Holiday Photo Album

*** THERE ARE LOTS OF PICTURES! CONSIDER YOURSELF WARNED!

We are officially trying to transfer out of holiday mode and back into real life as Jake went back to work today for the first time since before Christmas. Still have the tree up along with lots of other holiday decor, but the lights are down from the house and hopefully the rest will be put away soon. I actually did unpack my suitcase today which is an accomplishment considering we got back from Louisiana on Thursday night. So maybe I'm lazy, big deal, right! Anyways, onto the photos.

These first 4 are from New Year's Eve that we celebrated with some friends and food and fireworks. Elle and Mya stayed up past midnight (I know, we're bad parents) and had fun with their friends. It was a bit cold outside for the fireworks, but that didn't stop Jake from acting like a 10 year old boy playing with fire. Elle wasn't too fond of the smoke as can be seen in her pic below. Yesterday we had some friends over for a BBQ to wrap up the holiday festivities.

Now onto the trip to good old Cajun land. As we have the only grandchildren in the family, the kids get lots of attention from their aunts and uncles. And they have plenty to choose from with all of us together. The girls loved taking walks with Uncle Paul, attempting to play ping pong, and taking pictures of neighborhood cats.




Jake's parents arranged for "Santa" to stop by the house Sunday night so we took some pics with the big guy. Mya was a bit terrified, but did let him know that she wanted a bike in a very stern voice. She wouldn't dare sit on his lap, but Elle and Jada didn't mind.

Christmas Eve was a fun day spent taking family pictures, making sugar cookies dipped in sprinkles for Santa, putting on a spectacular rendition of the Nativity, opening Christmas PJ's, reading "The Night Before Christmas", making our yummy apple pie caramel apples, and dipping bananas and pretzels in chocolate. Sounds like a pretty good day if you ask me!

Christmas morning was fun with the usual present opening fiasco. Highlights were the Wii (bet you can guess who was the most excited about that one), a zoo membership, movies, dress-ups, Netflix for 6 months, a really pretty ring with a purple stone Jake's grandpa got in Brazil (all the girls got one with different stones and Missy got earrings), and a super cool Wal-mart T-shirt saying "This is what Awesome looks like" (thanks Jake- I'll wear it with pride). We are a spoiled group of people if you ask me!

I have to input a little note of bragging about my husband here under the picture of us before we went running. I am so proud of him because he has been training for a half marathon and has been doing so great! He ran 10.1 miles the other day! That is crazy long. And below is not the best pic of Jada but I wanted to capture the cute Christmas tights.

Jake got a little tired of driving on the way home and turned the wheel over to someone a little more responsible.

And Santa left some goods back at the Texas house that the girls got to see when we got home Thursday night. Mya still needs some practice with pedaling, but hopefully soon she'll be cruising around like Elle.

After our mail came off hold, we got a load of Christmas cards (so for those concerned, the pantry door and then some is covered with cards) and two fun packages all in the same day. Jake was so excited. He loves the mail for some strange reason. My sis decorated my package with this lovely drawing. Goes right along with the voodoo doll she found and threw in the package just for fun.

The other package was from my grandma and grandpa and had some fun stuff for all of us. Here's Mya in her soft Dora blankie and the girls with their cool monkeys.

Jake of course had fun with his brothers. They golfed one day and also spent time two of the days out shooting guns at things like oranges and cans and wild rampant deer (just kidding about that last part, but they did see some in the swamp). I'm just glad no one shot their eye out.

And here's a brief recap of the family photo shoot. My favorite picture is obviously the last one. Our trip was great, so fun to see family. Sad that Jake's mom got really sick and spent the last few days in bed (including Christmas day), but we were happy to spend the holidays with everyone.

Next up is birthdays! Mya turns 3, and then Elle will be 5 a little later in the month. We're contemplating the purchase of a trampoline as a joint present. Thought it would be fun since we really don't need any more toys or clothes or anything else to clutter up the house. And this is actually the time of year we can be outside in Texas so we need to enjoy it!

