Connor's Christmas Pagent

Connor was picked to be a sheep this Christmas for their little awana play at church.

He was not excited about it.

From the moment we told him that he was gonna dress up like a sheep he said 'no sheep' and wasn't thrilled at the thought of getting up in front of everyone and singing away in a manger (even though that's one of his favorite songs ever).

Jimmy tried to take him up on stage but he wasn't having it...

Poor kid was terrified... 

And since he had never claimed he wanted to do it... he wasn't backing out on his word and there's no sin in not wanting to be on stage... we let him sit the rest out.

After that part was over he was happy as a clam!

Vale on the other hand was itching to go on stage and when it was all over, he was dancing and making his own musical production on the empty stage... :)

There has been speculation that since Connor was the only sheep all dressed in white maybe he was scared of being the lamb chosen to be sacrificed without spot or blemish... just sayin'... ;-)

Advent Calendar

 I love the tradition of our advent calendar!  It was handmade by a friend of my dad's from college and it's perfect! :)

Every night we take turns reading the verse that's in the little pouch and someone gets to open up the present that's in there, which is a little ornament to pin on the tree.  They have to listen to the verse before we can open the present.

It's so hard to keep Connor from 'helping' Vale... ha

... and Vale goes so slow... hahaha Christmas morning is gonna be fun... :)

Yeah! He got a snowflake!! 

Now he gets to tell daddy where he wants it.

or show him since verbal skills are a little lacking... 

He has to make sure that daddy put it RIGHT where he said to... :)

Here are some good pictures of the boys that I decided not to use for our Christmas card...

He's such a happy boy, I love his smile!

His eyes are crazy beautiful... 

He's such a sweet kid... 

He's got one of the greatest laughs!!! :) Makes my heart smile!

My niece baby Emery

Baby Emery Love was born on Dec 7th at around 3am.

She was 8lbs 7oz and a little over 21" long!

With a full head of beautiful hair!

She's so sweet and cute!

All snuggled in with mommy and smiling :)

All snuggled up for the cold California weather! (no lie, it's been in the 40's... that's cold for a baby!)

Meeting Aunt Courtney... personally I think she's already decided I'm her favorite... ;-)

Daddy and Mommy definitely love their little girl!!! :)

She's so precious!

Welcome to the breathing world baby Emery were we can love you and shower you with all the affection we can! :)

Preparing for Christmas!

  Ok I know cute towels have nothing to do with Christmas but I just needed to post these... :)

Ok, now on to holiday prep... :)

So we went to look at Christmas trees and I said to Connor, 'Doesn't that smell AMAZING!?!?' and he said, 'no it stinks...' and plugged his nose... kid doesn't know what good stuff is?!?!?  How have I failed so miserably?!?!?

But then we found the perfect tree!! :)

 

He tried to help move it but it was a bit too heavy for him... 

Vale was enjoying family sleep/snuggle time... :)

I wish his eyes weren't closed but Connor was having a blast playing with this nativity set while we pulled out all the decorations! :)

The boys helped daddy put up the lights... it was really cute!  They both wanted to help.

Then we made this ginger bread house which was fun... as long as we could keep Jimmy and Connor from eating the candy... sigh... (Vale was put to bed before this fun...)

The next morning, we put all the ornaments on the tree... the boys really liked this part!  Connor is still asking me if we have more decorations to put on the tree... :)

This is Vale saying, CHEESE!!! :)

He stopped hanging ornaments and started removing the hooks and making a nest out of the balls... it was really funny... 

We got some cute picture with the boys and Nona when we were done! :)

They were having fun shaking their jingle bells! :)

So we aren't quite ALL decorated for the season but we are mighty close!!  I'm so excited for Christmas!!! :) 

Thanksgiving Fun

 We were so blessed to have Jimmy's mom, Cassi and 'Super' Chris come out for Thanksgiving!

I can't travel anywhere, because of pregnancy, so it's wonderful to have people who will come to us!

On Thanksgiving morning we were up early, baking pies.

Mmmmm....

Connor wanted to make his own pie so he got to mix up all the ingredients!

He really likes to cook with mommy!

He put his ingredients in a shell and we baked it in some tin foil... 

Then he and Vale devoured it... yeah that was pretty much their lunch since we didn't eat Thanksgiving dinner till later... :)

Here is the apple pie we made!!!  Yeah for plumpy pie! :)

We went down to my cousin's house in Redondo Beach for the big feast.

They had dressed Bish, the Chihuahua, up like a turkey... at this point I was so hungry that she was lookin tasty... 

 Stephanie decorated so well!! 

 Everything looked so festive!

Everyone had a really good time! :) It's always great when you can be with friends and family.

The food was not too shabby either... ok the food was AMAZING!!!!

It was almost like, if you can imagine it for a Thanksgiving feast, we had it!

The mashed potatoes were absolutely delicious...

The turkey was wonderful and juicy!

 I ended up making an apple pie, a blueberry pie and two pumpkins...

I think we all ate a little more than was prudent...

 We had Turkey, Ham, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry dressing, candied yams, carrots, corn pudding, green bean casserole, sweet potato casserole, apple/bacon salad, and rolls.  Oh and then 4 pies...

The kids didn't as much appreciate the food as they did hanging out with their cousin. :)