Christmas Party

 I love me some church parties.  I am always excited to take the kids somewhere fun to play and have games to participate in and treats to dig in to.  There was a nice christmas dinner spread complete with ham and the ever so popular cheesy potatoes.  Oh man.  Cheesy potatoes I love you.

The primary got together to put on a little nativity show and sing some songs and Elijah came out excited. Front and center.

But something must not have gone the way he wanted, but he got upset and sat down for the whole performance.

 Fooey.

 At the end of the party, Santa showed up with a box of presents!  Elijah very patiently waited his turn.

 Santa gave him a little beanie baby puppy named Crinkles, which he now sleeps with every night, along with Rocket of course.

 This, however, is all I got out of Evie when Santa showed his sinister face.

Clawing at my legs to keep away from Santa.  Seriously Evie! The man was handing out puppy and kitty dolls! And candy for pete's sake! Oh well.

Grand Meander

 One thing I really dont like is when the weather starts getting really chilly, but at the same time, I love it because it means Christmas is coming!  We found the perfect little tree at the church a few blocks away from us.  I put the lights on and let the kids do the rest.  I learned after the first year with Elijah to use all plastic or wooden ornaments. Loved it.

On the first sat in Dec, Grand Ave businesses pull together and put on the Grand Meander! It is so fun for the kids. Even though Tony was working, I was determined to squeeze every jolly bit I could out of the christmas season, so I tossed the kids in the car, and we hit up the free pancake breakfast with santa at 830.  And yes, it is at the Tavern, I see the irony, but pretty much every restaurant here is some sort of bar and restaurant where, yes, families are welcome. We waited in the cold december air for a solid 30 mins to get in.

 You better believe we asked for seconds.  Hey, we brought the dang toys for tots donation, another round of pancakes!

 After brekkie, we headed across the street to see Santa.  Now, you have to understand, Evie will not sit in santas lap.  She will happily wait in line and listen to me drone on about how santa brings us presents and gives us candy, but as soon as she realizes it is her turn to go, she FREAKS and starts to scramble and it is like trying to get a dog in the bathub.  For some reason though, with this santa, she strolled right up like it was nothing. NOTHING.  She put on the christmas hat, took a few pictures, and even asked him for a candy cane for christmas.  I dont know why or how it happened, but it was adorable.  (for the record, I tried about six different times with six different santas throughout december, and this was the only one that she would even acknowlegde)

 What's that? A smile? Am I dreaming?

 Outside of Santa town, they had free fire truck rides!  Elijah was so pumped

 We got to ride in the old school fire engine with a big bell.

 

And lest I forget, Santa's reindeer!

Depending on how cold it is next year, we are doing this again!

Thanksgiving

By the time Thanksgiving rolled around, it was already pretty chilly, so I say fall was over.  We made some snowmen to portray our feelings.  Evie made this snowman all by herself. We share the same sentiments.

 Cold days mean snuggle time.  Elijah likes to snuggle with his best pal Rocket. A little extra close sometimes.

 We went up to Aunt Wendy and Uncle Joe's for Thanksgiving.  It's always fun going to their house. The kids especially LOOVE seeing them and me and Tony usually snag a break with all the other fun adults around to keep an eye on things. I got to fit in some Black Friday shopping (Tony refuses to set foot in Walmart ever again. Ever.).  I think we even got out to a movie! I loved putting dinner together with Wendy.  The best parts though are always the crazy flukes that happen around family gathering.  I might have set the oven on fire at one point and Tubby the dog helped himself to my apple pie while it was cooling (a la stealing pie off the windowsill style, except he just ate part of the pie and left it there). While I didnt get any pics from the actual festivities, I did get some from when we went to Bentleyville the next day! In a snowstorm!

 Best part about Bentleyville? Free cookies and cocoa. and marshmallows to roast.

The christmas season officially began!

Fall came and went

 At some point in the past few months, tony won a few crossfit competitions, which Evie took credit for.

 Halloween came upon us very quickly..

But, we did make it out to a pumpkin patch to choose our perfect pumpkins for Halloween

 

Hay ride + cider = awesome and possibly dangerous.  I held the hot cider. (and drank most of it.  think of the children!)

Putting Elijah to work.

 

Life is hard. 

And that was fall.