November/December Jewels and Recap

So I noticed last night that this will be my 146th post for the year...this is my least blogy-est year yet.
::hangs head in shame:: ;)  HA! My system is to download pics, and then blog them and then file them as needed...wanna know where I stopped? Mid-November.

Here I am organizing and trying to get my digi scrap on. And lo and behold I failed. HA. I just want my memories in one tangible place...so get ready for picture overload. :)

November Highlights--
A zoo trip with one of my besties...I love these girls together. My MIL got us this zoo membership and I couldn't be more thrilled and the next day it was really nice for November, so we went. Of course we had big plans to be there at 930a...zoo opens at 10a, so we went to the park instead to kill time. Love this photo Ginger took!

Zoo fun...

 MW admiring the beautiful giraffe! He knows. He is my boy!

I took the kids through the rainforest while Ginger hung back with Ezra, hoping he would nap...

 Gorilla love and lunch break! I Love going to the zoo with these guys, so fun!

 Another beautiful November night, playing at the park.

My little Rainbow Bright! What can I say she has her own fashion sense...better than mine at least! ;)

 I don't want to go all bragg-y about my kids, but I suppose this is my blog so I can. HA!
Leighton's mind is a beautiful thing. I am now starting to see her strengths and weaknesses in learning and how she learns. She is very artsy. She colors all day and in the lines very meticulously, most of the time...she also comes up with craft ideas or projects. She is always trying to figure out how to "make" something from nothing. That's my girl! Below is a prime example. She wanted a doll carrier for her bike. They are like $6, I would have just bought one...nope she wanted to make one.

So there you have it...this is 100% her conception, daddy just did the cutting with the box cutter. She told him exactly where and how to cut so her dolls would fit and how to put it on her bike. She did the same thing with the elves she crafted.


Now for some highlights for December.

Leighton up and finally learned to spell her own name. All the letters are there, order not so much. HA! However she now has them all in order and can do it with zero help. Pretty good considering her name is 8 letters long! And just for the record I have no part in this. She is always self taught and driven. Which is probably a good thing for this mommy.

Daddy turned 32 a few weeks ago. You know when you get old your birthday means little.
For his actual birthday we made a chocolate chip cookie in a mug. It was so good and perhaps a tad dangerous of a skill to learn. Pinterest it. You won't be sad.

 

Leighton was pretending it was snowing inside, thus the attire. :)

 

 A few nights later we had dinner with his mom for his birthday. Lo liked the broccoli! Only my kids.

 Leighton is very into making cards and gift pictures for people and wrapping them all up herself. It really means so much when she does that!

 MW takes after me and his grandma...CHOCOLATE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 My grandparents are moving, so we went over to pilfer their home for ourselves. HA! The kids had fun running and jumping on the mattress.

I love this picture. Daddy always gets the snuggles. Not fair. 

Well besides a few snow day pictures and a visit to my Great Grandma and the kids' Great GREAT grandma that pretty much sums up December!

Now to snuggle up, enjoy the snow coming down, drinking my hot coffee and celebrating the New Year! Seems like just a month or so ago I was closing the chapter on 2011 and relishing the fact MW was going to be one. Now they are nearly 2 and 4. This is just utterly heartbreaking to me. They both are at such perfect wonderful ages and I can't bear the thought of either growing another day older...Leighton thinks it is so funny when I teasingly tell her to go sit in the corner for "growing up."

Happy New Year's Eve.
See ya next year!

A Very Jake Christmas

I hope you all had as blessed of a Christmas as we did.
I was just telling Chad as I was going through the pictures, that I really LOVE how Christmas went this year. I feel like we really struck a nice balance between celebrating the reason--our SAVIOR's birth and embracing the fun and whimsical--Santa and Izzy the elf. We have started some really great new traditions and I love it.

I also took a step back this year from overly decorating and trying to cram a bunch of "memories" down all of our throats. We just went with the flow and it was nice and relaxing.

I was part of our church vocal team's 6! Christmas Eve services. We had 2 each day starting on Saturday. At times it was long and draining, but it was so worth it to be apart of something so fantastic.

Every year I fail to take a Christmas Eve "best" picture...so here it is. Not so great as 1.MW has a meltdown every.single.time we want a family photo op and 2. My husband looks like grizzly Adams, he is going all Duck Dynasty on me over break...NOT HAPPY, HAPPY, HAPPY. 3. I am exhausted from our services and sick. :( At least Lo looks cute!

Sunday afternoon Chad and I headed to my parent's for our family Christmas, the kids were lucky enough to spend the night before hand.

My sister got the kids these cool digi cameras! As you can see Lo was THRILLED. She loves taking pictures and scrapbooking. Thanks Auntie 'lissa! Even MW loved going around "trying" to work it. HA!
MW finally got his long awaited helmet...if you know him, you would understand.

Tickle monster gloves! And Jake and the NLP figurines...let's just say between both GPs the kids may own every Jake and the NLP figurine, toy, book, dvd and bath accessory there is and if not, I predict by birthday's end they will, which is in 1 month's time! {Thus, the Very Jake Christmas reference.}

My sister, Meg, knows my love for coffee and got me the perfect gift. ;) A shower coffee pot! {prank gift} HA!
Look at my eyes...I was having a severe allergic reaction to the fog machines from church and I was miserable, but trying to stay with it! :(
MW eating per usual. Lo got a darling tea set from her great grandma.
I made my mom a cute photo collage that says "WE LOVE YOU" by each one of her kids.
And I may or may not have a spray paint addiction, so my mom got me a special kit to mix my own...look out world! HA!

