Christmas Morning (cont.)

At 8:00 AM on Christmas morning, my mom, dad and sister came over to start opening gifts.  This cool HotWheels set was from Mammaw (the money she sent).  This is the first gift Brady wanted to assemble on Christmas morning.

 Grammy and Pappaw gave Anna Belle an American Girl Bitty Baby.  Anna Belle is in love, and it melts my heart.

 Mammaw's money got this little baby doll crib for Anna Belle.  It's part of our bedtime routine now for Anna Belle to put her baby in the crib, kiss her goodnight, and then we read our regular bedtime stories.  She even says, "Night-Night baby, I love you," which is what I say to her each night before I close the door.  My heart swells with love to see a loving and nurturing spirit from my kids.

 When Anna Belle and I watch movies in my room, she wants to lay next to one another and hold hands.  Now that she has baby, she holds my hand on one side and baby's hand on the other side.  

 At 10:00 AM Christmas morning, we went to Papa's house to meet up with the rest of my mom's side of the family.  Again, I feel overwhelmingly blessed to have such a great family.  We had a nice brunch before heading home for the kid's naps.

Our living room was a HUGE disaster when we got home.  The wrapping paper was all in trash bags, but there were still lots of things to take out of boxes, assemble, find new homes for, etc.  On the day after Christmas, after I was done assembling most of Brady's toys, I put away the Christmas tree.  It's ironic to me how much I love putting the decorations up right after Halloween and how eager I am to take the decorations down on December 26th.  Though I didn't tell Taylor that was my plan, he wasn't the least bit surprised to come home from work and see that our house was back to normal.  

Santa Gifts

Brady and Anna Belle are here playing with their Santa gifts.  I love listening to Brady's dialogue through the video.

Dragging Brady Along

Santa!

Santa brought Playmobil for the kids.  Brady woke up first.  We've been talking about Christmas so much, I think Brady started to believe it would never come.  I walked downstairs with Brady, and he was sort of in shock and disbelief.  I need to get the video off of Taylor's phone.

 Anna Belle waves this chiming wand and says something that sounds like, "Fairy Godmother."

 Brady's boat has a little motor with a rudder.  We had fun letting it scoot around the pool.

 Anna Belle was pretty tickled with it too.

Christmas Eve

Since being married, Taylor and I have spent Christmas Eve with his family.  This means I haven't attended my family's traditional Christmas Eve party in quite some time.  The kids dressed up for the party, but we got a family picture right before we left.

Aunt Megan filled special stockings for the kids with fun little toys.

 My mom is an awesome hostess.  She came up with these little santa hat brownies... so cute.

 Serving 18 people isn't always easy, but my mom did a beautiful job.  We all had a great time.

Saturday before Christmas

On the Saturday before Christmas, we went to Cheesecake Factory at Memorial City.  Did you know they have tiny pink high chairs made for American Girl dolls?  We need to take Anna Belle back soon. Anyways, the traffic was crazy, but we got to valet.  I'm jumping up and down and making farting sounds to get the kids to smile.  Grammy and Megan liked it too.

 Brady and Anna Belle were being a little rough with the dogs, so I put the dogs outside and yelled at the kids.  This really hurt Brady's feelings, so he grabs Anna Belle's hand and says, "C'mon Anna Belle."  They sit under the window sill and make faces.  You can tell Brady feels it and Anna Belle's just going along with him.  They are so stinkin' cute.

Birthday Party for Jesus

I am blessed with a lot of wonderful neighbors, many of whom I went to high school with.  My newest neighbor (across the street) has joined this little mom's group.  Our kids are generally all the same age, so it's fun to see them grow up together.  Jenny initiated this little birthday party for Jesus on Friday.  Sarah Beth is reading the Christmas story here.  You can see that Brady's a little bit cold, miserable, and eager to eat cookie cake.

 My neighbor Kristi and her son Caleb.

 Brady and Anna Belle really enjoyed this slide.  I couldn't take photos of Anna Belle, because I had to focus on catching her.  She has a tendency to turn sideways halfway down the slide.  I'm afraid her back will flip off of one side... it's rather scary for both of us.

