The Stockings Were Hung...

by the chimney with care, in hopes that Saint Nicholas soon would be there!

Our stockings are hung, the presents are wrapped, and the cookies are baked for Santa. Merry Christmas Eve everyone! I think I may love Christmas Eve even more than Christmas Day, the excitement is so much fun! Can't wait to hear my daddy read the story of Jesus' birth and "The Night Before Christmas" tonight, it is one of my favorite moments each year! I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas celebrating with their families and friends. Happy Birthday Baby Jesus!

My Christmas Cuties!

We have been doing all sorts of fun Christmas things in preparation for the big day. On Monday, we headed to Bass Pro Shop to see Santa. We go every year. They have things decorated beautifully and best of all, you get a free Santa pic. Both kiddos did great and sat with Santa all alone for the pic:




We also did "Christmas Card Pictures" with both kiddos...It is pretty darn tough to get a good shot of Gaby these days...He does this super fake smile that is just horrendous...Then when he tries to correct it, he tries too hard and it is just worse. Izzie is pretty easy if you can get her to stand still...and forget her keeping a hairbow in her hair, even though I make them and she has a gazillion cute ones...she rips them out immediately! Both of them together is difficult. I see why I usually pay good money to have someone else do these shots...but I thought they turned out ok for freebies! They also had their picture made at school and we got the proofs back. The picture of them together was good so I bought it, at least I have one "professional" Christmas shot of both of them...Here are my attempts:








And here are a few of the "outtakes", just so you can see what I was dealing with :)







This morning, we did a "breakfast with Santa" with Nicole, Jackson, Wyatt and more of their family. SO much fun, thank you so much for including us. Both boys got their noses painted like Rudolph and got balloon antlers, they looked adorable!

We Have Walls!

The first wall is up! Saturday 12/10/11


The kids bedrooms are framed! 12/14/11



Things are really moving along on our house! The first wall went up Saturday after Elizabeth's birthday party (more on that later) and now the kiddos bedrooms and bathroom are framed, as well as the back wall...There are temporary stairs built down to the basement. You can really see the size of the rooms now and where the windows and doors go and it is fun to plan where we are going to put things! I cannot wait to live here!!!!!! We will have TONS of room, more than one tiny bathroom, and the entire house will be the same temperature!

Birthday Pics

We celebrated with a mini-party Tuesday night with mom and dad. We did presents first b/c we knew she would require a bath after the cake. She got some adorable outfits, a comforter set/sheets for her room in our new house, and 2 cupcake toboggans that I wish would fit me and MeMe b/c I would have bought us both a set too! She will open a few more presents from us at her party on Saturday. She was not into opening the presents at all, but of course, Gabriel was right there to help her!

Elizabeth was hilarious with her smash cake. She delicately placed her fingers in it at first, I think she had no clue what to do because I don't usually let her get all nasty. But then once she got going, she had a blast and had it everywhere. She washed all that icing down with what else? Diet Sundrop! I ordered a pink/purple smash cake, thinking in my head, pastel pink and purple...But obviously I should have specified PASTEL. The icing was everywhere and even stained mom's vinyl high chair! We had to put Iz in the tub after she was finished! Lots of fun and can't wait until the big party on Saturday!

Happy 1st Birthday Sweet Baby Girl

Wow, Elizabeth is officially 1! Where has the time gone?????

Christmas Parade Pics

We headed out to the Mooresville Christmas parade last Tuesday and had a blast! The weather was wonderful (it was hot and did not rain like last year) and both kiddos had a ball. It was the first parade experience for Elizabeth and Wyatt. Here are some of the highlights:

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! We have SO MUCH to be thankful for today and everyday. I am most thankful for my family. Enjoy today with your family, friends, and loved ones.

House Update!

Wow, our house is really coming along!!!!! The basement was poured last week and this week they have framed the back wall in the basement. There are spots for the windows and a double door. It looks awesome and I just love how HUGE the basement is. We will finally have room for all our stuff!!!!! Once the stairs get put in, we will figure out where we want to set up the TV, couch, etc. The basement is going to be a "man-cave" for Ceddy! Here are some pics!

And by the way, I should have posted on this earlier, but Elizabeth is a walking machine! She is walking all over the house! Where did my baby go??????

Tradition, Tradition (sung in the style of "Fiddler on the Roof")!!!

So one thing I can say about my family is that we love us a tradition, especially when it comes to the holidays! My mom always joked around Christmas that she was not going to do anything new because if she did it once, she would be doing it year after year. Here are some of of my family traditions growing up that still live on: putting up the Christmas tree at my parents house the Sunday after Thanksgiving (while listening to Kenny/Dolly Christmas CD), my dad reading the Christmas story out of the Bible and "The Night Before Christmas" on Christmas Eve, eating country ham on Christmas morning, eating popcorn out of the same wooden bowl (I know this is one thing that my brother and I will fight over!), mom making country ham biscuits for the beach trip and putting them in the same green container year after year, leaving super early for vacations even though the room will not be ready when we get there (this one drives Ceddy crazy!), going Christmas shopping with mymom super early on "Black Friday" (Ceddy goes with us now too which is fun), and the list goes on and on. We thrive on tradition and do many things "just because" we have done it that way for years. I am instilling some traditions of my own with my kiddos.

Growing up, my grandfather made a beautiful nativity stable for me. Each year, I received a piece of this nativity from my parents. This is something I treasure dearly and will pass on to Elizabeth one day:

Gabriel received a Fontan*ini shepherd "Gabriel" from Aunt Janie on his 1st Christmas in 2008. We decided to add to that collection each year, so that he will have a complete nativity of his own when he grows up! 2009 he got Mary/Josesph/Jesus and 2010 the 3 kings. This year he is getting one of the animals. This is a HUGE collection and even has villagers which I do not plan on getting. I just love this nativity set. It is SO detailed and looks so fragile, but it is actually made out of some material that is unbreakable! Perfect for kiddos who want to play with it. I looked around this year and decided to go with the same set for Elizabeth, she is getting Mary/Joseph/Jesus this year, here is a picture of it.

Another tradition involves books. Each year on Chrismtas Eve, the kids receive a Christmas book from us, a nice hard back one. I write a note in it about things that have happened over the course of the year, their development, etc. All our Christmas books are boxed away after Christmas, then right after Thanksgiving, we bring them out again for reading, so fun! This year, they are both getting "The Night Before Christmas" that is recordable, so that we can record ourselves reading it with them! These recordable books can be pricy at H@llmark, but I found theirs at ABC Distr@buting online for 12.95, much cheaper than I have seen anywhere else. I order from them all the time and have been very impressed with their stuff!

We do not have a set "day" that we put our tree up yet, but in the past it has usually been sometime before Thanksgiving. I am thinking that maybe our "day" should be the Saturday after Thanksgiving. I have added more Thanksgiving/fall decorations and really want to have them up through Thanksgiving and it looks kind of funny to have the tree up with all those pumpkins/turkeys/etc. So maybe our "day" to put the tree up with be the Saturday after Thanksgving from now on...if I can make it that long...writing this blog has me in the Christmas spirit, you know I start listening to my Christmas music the day after Halloween :)