The Bacot Family: T'was the days before Christmas

Last week, we had dinner with Brett and Allison. They made and decorated gingerbread cookies with the kids. Brady was pretty excited about playing one of Brett's Wii games, so he wasn't quite as focused on the process.

This girl is my little shopper. On Thursday of last week, I had 2 doctor appointments and some shopping to do before we picked up Pappaw from the airport at 2:30 PM. Anna Belle loves all the toys at Anthropologie, and I made her try on an apron. We also sat on one of the couches and read Madeline. Shopping's never been so fun.

Thursday night, we met up with the Dennis family and went to Santa's Wonderland. I know some people are irritated with Santa's Wonderland, but we did it right. We bought tickets at a 30% discount online. We arrived about 5 minutes before opening, so parking was a breeze. We passed the ticket line without wait, because we already had tickets. We had ZERO wait for the hayride. At the end, we made s'mores, watched Frosty do a dance and let the dads take the kids into the petting zoo. It was really a fun night.

Our four kiddos.

I almost get giddy every time I see a company choose to openly profess their faith.

On Friday, we went to Brady's Christmas party at school. It began with a puppet show and some songs. Anna Belle just joined in with the boys, who are all really sweet with her.

They had cupcakes and a craft, which went over well. Afterwards, Parker (in the green stripes) came over to play with Brady. They were hopping from one thing to another, until they jumped on the trampoline. After that, they went to Brady's room and watched Star Wars contently (Parker on the top bunk and Brady on the bottom).

On Sunday, after volunteering with the preschool group at Second Baptist, we met my parents at Brennan's for brunch. Apparently the waiter who arrives to work the latest "gets" to play Frosty.

An elderly couple sat next to us. We became friends because we took trips to the restroom with the gentleman at least 3 times and the lady, Ms. Betty, kept talking to Anna Belle. Anna Belle mostly wanted to show her a few ballerina spins.

I failed to get a picture of the trio with their instruments singing Christmas carols. They played "Johnny Be Good" at the request of a neighboring table. Brady was pretty excited about it; he loves Doc and Marty.

I asked the waiter if I could get a "To Go" cup for my tea. He said they didn't have any, but he crafted a cup from a large soup container and brought me a bottle of tea. I was one happy girl.

On Monday, I panicked when I realized all of our Christmas clothes were dirty and/or wrinkled. I spent most of the day doing laundry, but we visited our neighbor's house (who has a son in Brady's bridge class) to a Happy Birthday Jesus party. Jenn also has a daughter, Karis, who is Anna Belle's age. After I took Anna Belle potty, she screamed, "I'm gonna go play with Karis!" and ran back upstairs to the playroom. In the photo below, Jenn's telling the Christmas story as the kids place each character of the Advent calendar in the nativity scene.

On Christmas Eve, I became acutely aware that our play room needed to be reorganized, the couches and carpets should be vacuumed again and we needed to wash our kitchen and living room windows inside and out. Sometimes I think I may have OCD. Taylor was a trooper and aided in my crazy efforts. At 10, he took the kids to Grammy and Pappaw's so we could set up the Santa gift. Here are a few pictures.

At 3:00 PM, we went to church to hold our seat for 4:30 PM mass. I thought the kids would go crazy, but they were really quite good. I found a puzzle app for Anna Belle with images of the first Christmas (shepherds in the field, the wise men, nativity, etc.). I had this beautiful view of the mass and managed to steal the phone from Anna Belle to snap a picture. The smell of the lilies and incense were intoxicating, in a good way.

After mass, we went to Grandma and Grandpa's to open gifts.

As a child, I remember thinking I was really tricky and didn't actually have to look at the camera in order to smile for the camera. This is why my mom has a lot of pictures of me with my eyes cut to the side like this:

Brady got a hydraulic truck crane from Grandma and Grandpa. Grandpa had logos printed up at work, so it can be an official TNT crane. TNT actually purchases Liebherr cranes in this model. We need to get a picture with the real deal.