Annual Santa Party

This past Saturday we had our Annual Santa Party. It is by far my favorite party of the year. I have so many wonderful memories of this party when I was a kid and it's really neat that I get to pass that on to our kids now. We had so much fun with all our friends and family and this year did not disappoint at all!

We greeted our guests at the door. As you can see, Lila was checking out her two perspective boyfriends, Henry Duncan and Sawyer Rachavong.

Then we went outside to wait for Santa's big arrival.

After a few minutes we saw a big firetruck AND ambulance coming down the street. Jackson was the first kid to hustle down the street and greet Santa!

Santa was cool, but the firefighters were too! Jackson and Madison marched right on over and introduced themselves to the Murphy Fire Dept.

After reminding Jackson that Santa was the main attraction of the night, he held Santa's hand and walked with him all the way back into our house. So cute.

Santa and Mrs. Claus got comfy by the fire and read the kids "The Night Before Christmas."

Everyone enjoyed listening to the story and it gave some of the kids time to warm up to the jolly old guy!

After letting a few other kids go first, Lila and Jackson hopped on his lap. When his sister started to fuss a little, J gave her a big kiss! Not sure it helped, but it was funny.

Madison wasn't having anything to do with Santa at first, but then decided to bring him a chip. She must have heard he really likes chips. So, here are all the kids...Maddie's chip in her hand!

Gigi and Boom were in attendance...

as were Memaw, Poppy and Uncle Andrew.

Lots of our friends came and I have many family pics...this one made me laugh the most, though. Levi Martinez was so not wanting to stand in front of Santa! He was at least standing there, though. His big brother kept running away!

Monica was finally able to convince Judah to stand by her and they got a family pic with Santa:)

When Madison decided she finally wanted to go talk to Santa we got the sweetest picture of them together. Love. Those. Dimples.

We were glad that the Fort Worth crew was able to come--always good to see Pa "Grape," Aunt Bina and Roxie.

The big boys had fun hanging out.

And we loved getting to visit with my Papaw, too.

I wish I would have had more time to visit with my girlfriends, but when there are 28 kids running around, adult conversation is a little tough to come by!

By 7:00 Sawyer had had enough party:)

It was time for Santa to go back to the North Pole, so Boom and Jackson walked him out.

Thanks Santa and Mrs. Claus for stopping by our house! See y'all again next year!

In the Christmas Spirit

Christmas in in the air! And I love it! Last night we went over to The Brooks' home for some good family fun. First, we roasted a few marshmallows over the fire...Jackson was a little leery of the whole process and told me that I needed to eat that marshmellow, not him!

Then we drove to this really festive house in their neighborhood for a train ride!

The kids were very excited! Jackson must have asked me 12 times on our 5 minute drive when we were going to get to the train.

This nice man (the one driving the train) sets up this whole train in his backyard and gives rides to adults and kids. For free! So nice. Jackson chose to ride in Santa's sleigh.

After we got home I checked my email and saw that Santa had sent a video message to Jackson! It is the coolest thing.

I wish I could make the link work so that y'all could watch it.

Here's Jackson in Santa's book!

Needless to say, he was amazed by it! Let's hope he listens to Santa and continues to be a really good boy this year.

Guess who?!

Guess who is 8 months old today?!

You got it, Miss Lila Grace!

Lila is having a great 8 month birthday today. She's been so happy all day long.

Love those two bottom teeth!

Happy 8 months! We love you, sweet girl.

Happy Birthday, Daddo!

Last night we celebrated Jared's birthday at home. While this would seem like laid-back, chill affair, that would be wrong. You see, there are three small, quite loud kids that were all in attendance. Noise and all, though, we wouldn't have it any other way!

Miss Lila greeted her daddy with a smooch right when he got home.

All through dinner Jackson kept asking if it was time to get out the cake! He helped me make it the day before and was sooooo excited about it. Although, I must mention, he really pushed for the strawberry cake that my Aunt Glenda makes so well. It is so very good and Jackson remembered it from when she made it for my dad's birthday back in June. Yes, it's that good! Jared really wanted a chocolate cake, though, so chocolate is what we made.

