Christmas Day

Ella with my Grandma Doris

Will posing in front of Grandma's Christmas tree


Will helping Grandma Doris open her present

Mom and Grandma Doris

My little brother, Lee with Ella

Will got a coonskin cap from my brother, Jeff. He's always good for the real macho presents!

Opening presents at Lee and Kelsee's. Do you like the camo wrapping paper?

Will showing off presents to his papa

Diagnosing dad...I loved that Mike was really hamming it up for Will!

Time to check Ella's heartbeat

Listening to mama's heart

Ahhhh...opening presents on Christmas morning

Mike with two babies

Thanks for the new running shoes honey doo!

Opening stockings

Look out, Will, there's a ravenous hippo emerging from your stocking!!!

Will's big gift...a train table

We ended Christmas day with a visit to Grandma Novie's

I sincerely apologize for the order of these photos, but I just do not have the patience to arrange them correctly. I did it for the last two posts and know if I don't just blog right now, it won't happen! I had been looking forward to Christmas morning for weeks. I just knew that Will would be overjoyed this year. I was not disappointed. It was so much fun. Santa brought Will a train table with some wooden track and new locomotives. I think he was actually a little more shocked than anything! After he played with his trains for a bit we opened stockings and presents. You can see in the pictures that we got him a doctor's kit. Will has quite the imagination and was listening to everyone's heart beats and giving Mike shots. Mike was hilarious playing around with Will.

After all of our Christmas fun we got ready and headed to Lee and Kelsee's to open presents with my family. It was a pretty rushed event. We had to hurry things along to get to my Grandma Doris' house for dinner. Still, I think I managed to get some pretty cute pictures. After a nice turkey dinner at Grandma's we went over to see my Grandma Novie. Mike said that she seemed overjoyed to see us. I thought that was a very sweet observation. After all of that excitement it was time to head home and put the babies to sleep. Only problem there was that Will did not want to go to bed. He wanted to play with all of his new toys!

I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve

My sleeping baby...This is how the night startedWe had a nice dinner at the house. It was great just to enjoy each other's company, tell stories and laugh.

The best part about Ella's first Christmas was the wrapping paper

New running shoes from Kristin and Carlos. To see a video of how much Will enjoyed these, check out Kristin's blog.

A sun hat for Ella. I'm sure she'll grow into it! I don't know if you can see it in this picture, but the hat has her name embroidered on it--how cute!

I thought this was a great gift from Carolyn to David

Daisy getting a little love on Christmas

Oooooh...a new backpack!

Will opening his backpack...yes, these pictures are out of order!

Helping Grandma C. with a present

Train stencils from Auntie Carla. We'll have to show Will how to use these! They'll be the perfect activity during the winter months ahead.

Daisy loves my father-in-law!

The night ended with us watching Horton Hears a Who. Will and Kristin fell asleep after the movie started. Aren't they cute?

This year we celebrated Christmas Eve at our house with my in-laws. It was a change in the original plan. They had not had power or water at their home for the week due to the crazy weather. We were thankful that everyone could make it down safe and sound to celebrate with us. I made homemade pesto for the gang per Michael's request. For dessert, Carolyn brought all of the fixings for fondue--yum! It was such a nice evening hanging out and enjoying Christmas together.

Seeing Santa

After seeing Santa Claus, Will took a ride on one of the cars at the mall
Talking to Santa

This was the first year that Will had a concept of who Santa is. The poor kid was so tired by the time we reached our destination. While we were driving over I kept telling him to stay awake so we could see Santa. We made it and he was able to have a little conversation with the man himself, St. Nick. I love Christmas!!! Afterwards we took a little ride on one of the cars at the mall. This was just as exciting as seeing Santa!

Decorating the Tree

Ella goes straight for the lights! There's something fascinating about Christmas lights...
This would have been a great picture if I didn't cut Will's head out of it. I'm notorious for this!

Will wants to do everything that daddy does!
Ella makes her way to the tree

Will doing some decorating. A lot of the ornaments are on the bottom portion of the tree this year!

Isn't this the cutest picture ever?

When I was little my dad would always lift me up to put the star on the top of the tree. I loved it and decided we should do the same with our kids.




The finished product. Check out the look of awe on Will's face!

Will was fast asleep by the time we arrived at the Christmas tree farm. We had a hard time waking him up!

Ooooh, this looks like the one!
Ella in her holiday gear

I love this picture of Mike cracking up!

This should have been posted earlier in the month, but I'm trying to play catch up to document our activities! Here are some pics of us choosing the perfect Christmas tree. The past couple of years we have picked out a noble fir tree. They're very pretty trees. We made sure to get ours nice and early this year so Will could enjoy it a little longer. He's really into Christmas this year!

Snowy days...

Close up of Will in his winter gear. One of his great grandma's knitted his hat. Cute, huh?


This is a picture of our snowman. He's pretty homely. I didn't know what to do with Ella while we were building. I put her in her little chair outside so I could help Will, but she didn't like that very much. We did this kind of quickly!

Will enjoying a walk in the snow

Ella is attached to me most of the time in the front pack, so this is the only way I can get a picture of her--close up!
In case I don't blog beforehand, I'd like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas!

I'd also like to add as a sidenote, that most days end up with Will wearing no pants. I try to keep him clothed until Mike gets home, but lately that hasn't been happening!