Playing Dress Up

Check out sweet little Elizabeth playing dress up. She loves to wear hats around the house, she found this scarf in my closet and has claimed it as her own, she finds all kinds of creative ways to wear it, even likes me to tie it around her waist as a skirt. She is such a sweet, outgoing and adventurous little girl, I see big things in her future. Maybe even a career in fashion design!

Grandpa D and Miss Carol's visit

We had a whirlwind visit from my Dad and Carol the week before Christmas. Again, the kids got some awesome gifts and had such a great time playing with Dad and Carol. They absolutely love when people come to visit us, I think they really get bored with just ole Mommy and Daddy all the time. We all went to The Wildlife Experience Winter Wonderlights and froze while looking at all the really cool lights that I am pretty sure we could have driven by and seen for free from our warm cars. We had fun though, were sad to see Grandpa Danny and Miss Carol leave but were so glad we got to see them around Christmastime!

I am pretty sure Daniel is crying in both of these pics because he kept trying to take off and all of his efforts were thwarted. Poor kid.

Santa Schmanta

Like many families, we have fallen victim to the idea that we must participate in all of the standard holiday traditions. It was actually my idea to go see Santa this year, I think maybe if I hadn't mentioned it, Chris may have not thought of it and we could have just skipped it altogether. Me and my big mouth. We had gone to a really neat (and free) Fall Festival at a local nursery and wanted to go back there to see Santa Claus. We thought it might be less crowded than the malls, but there was still a long line of people there when we arrived and we got there right when they opened. We had talked it up quite a bit and kept asking the kids if they wanted to sit with Santa, and guess what they said? "No!" I knew they weren't going to do it so why spend a Saturday morning out in the cold trying to keep 2 2 yr olds occupied for over an hour? I did try to talk Chris into leaving pretty much as soon as we got there, even tried to bribe him by suggesting we go eat, but he felt like we should say since we were already there. Well once we finally got up there, the kids had no interest in sitting with them and well....you see the end result. This is the 2nd picture with Santa I have been in with them. It's crazy, why do we do this? They didn't talk to him but did give him high 5's when we left and talked about the candy canes they got from him for days after that. All in all, it wasn't a bad experience, just not really sure it was necessary. Next year, I am keeping my mouth shut.

Mama's Boy

Thought I would share a few pics of me goofing around with my little boy. He is just the sweetest boy ever, loves his mommy and loves giving kisses. He is quite the sensitive kid, they have started watching movies lately and he gets really upset when something bad happens, like it someone gets hurt or something gets destroyed. We have had to turn a couple of movies off because he actually starts crying. Don't get me wrong, he is a rough and tumble kid too, but I am enjoying his sensitive side while it lasts.

Thanksgiving

We took the kids on the first long road trip when we went to Oklahoma for Thanksgiving. We were pretty nervous about it since we had never gone more than 3 hours in the car with them before, we really had no idea how they would do. Can I just say - they did awesome! We were very pleasantly surprised. If they did this well with just some little toys to keep them happy, just imagine how well they will do when we get our tricked out minivan with a DVD player!

We had so much fun in OK, we had Thanksgiving dinner at the Kelley's on Thursday, hung out over there for awhile and the kids played with the awesome dollhouse that Cameron saved for them all these years. We were most excited to bring that back home with us! We went to Dad and Carol's that night for some desert - yum!

On Friday, we met my friend Kelli at Ted's, the best Mexican restaurant in the entire world - it was so yummy! The kids had fun afterwards playing with her daughter Meadow, we would have loved to get her twins over as well, but they were sick. Maybe next time.

On Saturday, we had Thanksgiving dinner at Dad's and played over there for awhile after that. The kids brought home some pretty awesome new toys and were just so excited to see their Oklahoma family and spend some quality time with them.

On our way out of town on Sunday, we stopped for lunch at Ted's so that I could get my fix one last time and so the kids could experience Ted's as well. I think it is safe to say that it is their favorite restaurant now too.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving in Oklahoma!

Now that we know the kids can handle that drive no problem, we have to get back to OK at least once a year.

Cuchara

Wow, I can't believe I haven't posted anything since Halloween, I may be the worst blogger ever. This post is a bit out of order but I wanted to talk about the trip we took to Cuchara, CO. We met my mom and my sister and her family just 3 hours SW of here in a teeny, tiny little town called Cuchara. There is nothing there except for cabins and apparently a place called the Dog Bar where we were told we could have gone to watch the OU/TX game but didn't.

Anyway, Cari reserved us a great cabin where we brought all of our own food to cook and really never left there except to go on a few walks. The weather was absolutely perfect and we all just had a great time. The kids were so excited to see everyone, they just love Grandma Judy, Uncle Kevin, Aunt Cari, Cory and Cameron. We went on a little nature walk where they got to explore a little bit and check out the river. Their favorite part of the weekend was throwing pine cones in the river and watching them float away, finding cool sticks and looking at the stars at night. They are so cute and I must say adapt pretty well to different environments, they loved the cabin and slept great while we were there. They still talk about the cabin and love to look at the pictures. We may have to make it our annual Fall Break trip!