New Christmas Carols

Well, Kate is reallllly into singing, especially Christmas tunes these days. We spent 45 minutes in the car the other night singing Jingle Bells and Santa Clause is Coming to town...yes, 45 minutes on TWO songs...over and over and over. Anyway, here's Kate's version of Jingle Bells:

Jingle Bells Jingle Bells
Jingle all the way.
Oh what fun it is to ride...
FOR THE BIBLE TELLS ME SO...FOR THE BIBLE TELLS ME SOOOOO!!!!!!

TOOO cute my crazy girl! Too cute! :)
At least we're getting that Christmas has to do with Jesus...maybe.

Christmas Cookies

Well, I decided that this year was a good year for us to start making and decorating Christmas cookies. After 3 days of the process, I am now officially tired of making cookies and the smell of that super sweet yummy icing kinda makes me a little nauseated...but we had so much fun and I am SO glad we started this tradition!!!

Kate enjoyed using the cookie cutters...but I think she liked the part where she got to EAT the cookies more! :)

This is Kate painting the icing on her cookies...I took her clothes off to protect them (good choice as she ended up with icing all over her belly!!!). She looks so skinny here...I promise she eats well!
The finished product...minus the gingerbread army (we did about 25 gingerbread men).
Kate's cookie...I think it started out as a snowflake, but now it looks like a mutilated dog bone!
JR played fairly nicely in all this chaos...he DID, however, figure out how to get into the cabinets. Oh the fun of a little boy!!!

On a side note, a friend called an needed to talk about something yesterday right after lunch and before nap (crazy time at our house) and I was trying to keep Kate quiet. I think I must've told her to be quiet just before I walked to the fridge to get her a cookie (thinking, but not saying that maybe she'd stay quiet as long as she was eating a cookie...not my normal MOD, but thought since it's Christmas she could have a treat.). Anyway, after I got off the phone she was telling me that she ate a red hot (the buttons on the gingerbread man) and I asked if it made her mouth hot. She said yes and then pointed to the leg of the cookie and said, "This makes me quiet." She's really too smart for her own good...I think I'm in for some fun years!!! ;)

Christmas excitement

Ok, so here's the thing. I'm not one of the very organized people of the world who shop for Christmas gifts all year long and don't have to rush around all of December to finish their shopping. Today I took Kate and JR to the mall to visit Santa and do a little shopping. We bought 1 gift. I realized in the process that I kind of enjoy the chaos of shopping in December. I think I'd like to have the majority of my shopping done or at least have an idea of what we want to get everyone on our list by Dec., but I do enjoy the bustle of the malls and the decorations and carols playing, so therefore, regardless of the chaos, I think I'm joyful that my shopping is NOT done! :)

SO, we visited Santa, and this year was MUCH better than the screaming of last year! :) The photographer was busy helping the mom in front of us, so Kate got to sit on Santa's lap for a really long time (like 10 minutes at least) and he talked to her and asked her what she wanted for Christmas (she said toys) and then suggested that she needed some Dora things for Christmas, which is now all she will say...it was great! She was thrilled. And JR tuned up for a second when we put him in Santa's lap, but then gave decently happy look for the picture. I need to scan the pic in, but it's a pain to do, so maybe tomorrow. :) After visiting Santa, Kate got to ride his train, which was LOTS of fun! I DID get pictures of that! :)

This has nothing to do with Christmas, but was so funny! I came in the kitchen last night and Jeff had turned Kate's socks into puppets to try to get her to finish her dinner. Apparently his puppet voice includes covering his mouth with his hand! HA! Anyway, Kate loved it and it was a great moment.

The kids before we went into the mall.
Kate waiting very patiently for her turn with Santa.
Kate is on the left...she pushed the other little girl out of her way so she could get in first...arg...I made her apologize.
JR thought watching Kate in the train was great!

The OTHER part of the Santa story is that Kate complained all the way through the mall after that. First her neck hurt (WHAT?) and then her bottom hurt (I realized later that she was holding her pee so that she wouldn't wet her pull-up). By the time we got to the car she was crying. She cried almost the whole way home till she fell asleep (VERY abnormal). Somewhere in the ride home I noticed the car smelling like sour milk and thought we must have left a bottle in there or something. When we got home, I realized that Kate had thrown up. Oh the joy. SO, I cleaned her up and when we got inside SHE told me to take her "tentatures" (temperature). I did and sure enough the girl has a fever. Hopefully she'll be better soon. :) I don't know if the fever is connected to the barfing or if she was just so upset or excited about Santa that she puked. I'm hoping for the last one so that it's not a stomach bug we all get!!!

Family Picture Day!!!