Leighton and Papa trying to keep the "Tree Ghost" from coming into the house! The imagination this girl has. She kept looking out the peep hole {see 2nd pic} and shouting "WATCH OUT! The tree ghost is coming!!"

 

 

{Christmas Eve}
Monday night I got home just in time to get ready for Santa.
Letters. check.
Cookies and chocolate milk. check.
Carrots for the reindeer. check.

 

This year my friend Ginger turned me onto this manger idea. 

If the kids were caught being selfless, kind, or serving they could put some "hay" in Baby Jesus' manger. The goal was to have enough for Jesus to come on Christmas night.

However, I took it a step further by asking each of us (minus MW because he is too young this year) to write out a gift for Jesus. Just a characteristic we want to work on to be more like HIM.

Then we laid them in the manger. I will keep them so we can see how we did next year. Lo's was sweet with "I am going to pray to Jesus for my sins."

My attempt at cool photos...clearly I need more help, but it is a start.

{Christmas Day}

What time did your kids get up?
Lo got up at 230AM! I kid you not. Dressed and ready. Apparently she peed through her pull-up and  wet her bed, so she got dressed and came to our room asking when can we open presents?! I told her Santa hadn't come yet, go to sleep. Well, she laid there talking. Then I started my coughing fit. Finally by 345a I got up and said I am going elsewhere in hopes she would GO BACK TO SLEEP. She must have because daddy and her came in to get me around 730a. Wow...thought I had a few more years before the 3a wake up calls!

Moving on...

Baby Jesus came! We sang Happy Birthday to Him before diving into the other gifts. Santa may or may not have covered up his gifts, because Santa doesn't wrap over here. ;) Just to minimize distraction. Just keepin' real.

Christmas morning fun!
We keep things very simple at our house. Sometimes I feel bad that we don't get the kids a lot...but the truth is the GPs spoil them so there really is no point.
They each get 1 Santa gift +stockings and 1-2 small gifts from us.
Santa brought MW as scooter. This boy goes into our neighbor's garage anytime it is open to "steal" their scooter...so best he has his own now! He LOVES it!
And Lo got a Bucky {Jake and the NLP} ship.
From us Lo got her beloved dog...when we turned it on it literally ran around yipping and jumping. Chad was like "really?!" we already have TWO dogs that do that! BAHAHA! Truth.
And MW got a farm house. And wait for it...a JAKE dvd!

The sweetest gift was Lo's. She worked so hard making a picture for me and daddy. She even wrapped it up in paper, bow and all and put it under the tree. What a great girl! And look how proud she is!

 

In the midst of playing with their new toys, they stopped to go be "Mary and Joseph" to baby Jesus. It was so sweet watching them play together and love on baby Jesus. Seeds planted.

Then over to Grandma Rachel's for more food and gifts.

Jesus' Birthday cake.

They each got these cool super hero capes now they can be "real" superheros.

MW loved two things this Christmas. Eating. And opening EVERYONE's gifts. That boy and gift wrap. My MIL saw this thing where you could wrap that press and seal saran wrap around your kid to make a "bib." Best idea Evah. Pin it... :)

Leighton getting her scrapbook on. She may just have grammy beat on it. HA!

A great Christmas complete with a Christmas day nap with MW! I was shocked by it, but that was a sweet gift he gave me, even if he didn't know it. I love having my little family to celebrate with.

Merry Christmas!

Izzy {pt 3}

I want to finish cataloging all Izzy's antics this month.

Towards the end we were really struggling with ideas. Mostly because if we put him lower MW would have touched him, a BIG elfy no no! Maybe next year MW will behave better?! :)


Fishin'

Izzy thought it to be hilarious to TP our tree.
Lo just was beside herself with the mess. She couldn't believe how "naughty" that was.

Hiding in the tree. It took her FOREVER to find him that day.

One Friday afternoon Izzy made up a batch of "snow" aka Cloud Dough.
Oh the fun and mess that was made. I got a TON of cool mom  points for this one...just sayin'

Magic "seeds" aka tic tacs. We planted them in sugar and the next morning...

cookies! I wanted them to stand up on sucker sticks, but I just couldn't get it to work. :( oh well, they thought it was cool.

 

Izzy taking his BFFs Birthday picture with Lo's new camera!

On Saturday night before Christmas the kids had a sleepover at Grammy and Papa's. Izzy secretly made the trip too. Unfortunately this girl forgot to take a pic. Both kids found him right away and couldn't believe he "popped in" there!

His final antic was making a Bucky Ship from Jake and the NLP for the kids! Chad totally rocked this all on his own. I woke up in the morning just as surprised as the kids! I was BLOWN away. I think Chad may like those blocks more than MW. HA!

On Christmas Eve Izzy had to go home.
So Izzy gave each kid a "report card."

 Both kids made the nice list! YAY!

 {Report Card}

 Then Santa lifted the magic so the kids could kiss and hug Izzy goodbye.

Santa would pick Izzy up when he got to our house stop.

Izzy was a really fun tradition to do with our kids. I think we have a good balance between celebrating the reason for the season, JESUS' birth and the whimsical side. More on that later, but both of my kids even at the tender ages of nearly 2 and 4 recognized the difference and embraced both.