Christmas with Daddy B and Grandma

We celebrated an early Christmas while Daddy B and Grandma were in town visiting from NC.

The most entertaining part was watching C and Daddy play Kinect Sports on the XBox. They are skiing in the above pictures. Keep in mind Daddy still has a broken shoulder! C beat him both times :)

Live Nativity and The Great Christmas Givaway!

For the last few years, we have really enjoyed going to see the live nativity performance at our friends' church. This year we got to take Daddy B and Grandma with us. It is so neat. You take a hayride through the nativity story that is being acted out. You can see there were real camels!

See the sign above the inn door- "No Room"!

The Sunday that Daddy and Grandma were here was also the kids Christmas musical at our church, The Great Christmas Giveaway. AP actually had a little speaking part and did wonderful!! We discovered during this process that our outspoken girl does not like all eyes on her, even though she would lead you to believe that she does! But, she faced her fears and spoke her line like a champ! C did a great job, too. In his past performances, he has gotten so caught up in the music, that he pretty much turns around and watches everyone behind him sing and all you see is the back of his head. But, this time he stayed right on track! He faced forward and sang his heart out! He was in the back, though, so I didn't really get any great pictures :(
The basic message of the program was that giving is better than receiving, hence the title :) The kiddos are still singing the songs non-stop. Although, this afternoon in the car, I heard AP singing at the top of her lungs, "It's better to receive than give!"

Daddy's Birthday continues!

After the kiddos and I celebrated with Daddy last weekend, the celebration just kept on going! This past Friday was his actual birthday. While the kiddos were practicing for their musical, we met up with family to celebrate again. Then after dinner and picking up the kiddos, we came back home to cake and presents. Hubs had requested that I make him a sheet cake, so I tried out a new caramel apple cake and it was soooo good. (You can see his stack of new birthday coffee in the background, he got a new coffee machine :)

Then Saturday his parents arrived from NC. Here is Hubs trying out his birthday present from them :)

We went out with them Saturday night to celebrate. I think that was the longest birthday ever!

Gingerbread Man Kindergarten Project

We were sent a paper cut out of a gingerbread man and were assigned to decorate him any way we wanted. C had the same project when he was in K and we decorated his as a Tennessee football player! AP then wanted to do the same, but I'm not about copying her brother's :) So we traced the gingerbread man onto cardboard and cut him out so he would be sturdier. Then we glued graham crackers and trimmed them until he was a graham cracker man! AP added candy and frosting until she couldn't fit anything else on it. My favorite part is the gummy teeth/lips that we had leftover from Halloween. AP's favorite part was manning the glue gun all by herself!

Of course, we added hair and a bow to girly it up :) It was AP's idea to make fabric hair, then we just clipped one of her bows on. Perfect!

Thanksgiving and the first signs of Christmas!

There were/are so many things too be thankful for this Thanksgiving, definitely too many to put into words, so apparently I avoided that post altogether! We had Thanksgiving appetizers turned meal at my aunt and uncle's house as is our tradition. There were grand plans for an all night card tournament leading to shopping in the wee hours of the morning on Black Friday. However, that didn't happen. After we all ate, everyone was too tired to do anything! My kiddos fell asleep and Hubs and I scoped out some Black Friday deals. We ended up joining in the shopping madness at midnight, but we were done by 12:30!

We finally got all of our Christmas decorations up last week. The decorating went a little slower this year as Hubs broke his shoulder (proximal humeral fracture to be exact) in our church's annual flag football game.

Friday night the kiddos and I took Hubs out to a surprise birthday dinner. His birthday is actually next Friday, but the kiddos have rehearsal for our church Christmas musical that night so we decided to celebrate early. We went to a steak house that he had been wanting to try. The food was good, the ambiance not so much. There are geese and ducks that camp out by the entrance in hopes that you have scraps to give them.They walk right up to you and one nipped at C's finger! The kiddos ran and jumped up on this bench. You can see the goose that chased them up there at their feet!

Last night we had our church small group Christmas party at our house. It was a lot of fun! We had a great dinner, including a huge yummy turkey and brisket brought by good friends. We had a couples gingerbread making contest, Dirty Santa exchange, a hot chocolate bar, and a Just Dance Dance Off! I need a nap today just thinking about it! I was behind the camera, so there are no pics of Hubs and I, but here are a few of the gingerbread house making!

Let the Christmas Season begin!