earlier, take earlier naps and have earlier bedtimes.  We'll see if this trend continues.
Since Gracyn woke up so early she was back down before 8 for her first nap.  The big kids made some Christmas cards and played and then we headed to the library for story time.  We have not been to the library as often as I would have liked to these last few months.  Our librarian is wonderful and they kids really enjoy it.  Today she read Owl Babies.  This was a perfect story for Garrett to hear.  It is about three owl babies who miss their mom and are afraid she is not going to come back and of course in the end she does.  Garrett has been so worried about me leaving him lately.  He is scared to death that I am going to forget about him.  We had a surprise visitor come after story time to make some balloon creations.  He was incredible.  I have never seen such amazing balloon animals.  Gaitley got a kitty cat and Garrett got a really neat sword.
After the library we headed to Sonic for Wacky Pack Wednesday.  This has become our new thing.  We don't eat out very often anymore and on Wednesday Sonic Wacky Packs are only $1.99.  You can't beat that!
After lunch we played outside and then came in and both girls took really long naps.  Garrett and I played and rested and then he helped me clean the kitchen.  He thought it was a treat to get to mop the floor.  I enjoyed the help!
Our day ended with a trip to Bass Pro Shops to see Santa.  Santa left a note in their Christmas calendar this morning and asked them to come.  They had been looking forward to it all day.  My sister and Ellie met us there.  We have been going to Bass Pro Shops for the last three years to see Santa and have never had to wait in line.  We got there tonight and it was packed.  We had to wait about 40 minutes to get our pictures taken.  I was shocked!  Garrett has never sat in Santa's lap before and I was really not expecting him to do it tonight but he did.  I really thought Gaitley would and the closer we got the more she didn't want to.  Oh well, two out of the three is not bad.  Then of course after we took our pictures we had to shoot some guns and bows and arrows.

Fun December Weekend

December is always such a busy month but so much fun.  We started off the weekend with our Sunday School class Christmas party on Friday night.  We had a delicious dinner catered by On the Border.  It was so nice to drop the kids off at the church nursery and not have to worry about getting a babysitter or paying for one.  We had a great time visiting with friends.
We got up Saturday morning and went downtown to watch the Christmas parade.  It was the largest I have ever seen it.  There were over 100 floats.  The kids loved it.  Garrett 's favorite part was seeing Santa on the fire engine and Gaitley talked nonstop about the cheerleaders.  Saturday night we bundled up in our Christmas pajamas and went to look at Christmas lights.  It is so exciting to watch the kids light up when they see all the decorations.
Our weekend ended on a good note with the Hanging of the Green at church.  All the kids' choirs sang Christmas songs.  Garrett has been practicing for this for months and he was so cute to watch.  I don't know if he knew any of the words but he stood up there with his hands in his pockets and smiled and waved the entire time.  Both my sisters were able to come and that really made it special.
We can't wait for the rest of the fun activities we have planned for this month.

So Thankful

We had such a fantastic Thanksgiving.  My entire family came to Rockwall.  It was so nice not to have to drive all the way to Spearman.  I did miss seeing Britt's family and my grandparents, but Christmas is only a few weeks away.  This was my first year to host and my first time ever to cook turkey and dressing.  I handed the hard part over to Britt and he fried the turkey and it was absolutely delicious.  I tried to copy Britt's mom's fantastic recipe for dressing and I think it turned out pretty good.  Now that you know it all turned out ok I will tell you how Thursday morning started out.  It was time to start cooking the turkey and when I took it out of the fridge it was still frozen.  Yikes!  It had been thawing for days.  We did the quick thaw method and soaked it in the sink.  Then Britt had the fryer all ready to go and it started pouring rain.  We moved it into the garage and just prayed we wouldn't have a big fire.  After all our morning drama everything turned out just fine and we had a great Thanksgiving dinner.  It was so nice to have everyone together.

Fun Fall Days

The weather has been absolutely gorgeous lately.  It's a little chilly but so enjoyable.  We have been able to spend so much time outside playing.  If it is a little too windy for Gracyn, I  have been able to leave the doors open and keep her in the playroom while the big kids play out front.

 Gracyn is such a happy baby these days.  Excuse the bad hair.  I never notice how crazy it looks until I see it in a picture.  Some lady told me she looked like she had a mohawk.  She has rubbed it nearly bald on both sides.

 Garrett and our neighbor raked up all the leaves and buried each other.  I thought the goggles were a good idea.  :)

 With the time change we have been getting ready for bed so early.  We have been able to spend some time playing games before it is actually time to go to bed.

 This is random, but my kids (mainly Garrett) thought these would look great on the door.  We turned some free address labels into stickers and he thought since they had our address on them we should tape them to the front door.

