Christmas Decor

Since most of you didn't get to visit our house during the holidays this year, I thought I would post some photos of some of my favorite Christmasy spots around the house.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Morning

We had a wonderful Christmas morning! 

We started with a sweet family time reading through our entire Advent Book (singing Christmas carols as they fit in with the story), and then had the kids bring their shepherds pouches and empty them in front of the manger. They have worked hard all month earning money to put in their pouches, and they were excited to see how much they had collected together. We combined all of the money, with a matching amount from Mom & Dad, and used it to support some local charities that we know and admire.

Then it was time to give our gifts for each other! Again this year, Lee Anna very thoughtfully made personal, homemade gifts for each of us. She followed up last year's Sir Sawyer with a new adventure about her brother, Cowboy Sawyer! 

And this year she also wrote a book for Sarah Claire. She chose a theme she knew her sister would love--puppies in a pet shop!

It's a sweet book, perfect for a preschooler, that even includes some activity pages at the back. It has already been requested as a read-aloud by Sarah Claire several times this week, and I'm sure there will be many, many more readings of Barky and Friends.

They were also excited about their other gifts, like Lee Anna's new jogging suit and Sawyer's new Wii game (the reason for the intense I-don't-even-realize-I'm-sticking-my-tongue-out concentration).

And we are all having a blast with this new marble track! I have wanted to get them one of these for a few years, and I was so excited when we found a good deal on one earlier this month. We have already spent hours building and rebuilding different tracks and just watching those marbles roll all over the place. I think this might be one of my favorite kid toys ever. I might have even gone in Sarah Claire's room to play with it once or twice when there were no kids around.

And yes, these Nerf guns were a hit, too! Sawyer was recently introduced to the world of Nerf at a friend's house, so he is beyond excited that now we can have Nerf wars at our house, too. I'm pretty sure that we are going to find Nerf darts EVERYWHERE when we get ready to move out of here, but I love seeing how much fun they're having! They spent a good deal of time doing target practice yesterday, first aiming at some darts that were stuck on the door, which of course resulted in lots more darts stuck on the door!

After a while, Daddy redirected them to a new target--King Tut's nose! One of our history books has a lovely photo of King Tut on the front, so they spent a good while trying to stick a dart on his shiny gold nose.

The rest of the day seems to have gone largely unphotographed, but we got to skype with family, and had several friends come by to visit. We are so grateful for sweet family memories and most of all for the gift of Christmas!

Christmas Smiles

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

Christmas Fun!

We are getting into the Christmas spirit around here...

and we've got the matching outfits to prove it!

Here are a few of the things we've been doing to celebrate the season:

We made our annual Christmas countdown chain on Dec. 1. I can't believe how few links are left already!

In the photo above the chain, the kids are listening to Mimi read them a chapter from The Best Christmas Pageant Ever over skype. They loved hearing that story, definitely a family favorite!

The gingerbread playdough has gotten hours and hours of playtime since we made it last week. I'm so glad when they pull it out because it makes the house smell so good!

Each child decorated a picture frame ornament to put on our Christmas tree. I'll try to post a shot of the finished products soon.

And, after they had made dozens and dozens of playdough gingerbread cookies, it was time for the real thing!

 Everyone helped mix up our gingerbread dough, and they all took turns decorating the little men.

It was quite a creative and varied collection of gingerbread "townspeople," as Lee Anna called them.

We are reading through our Advent book, as we have in years past, and hearing a little more of the story each night as we get closer to the 25th. I'm so grateful for the chance to see and experience the story through the eyes of these sweet children.

Let the Good Times Roll

We made one more stop in our crazy, two-week trip to the states: 

New Orleans!

Some of you may remember that last year on our way to the states we stopped off in Amsterdam for a few days to visit some dear friends. Well, those same friends are living in the states this fall, so we decided to arrange another little meet-up. However, this time, since we were meeting on the same side of the ocean where all the grandparents (a.k.a. babysitters) live, we made this one a parents only trip!  

We just had two short nights in town, but we crammed them full of fun...and food! I mean, how can you not enjoy eating in a town like New Orleans? We savored every bite of gumbo, shrimp creole, jambalaya, red beans & rice, bread pudding, and of course beignets!

We were a bit amused when the trip was over to see how many photos we had taken of us eating!

This meal was amazing...

 and this one... 

 and this one wasn't too bad, either!

We did take a few non-eating pics, like this one of me and Ashlie by the river...

and this one of the guys. I'm pretty sure their expressions mean, "Please can we go in one more cute little shop in the French Quarter? Please? Please?" They may have had their fill of home decor stores, but they never hesitated to follow us into the candy stores. In fact, they often led the way. I think Jason made it a personal mission to sample all the pralines in New Orleans and decide which was his favorite. 

One afternoon, we rode the trolley out St. Charles Avenue and admired all the beautiful old homes. Then we rode it back into town and picked up our shopping and eating right where we left off!

We had such a great time being with good friends and just relaxing for a few days before we made our trek back across the ocean. It was a perfect end to another whirlwind trip to the states. 

Sweet Reunions

When they weren't smiling sweetly or making silly faces for family photos (see previous post), our kids were soaking up all the precious time with friends and family. Uncle Andy got to hang around a few days longer than the other aunts and uncles, so he got in some extra niece-and-nephew time. 

They loved story time...

and ride down the hill on the skateboard time!

After a few more days at Mimi and Papaw's, we headed to Mississippi, where we got to see even more friends and family. We visited Gran one day and spent some time at her house.

Lee Anna was so excited to give her the vase that she had hand painted for her!

Here are the kids, ready for their meal at Gran's. As usual, she fixed way more food than we could possibly eat. And as usual, it was delicious!

Gran gave us our Christmas presents while we were there, and Sawyer's gift included a frisbee. It got a good workout that afternoon in the yard, as did we!

We also got to visit Grandmother and spend some time catching up with her. It was wonderful to see her!

Here she is with three of her many great-grandchildren. 

And the kids got lots of good playtime with these sweet friends!

It was such a blessing to get to go so many places and see so many special people. We are grateful!