Let's just say the cake was made with a lot of love...and my next job in life will not be as a cake decorator. It's so much harder than it looks!

Happy Birthday, babe! We love you:)

Let there be light!

After getting two quotes from different christmas light installer-men I chose the one that was much cheaper. He was originally scheduled to come put them up the day after Thanksgiving. The only caveat to this plan was that I didn't make it to Hobby Lobby to buy the rest of the lights we would need, so I pushed that date back a bit to the following Monday. On Monday I waited and waited...well past the 9:30 am promised time. Around 11:30 or 12 he finally showed up. I put all of the lights and exstention cords out on the front porch and was so excited that our house was going to really be all aglow in only a few short hours. About 10 minutes went by and the doorbell rang. Seems that his partner called in sick and this guy was the one with the really big ladder. Day One of Christmas Light Installation: Fail.

The next day both guys showed up (eventually) and I once again put all of that stuff out on the front porch. Got real excited again (I mean, really, what could go wrong?). Twenty minutes later, ding dong. I answer the door and the guy says, "I've got some bad news." I think, "Oh my, this is not going well." He then proceeds to tell me that their "really big" ladder isn't quite big enough. Looks like they are going to need a 35 foot ladder to reach the tallest peak and theirs is only 31 foot. Super. They apologized for telling me that they could do the job in the first place and drove off. Day Two of Christmas Light Installation: Fail.

Guess they should probably amend the flyer that they put in people's doors. It read "No job too small or too big." Maybe not...unless you need the 35 foot ladder. Arghhh!!

So, this past weekend my elves went to work. They worked all day and got these pretty lights all set up in our yard.

It was pretty chilly, so Elf Jack ran inside to get his new Frog Hat and gloves. I am proud to say we now have at least some christmas lights at our house! Thanks, guys!

Murphy Christmas Festival

I must admit, one of the main reason's I wanted to attend the Murphy Christmas in the Park is because there were going to be reindeer. Everyone loves reindeer, right?

Thursday night we went to the festival and enjoyed the cool, brisk night. We drank hot chocolate, ate hot dogs and chips and then popcorn for dessert.

We took silly pictures like this one...

and did fun activities in Santa's workshop...

like write a letter to Santa Claus.

It said, "Dear Santa, I would like a trampoline for Christmas. I've been a pretty good boy. Love, Jackson" Ha! At least the kid is honest:)

Memaw and Jackson painted an ornament...

and then it was time to watch the fireworks!

Fireworks make any festival very cool. Merry Christmas from our silly family to yours!

Romeo

I have mentioned Jackson's girlfriends before, but this post is about one in particular. Miss Mia. Mia is the little girl that dressed up as Cinderella and held hands with Jackson the Fireman at their school Fall Fest. A few weeks ago Jackson told me he wanted to write Mia a note. He dictated, I wrote. It said, "Dear Mia, You are my girlfriend. I love you. Love, Jackson." We put it in his bag so that he would remember to give it to her at school. Right after that he got really sick and I completely forgot about it. Fast forward to this past Wednesday. When I dropped him off that morning his teacher had two white envelopes for me. The first one was addressed to Jackson and inside were these two notes.

This is a love note from Mia.

Guess she was so smitten by his love note, that she decided to draw him a picture as well. This cracks me up--check out the size of his forehead!

The real humor was in this envelope, though.

I opened it up to find this 5 page application! It's from Mia's daddy and had me laughing out loud. It has lots of questions, like "Do you own or have access to a van?" "Do you have a tattoo?" It also has a sectioned entitled Daddy's Rules for Dating.

Rule One: If you pull into my driveway and honk, you'd better be delivering a package, because you're sure not picking anything up.

The whole thing is hysterical. I am keeping it for sure, and probably making a copy to give out to whatever boys try to date Lila one day!