Well, yesterday we went and had family pictures made by a local photographer. It was very fun, & although the kids were not AS cooperative as I had hoped, we did get some realllly great pictures!!! I didn't include any of all 4 of us yet, b/c none of those were AWESOME and I want to consult with Jeff on which ones are the best! Enjoy!!!

Thanksgiving Etc.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday and spent wonderful time with your families! :) We spent the day of Thanksgiving at home just the 4 of us...it was so fun! :) We never spend holidays at home, and it was nice just to have OUR family time! We started the day with Thanksgiving crafts...Turkey hands and a "thankful turkey" where we wrote out how God has blessed us this year, followed by my official first cooking of the Thanksgiving meal (it was pretty good for my first time!), and a GREAT nap! Then it was on to Fredericksburg for a weekend of fun with Jeff's family. We all enjoyed the beak from the daily grind. And now it's back to normal...well, with the added exciement of Christmas coming soon! :)

Jeff and Kate working on their thankful turkey feathers.

Jeff and Kate licking the beaters after I made mashed potatoes.
Kate showing off our "Thankful Turkey"
Our little family meal.
JR after our family meal! HA!Jeff's Grandmother playing with the kiddos
I think this is just the most precious picture of Jeff's Granny reading to Kate!!! Playing with GranJo
Oompa's the bestest!

Kate

Well, I had to put up some pics of Kate too...or she'd be offended! :) She is too funny these days. Most of our day is a power struggle lately (the 2s are a whole new thing for me!), but she does make me laugh almost every day!

She really enjoys reading lately and will pick out a book for one of us to read to her at bed-time. I will have her sit on her bed and read while I get JR ready for nap, and I can see her from the chair I sit in while I feed him a bottle. Today she was trying to read out loud...it was too cute!!!

Her hair is finally long enough to really put in pig tails, and not long enough to do anything else with, so pig-tails it is every day!!! This is Kate "driving" my Grand-dad's scooter...it's one of the cutest things ever!!! She also likes to pretend to walk with her "cane" (a green stick for horse-shoes in the yard) like Jeff's Grand-dad..so funny! This is her and my Grandma looking at pictures. She could look at pictures all day long. She LOVES it when I let her look at my scrapbooks...especially hers! She opened our wedding one and gasped...then she said, "MOMMY PRINCESS!!!!!!!" I thought that was GREAT!!! :)

JR---I think I have my hands full

Today as I was attempting to clean while Kate napped and JR ad already woken up...I came to the realization that I may not get any thing accomplished around the house until he goes to school! Every time I turned around he was into something else. Either we need to invest in a baby-gate company or I'm going to have to get creative! HA!!! Here's some pictures to prove my point. Keep in mind, the boy is only 8 months old.

This is JR trying to crawl INTO the fireplace...he has eaten ashes already!!!

Notice that my attempt to BLOCK the fireplace did not work!

This is JR crawling to the dog food.

This is JR EATING the dog food.

This is my 8 month old standing by himself!!!

Chicken Pox

Well, our house has been afflicted with the chicken-pox. It's a terrible thing. Apparently there's a major epedemic in Round Rock, which Kate managed to catch! That girl can catch anything!!! She did get the shot when she was 1, but, as I now know, the shot does not prevent the virus, it just makes it a mild case if you do get it. J.R. however, has NOT had the shot, so please pray that he does not get the pox!!!

SO, we came all the way to Katy for a birthdaay party...and when we got here I realized that the "rash" she had suddenly seemed to have spread a lot. SO, I took her to the DR. here and sure enough, we have the pox. SOOOOO, no birthday party for Kate. Just a fun couple of days with Grandpa and Judy. I however am about to leave for the party. Poor Kate, after she got dressed this morning, she said "I ready for Matthew" (the birthday boy). She is going to be very dissappointed when I leave in a few minutes. Oh well. That's the way it goes I suppose. Anyway, that's that. :)

Stupid Chicken Pox!!!

Fall Dress Up Pictures

Here are the much awaited Halloween pictures! Sorry they took so long...I'm a little behind! :)

Jeff was Magnum P.I.---TOO FUNNY!!! This picture really doesn't do it justice. It was hilarious. People dressed up at his work, so this is what he wore & it carried over while we hung out on the driveway handing out candy.

This is Kate and I before a "Fall Fest" at a friends preschool. She was so cute!
This is the fall fun fest at the friend's preschool...our friend was Yoda and his brother was a jedi!
This is Kate riding her bicycle while we hung out on the driveway handing out candy.
This is Jeff and Kate before the festival.
Happy Fall Y'all!!!

Crawling, pulling up, and princesses

Here are some just plain cute pictures.
































Kate was "turning circles" in her room in her "princes dress" (a hand-me-down night gown and 2 pairs of pants!!!)














This is the princess ensemble. We'll have to work on our fashion sense a little in the coming years!











Aren't they adorable!?