 Caleb and Anna Belle

 chattering her teeth...

 Finally, he got his cookie cake : )  

In retrospect, it was probably a bad idea for me to take the kids out in the cold wind.  Brady's done the best, but Anna Belle and I have been fighting a cold.  As of this morning, Taylor officially has it too.  

Pappaw and Christmas Trees

On Monday (Anna Belle's first potty training day), I made it a point to stay in the kitchen a lot (no carpet, no couches = less mess).  In the morning, we colored and played with play dough.  We usually snack after naps, but on Monday I pulled out some ice cream cones and made some icing to decorate them like Christmas trees.  The kids thoroughly enjoyed it.  Taylor would have cringed at the huge mess we made; fortunately everything was back to normal by the time he got home. 

 During this potty training process, I've seen a lot of Anna Belle's little legs.

 Pappaw got in town on Sunday, and went straight to bed.  We planned a dinner on Monday night to welcome him home.  Though Pappaw was only 2 seats from Anna Belle, she kept pointing to this giant  painting behind us and saying, "Pappaw."  I didn't notice it then, but looking at it now, Pappaw frequently uses that facial expression.

 Kisses

Yesterday we visited Megan's school and brought lunch.  We had a nice time.  Afterwards, the kids napped in the car and we (Pappaw and I) drove out I10 to look at RV's.  It was the first time for me to really look at RV's in person and get an idea of what you get at different price points.  I hope we can get one by the time Brady's ready for Cub Scouts in 2015.

I mailed out the last of my Christmas cards today.  I should have purchased more, but I guess I'll know better for next year.  

Painting and Potty Training

Anna Belle woke up from her nap early and eager to put on big girl panties.  Since I wasn't done with my "beauty regime" (AKA drying my hair), I stuck Anna Belle in the bath with water colors.  This was recommended by my friend Amanda.  She happily painted for an hour.  Brady joined her, and he lost interest in about 10 minutes.  While they clean up, I type.

On Friday we bought 18 pairs of underwear, and I started potty training Anna Belle this morning.  In the first 90 minutes, she had 3 successes and 3 accidents.  Fortunately, she's very eager and excited about the whole process.  I've been working hard to keep her entertained in areas without couches or carpet, to minimize my clean up efforts.

 Here's what Brady thinks about Anna Belle's potty training... actually this is how Brady feels about me taking his picture.  He's really happy to cheer Anna Belle on for every little tinkle, and he loves the excitement of Mommy and Anna Belle running to the potty.

Really Really Big Christmas Show

After dinner last night, Taylor and I were watching TV and our kids ran into our bedroom holding hands.  We cooed over how cute they are playing together.  Shortly thereafter, we found our closet full of cough drop wrappers and each child had multiple cough drops in their mouths... little Bonnie and Clyde.

 This afternoon we went to Second Baptist's Really Really Big Christmas Show at the Woodway campus.  It was full of fun songs and dancing for the kids.  

Another Post

With the new blog address and a new year fast approaching, I feel a renewed commitment to blogging more often.  I don't know how long I'll keep it up, but here's another post for now.

I've been reorganizing the house to make way for the forthcoming Christmas toys.  As part of this process, I found a blow up "dart ball" game that we never took out of the box.  We probably got it 4 years ago.  The kids are old enough to really enjoy it now, and our garage is a great place for it.  While Brady played dart ball, Anna Belle happily took the driver seat of the Jeep.

 Last night, we went to Jason's Deli and the zoo with Brett and Allison.  It was our first time to see the lights at the zoo.  Most of the animals were sleeping, but the lights were pretty and the weather was perfect.  We really had a good time.  I'm a somewhat picky picture poster, so I didn't even bother taking pictures in the dark.

Around lunchtime, Trey and Ann invited us to the Alley Theater with them to see "A Christmas Carol."  Afterwards we had a drink at Hearsay.  We will definitely have to visit Hearsay when we have time for a burger.  It seemed like a very cool, downtown sort of place (and not as stuffy as most of the downtown steakhouses).