Christmas Prom

Last night was Jake's annual work Christmas party where we get to get all fancy shmancy and go hang out at a decked-out place with a bunch of people drinking alcohol. Sound like your idea of fun? It actually is fun to get dressed up and go somewhere nice without kids and feel like a grown up. I did a whole lot of "I'm Sunnie. Nice to meet you." and standing there awkwardly while Jake talked work talk. It is nice for me to be able to meet the people he talks about and for them to meet me and see that there is a wife and kids and maybe they'll take pity and let him work less at times. Maybe not, but you never know. One of my favorite parts of the whole night is the food. I love food. I eat lots of food. We didn't get there until a little later and so I was eating dinner really late. And I have to admit, I was a little disappointed with the desserts this year. Such a bummer because that is such an enjoyable part of the meal. Something else funny is that they hire dancers to go out on the dance floor, probably to encourage more people to dance. It's very obvious who the hired dancers are, especially this year. The guy was wearing a cool glittery black shirt, and I couldn't get Jake to quit trying to show off his moves and he kept challenging the guy to a dance off. And Jake's totally begging me for a shirt like his for next year's party. Okay so not much of that was true, but there were hired dancers and he was wearing a sparkly shirt. As always, we got to go prom style and get our picture taken. Sorry, no wallet size pics so you won't be receiving your copy of this beauty in the mail.

On Friday night, we had our ward Christmas party for church. The theme was "A Night in Bethlehem" and they had us dress up in period attire for the event. Since I'm not the handiest with a sewing machine, nor do I own one, nor do I frequent Joann's fabric store on a regular occasion, we had to get creative. Jada's car seat became a modern day manger, she sported wings like an angel, and the older girls dressed in my bathrobes. I'll tell you what, those would have been some stylish robes back in the day! Jake wore his white bathrobe, and because he was looking mighty angelic that night, they recruited him to star as the angel in the little Nativity play they put on. He wanted to wear Jada's pink wings for the part but decided not to, and instead stood there on the edge of the stage with arms in the air mouthing some of the words the narrator was saying to the shepherds. Think Japanese interpretation of the nativity story and that about sums up what it looked like. He may just win an Oscar. I didn't get to show off my acting skills, but did shine bright just like the star that first Christmas night.

Here are some pics of us in our church Christmas attire. We're lucky and get to wear Christmas outfits again next Sunday because we'll be in Louisiana so no one will care that we just wore them. Elle and I were almost twinsies with our black and red silky outfits. For her, it's still cool to be dressed like mom. Gotta take advantage of it while I can.

Jada had her half-birthday the other day. It is so crazy that six months have already gone by. In another six, she'll be one. I just love having her in the family, and she is at such a fun stage. She's finally rolling (just front to back, one way, but we'll take it), sits up and plays, loves her baby food, and is so smiley and happy. This age until about 18 months is really fun. And I feel like we royally spoil the child. I don't know if it's because she is such a baby and the other girls play together and seem so old and so not babyish or what. All I know is that she is spoiled but I can't help it because I love to snuggle with her and hate to hear her cry. Oh well, I'm sure we'll be paying for it someday. As for the rolling thing, I'm just so glad she's finally doing it. I was getting worried and we're going in for the six month check tomorrow and I was afraid of what the doc might say. So we took on some intense rolling training sessions and with a little bit of practice, she's a pro. Okay maybe not a pro. But at least she can roll.

This Thursday night we may celebrate Christmas and open a lot of the stuff here so we don't have to pack it with us. Still trying to decide the best way to go about giving the girls bikes from Santa since the bikes are not making the trip to Louisiana. Any good suggestions??? Have a good week and Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, Feliz Navidad, etc. etc.

All about that Holiday stores have been promoting for months...

