december daily 2

On the second day...

Santa Elfy showed up at our house today with his own wish list filled out!  Boy, does that elf want a lot of toys!!!  The kiddos wondered if we had to go get them for him, but I told them I thought Santa could take care of it.

Our activity today was to write letters to Santa to tell him what we wanted.  Yes, we did just tell Santa yesterday what we wanted, but I thought it might be nice to have it down in writing so that we wouldn't forget for later.  I also asked the kiddos if I could just keep their letters for my scrapbook and they could tell Elfy tonight what they wanted again so he could talk to Santa about it too!  After some persuading I got all three of them to write a note of some sort to record what they wanted.  I love seeing the three stages of writing from them!

Some other non-Christmas pictures from today...

Ryan was a Watch DOG dad in Evan's preschool class so he got to hang out with Evan all morning and was there when Evan got to do his birthday treats...donuts!

And Avery started his new sport tonight...basketball!  He had his first practice and he said he really enjoyed it.

december daily 1

If you haven't gotten enough of our daily life in November...you're in luck ;)...

I will be documenting the 25 days until Christmas in my blogging version of my December Daily.  Tune in to see what Elfy is up to and our Advent "activity" for the day.  I {love} this time of the year so want to stop and cherish it as much as possible!

On the first day...

The 1st day of December is always extra special because it is Evan's birthday!  It is also the day Elfy shows up!  Man, Evan must be extra special to have Elfy show up ON his birthday!

Elfy showed up today with a note to the kiddos, wearing a ninjago mask {in celebration of Evan's birthday party}, and brought the kiddos a football because he told them it was his favorite sport to play at the North Pole.  We were so excited to see Elfy again...we always miss him!

Ellie didn't want to take the picture with Elfy...she said she wanted to take a picture with her baby...so here you go...

Our Advent activity for today was just to celebrate Evan's birthday...easy way to start the month!

We decorated our last, real Christmas tree today with the family and Grandmommy got to read their first Christmas book to them!

We went to Bass Pro with G&G and Kassi.  The kiddos got to see Santa and tell him what they want for Christmas.  The first year that no one was afraid of the man in red!!!  Avery told him he wanted the new Skylanders, Evan said a trampoline, and Ellie told him princess lights {don't know where this came from...if someone wants to give Santa a hint of where princess lights are sold let me know and I will pass it on!}

our little man is 5

How did this happen...

our little man who...

loves footie pjs, 

plays mom & dad with his sister, 

wants to play everything big brother plays, 

counts things all day long, 

says Bella is his best friend, 

wears crazy socks EVERY single day {I don't even remember when the last time he put on WHITE socks was},

always wants a new game on the "big phone",

says his favorite color is now gray & golden {who picks those colors as their favorite??},

eats peach oatmeal every morning if you would let him,

is excited to go to preschool and be a big boy,

snuggles with his brother almost every night at bed, 

tells me he is going to be a firefighter when he grows up, but is nervous about where he's going to sleep and who will be there with him....

turned FIVE years old today!!!

I love him and every crazy thing about this boy! 

 Here's all the fun and exciting things that happened this weekend on his birthday!

thankful...day 29&30

Now that I have my first free moment in the last three days it's time to catch up on here...we have had a busy, busy weekend!!

Day 29:

Mom:

Friday was our Thanksgiving...so I am thankful for the Thanksgiving holiday, which doesn't require the need for gifts...just spending time with family and friends around good food!  I am thankful that we got to spend dinner not only with our great friends, but my family was able to make it in time to eat dinner with us too!  The food was really good, thanks to Jennifer who made such great things to share with us, Ryan's first fried turkey, and my mom's desserts!

Avery:
Thanksgiving

Evan:
Opening Grandmommy & Granddaddy's birthday presents to me.

Ellie:
Grandmommy & Granddaddy coming up.

And a picture from Friday of our newest Christmas tree!

Day 30:

Mom:

Saturday was Evan's birthday party with friends.  I am thankful for all our great friends who always make my kiddos birthdays special for them...we have so many wonderful people in our lives!  {I will include a separate post with all kinds of pictures from Evan's birthday weekend!}

And since we are out of thankful days for the month and I had one more thought I will include it today as we head into the Christmas season...

I am so thankful for the belief in all things magical that still lives in our family.  I know that one day soon this will pass and we will move onto a new chapter in our lives, but I want to hang on to this for as long as we can...we believe in Santa Claus, reindeer that fly in the sky, a little Elf that shows up at our house each morning, the tooth fairy who exchanges our teeth for money, an Easter bunny that brings us yummy candy, a leprechaun who made our house green...and I {love} every minute of this!  We BELIEVE!!!

Avery:
Birthday party.

Evan:
Birthday party.

Ellie:
Orange juice {yes, that is how she is leaving the thankfulness month ;)}.

Magic is watching Frosty the Snowman with the kiddos and believing!

We also watched Frozen with G&G and Kassi!  This was Ellie's first "official" big screen movie and she did really well watching the movie about the princesses!

Evan did take obligatory 20 minute nap during the movie...he hasn't made it through a big screen movie without one yet ;)...