Traditions Old and New

Walking to Miss Allison's to decorate cookies for Santa

Icing our cookies

Showing them off...

Unwrapping at Nana and Poppies after church on Christmas Eve

Making sure Santa is properly fed...

Waking up and checking to make sure Santa made it...

discovering new toys

trying them out...

Celebrating at Gam and Pop's

Ready to head back to bed!

Drifting off to dreamland before the party is over...Princesses have to have their beauty rest!

Christmas Lights

A family tradition of ours is to go to a local state park to see their Christmas lights. They always have marshmallow roasting, hot chocolate, and this year sledding. We had a great time and it was a wonderful start to the holiday season.

Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving, we gave thanks for friends and family. We were especially blessed to have a healthy Poppy and Grandma Lane at our house for Thanksgiving dinner. I made the family stop for a second to snap a few group shots. They reminded me that dinner was getting cold and the kids (and grown-ups) were growing impatient , and we just needed to hurry. But after seeing these sweet photos they all told me they were glad we did it. And I am too!

Christmas Card Take 2!

Sometimes it takes us a few times to get it right. As my boys get older they are accepting the fact that I am going to take their picture so they might as well do it right the first time. Miles loves to challenge my authority during our family "sessions"! I am not sure what the incentive was this day, but they are getting a little better. Thanks boys for cooperating for a few minutes. I was able to get our Christmas card picture on the second try!

Getting Ready for the Holidays

Our Pumkin isn't ready to go...

Miles and Barnes couldn't wait to go through all of the ornaments and decorate our Christmas tree. They were so careful decorating and took so much pride in their work. We saved all of their ornaments for their "Charlie Brown" tree in the playroom. They had the most fun decorating it! They want everything for Christmas-the marketing strategies of the toy companies are right on target! Miles wants everything Star Wars or Lego-if it is Star Wars Lego that is even better. Barnes wants all things Mickey Mouse. We will have to see how Santa does.

A Mickey Party

Barnes and his best friend Sae!

Precious Reese

Our birthday boy!

Poppy and Bradley

Thinking about his birthday wish!
Friends big and small gathered a few weeks ago to celebrate Barnes' third birthday! Our family has been blessed with Barnes who is a ray of sunshine in our lives. He has the happiest personality and makes the best of everything. He loves with all of his heart and chooses to be happy! The week of Barnes' birthday my dad, "Poppy", had a little heart scare. One morning we were not stressing about a routine stress test on a very healthy man-that afternoon we were wondering what was going to happen next. Luckily my daddy "only" had to have two stints put in his heart and did not have to have surgery. We felt doubly blessed during Barnes' birthday week! We love Barnes but we also love Poppy! We are so glad Poppy found the problem before it found him and we were able to celebrate together.