Since Wal-Mart's been promoting Christmas probably since May (just kidding- sort of) I thought I'd share with you a few Christmasy things from our home. We're heading out to Louisiana for the big holiday to celebrate with Jake's whole family. It will be fun to ALL be together- doesn't happen very often. I do wish someone else in the fam had kids, though. Maybe by the time Elle's like 10 they'll get some more cousins. Elle and Mya both had Christmas parties at preschool this week. Elle scored lots of goods at hers. I'm thinking she really doesn't need anything else after bringing home all this loot.

She was really excited about her Barbie camera that takes real pictures. Unfortunately I think I broke it before she even got to take her first pic. Now it will be a play camera. I'm not too concerned because she's getting one of those kid digital cameras from my parents for Christmas. This will be way easier to manage than one with film. And here's Elle and I modeling some of the new stuff. I was trying to get her to let me do something funny for the picture, but she insisted on a beautiful smile. So there you have it.

Here's another shot of the tree. Have I mentioned how proud I am of myself?! Anyways, here it is lit up before some of the lights decided to get all temperamental. I think half of one of the strands is picking and choosing when it wants to work. Jake and I really tried to fix it. I even made him help me change the fuse, and he found the burnt out bulb, which we changed. Oh well, I'm not redecorating the whole thing, so we'll just enjoy the on again off again show.

I found another dangerously good treat this Christmas. Just what I need- something else to snack on all day. They are really really good. But I am a minty chocolate kind of girl so these are definitely right up my alley.

I wanted to capture the mountain of sprinkles Mya put on this sugar cookie she made at preschool. It was honestly a huge mound. When I tipped them off, I found a cute sugar cookie with frosting and pink sprinkles and candy underneath. At least she had fun.

I had Elle help me wrap a present yesterday. Never too soon to get them started I guess. She had a little trouble with the tape but other than that, she did good. They'll definitely be put to work helping wrap once they are old enough. And honestly, she'll probably be better than me at wrapping by age 7. Present wrapping is not my specialty.

And don't you wish you were getting some of these goods?! I spent some of yesterday assembling some fun packages for Christmas. I like doing stuff like this. My kids had fun with some styrofoam peanuts that came in a package from my grandma. They were everywhere. I should have taken a picture. Luckily Jake had taught us last year that the dustpan works wonders in cleaning them quickly.

I am really sad about the Christmas card shortage so far this year. We've had a 3 day dry spell of no cards. I even put up a homemade card from Elle, our own Christmas card, and our card from TXU Energy (our electric company- sad I know, but I'm desperate for cards!) to fill the pantry door. I guess I can't complain- I just sent most of ours out today, but they are just so much fun to get. I get excited to check the mail.

I know by now you all know how super crafty I am (ha ha). But I did want to show off my newest project. I can't take credit for the idea, just the assembly. It was inspired by a cute decoration I saw at a little shop in California, and my mom had this good idea. Baby socks from the Target dollar spot. Love that place.


And I really love Super Saturday (for those who don't know what that is- it is an all day craft day at church). You sign up, they have all the stuff there for you and they teach you how to do it. It's probably one of the few days a year that I actually make really cute stuff. I thought I'd show some of the projects I've made over the years. The sad part is that we haven't had this day in our ward for the past two years. Don't they understand I need these days to up my decoration supply?

A sort of fun tradition that I've kept is a Christmas scrapbook. I started the first year we were married with a fancy binder Jake's mom gave me and scrap stuff from each Christmas. It is so fun to pull out and see every year.

Here's one of my favorites from the Christmas tupperwares. It's so great because it is totally kid-friendly and will maybe help them remember the story. I think that the Barbie DVDs add a nice touch to the backdrop for the Nativity scene, don't you?

I can't take credit for this cute Nativity set. Jake's mom gave it to us on our first Christmas. I just really like it.

And, lastly, something not Christmas. I got my girls new pictures up on the wall. It's about time. They replaced the pics of Elle and Mya when they were 2 years old and 2 months old.