Saturday, December 29, 2012

Advent

We had a very fun and eventful December this year. I made Carson and Avery an Advent calendar with lots of fun Christmas activities to help us prepare for Christmas. It was so fun watching them get excited this year about Christmas and helping them to understand the true meaning of Christmas.
Some of our advent activities included:

Our annual trip to Walls Family Farm to cut down our Christmas tree.
Carson brought his own saw this year.



Making Christmas cookies

Visiting the trains at Northpark
Going over to the Long's to decorate Christmas cookies



Some of our other activities (that I didn't get pictures of) included, going caroling at a few different houses (the kids sang Jingle Bells and We Wish You a Merry Christmas) making Christmas ornaments and then delivering them to our sweet meals on wheels clients, picking out toys for the "Christmas angels" at church, looking at Christmas lights, and Carson's favorite making a fire in our fire place (he is obsessed!!)

The kids also really got into "The Elf of the Shelf" this year. They got this Elf for their birthday from Aunt JJ, Uncle Travis, and Barrett and they loved it!! They named him Ellie and had so much fun waking up each morning and searching for his new hiding place. (I think Daddy had just about as much fun hiding Ellie each night). Here is Ellie on his last night before flying back to the North Pole.
And lastly, it just wouldn't be Christmas without a trip to see Santa. They did great this year!! They both ran right up (Carson even gave Santa a kiss) and sat right in his lap. They told Santa what they wanted for Christmas. Avery asked for a Doll house and Carson asked for a "kentar" (guitar). Not a single tear was shed this year, which kinda made me sad...my babies are growing up!
What a difference a year makes!


Wednesday, December 12, 2012

ICE

Avery and I had a really fun girl's day a few weekends ago while Shane and Carson were at the deer lease. We headed over to the Gaylord Texan with MiMi, KiKi, Bran, Britty, Berkley, Chelsea, and Ava to visit ICE. This year's theme was Merry Madagascar. It was so fun!
Avery loves her some baby Berkley!!


Getting bundled up to head into the freezer.
Britty, Bran, and Berkley

The Ice sculptures were amazing!




Brandy with sweet Berkley
It took a lot of convincing to get Avery to try out the slide,
but once she did, we couldn't get her off of it!
Britty and Avery


Avery, impersonating the hippo
I'm not sure which she loved more, the Ice sculptures or all of the baby Berkley time she got that day. 

She is obsessed!!

One more of this sweet little face!
We had such a fun day!

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving at MiMi and Papa's house with my side of the family and the Miller's this year! It was a fun day!
Sweet cousins!

Aunt TT and Kennedy
It was pretty warm that day, so we had lots of outside time!

Carson, helping MiMi unload the dishwasher
Shane and Tay
The boys frying our turkey
Sweet baby Berkley in her cute Thanksgiving outfit
Avery loves Berkley!
Poor baby, she got passed around a lot that day


The kids actually sat at their own table this year, so cute!
My mom and Christy did such a great job on the table!
Happy Thanksgiving!