 When Garrett was two, the first thing he would do when we went outside was run around in a circle yelling, "it's a beautiful day!"  The tradition has stuck and now he has passed it on to Gaitley.  Silly kids!

 Having fun in the gator and then the wagon.

Now I am off to enjoy an evening with just my baby girl.  Britt took the big kids to watch our nephew play football and they are spending the night.  So far my free time (her nap time) has consisted of blogging and cleaning the windows.  Fun times!

Family Pictures...Enough Said

Last Friday night we got the kids all dolled up and met our friend Allison out at White Rock in an attempt to capture the perfect picture of our little family.  The kids looked adorable in their red outfits and we had the candy ready for bribes.  We were going to meet her around 5 which meant we needed to leave our house a little after 4.  Of course, this is the day that Gaitley needed to take a really long nap and we had to wake her up in order to make it on time.  Well, she never got in a good mood and pretty much cried the entire time we were taking pictures.  It was a disaster!  She didn't want to walk and wouldn't get down and had red, watery eyes in all our pictures.  In the few that she was smiling, Garrett wasn't or Gracyn was not happy.  We left the photo shoot and felt completely exhausted.  Poor Allison!  I do think we got one good shot out of the 300 she took.  I guess one is all you need though.

Now it is time for the fun part; picking out the perfect Christmas card.  It is fun but also so hard.  There are so many beautiful cards.  One of my favorite places to look is on Shutterfly.  I absolutely love their Christmas cards.  I have ordered from this site in the past and have been very pleased.  They have such a variety of cards to choose from and you can always make yours unique by picking out the number of pictures you want on your card.  I love this because it is a lot easier to get a one good picture of each child than one good picture of the entire family together. I am pretty sure I will be buying a card with enough spots for one picture of each child.  The quality is great and the delivery is always speedy.  Here are a few of my favorites this year.

 With Love Chartreuse Christmas Card

Faith Hope Family Religious Christmas Card

Elegant Cranberry Damask

I am always looking for a deal and if you are too you might be interested in this.  Shutterfly is offering a deal this holiday season.  If you have a blog, Shutterfly is offering bloggers an opportunity to earn 50 free cards just for blogging about their site.  Just go to this link:  http://blog.shutterfly.com/5358/holiday2010-blog-submission-form/

Sweet Mess

Gaitley has entered the phase of absolute sweetness.  She is starting to pretend and and make up stories all the time.  Her imagination is running wild and it is so fun to watch.  She loves to play kitchen and baby dolls and get all dressed up in jewelry and make-up.  She is constantly talking to herself or pretending to have a conversation with someone on the phone.  Maybe it is a boy thing, but I don't remember Garrett ever really doing this.  He is just like his daddy and me and we sometimes have a hard time pretending.  We like to stick to the facts.  I am so glad Gaitley is different and has a great imagination.

 

Don't let this post fool you.  She is still my mischievous, middle child.  I found her like this the other night while I was cooking dinner.

Pumpkin Patch and Halloween

We took the kids to a local pumpkin patch to pick out a few pumpkins for Halloween.  Their favorite part was running through the hay maze.  Gracyn is at an awkward stage for pictures so she looks a little uncomfortable in all the ones with the kids.  Garrett had to hold her and she didn't like it too much.

Halloween was also a success.  Garrett is really into guns, knives and swords.  He decided to be a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle pretty much because he got to carry some swords with him.  I thought it was fun because this was one of my favorite shows growing up.  He couldn't believe I knew all the words to the theme song.  Gaitley was a ballerina.  She didn't really care what she was but enjoyed putting on some fancy clothes and getting to wear a little glitter on her cheeks. Gracyn was a little pumpkin and was absolutely perfect while we took the big kids trick-or-treating.  We went to about twenty houses and then headed to our neighbors for a little Halloween party.

Fair Day

Last Wednesday we took the kids to the State Fair of Texas.  It was quite a day.  Garrett was so excited he could hardly stand it.  The first thing he wanted to do was go find the rides, of course.  The tickets were so expensive, so they only got to do a few things, but still had a blast  Every time we drive down I-30 he says he wants to ride the Ferris Wheel.  I am scared to death of that thing, but lucky for my kids, Britt is not.  I had a good excuse because Gracyn was asleep, so I got to stay on the ground with her.  Britt said the kids absolutely loved it!  After the rides we headed to the car show, petting zoo and the BMX bike show.  By this time, Gaitley had fallen asleep and Gracyn was waking up so we decided it was time to go.  It will be nice to be able to go one day with no diapers to change or strollers to push, but we still had a great time.

 Their first ride

 This is how Gracyn stayed the entire time we were at the fair.

 Waiting in line for the Ferris Wheel

 I love this one!  Garrett is in awe at how high they are and Gaitley is just having run on the ride.

 Big Tex

 Feeding the goats

Two tired kids