The Joys of Christmas

Oh what a Christmas it has been!! Such a wonderful day with the the whole family being together in the morning and getting together with friends in the afternoon!

The kids awoke just before 8am and Bobby was anxious to see what what Santa had left for him. We made him wait in his room for awhile so we could get the camera and make sure that Amaryllis was clean. He did mention that he could see some stuff from his bed, crazy sneaky child. Then we let him loose down the hallway. Santa had wrapped everything, except for Amaryllis' BIG present, which Amaryllis went right to ad LOVED! Santa got her a doorway playhouse. She enjoyed opening the door and windows, and ringing the doorbell was fun too!

While she played, we let Bobby dive into the pile of presents. He enjoyed figuring out who's present belonged to which person. He loved ALL his stuff and got his FP3 Player, and Santa even knew he liked Peter Pan music because it was on the player!

After all the presents were opened and the stocking gone through, we had bacon and french toast for breakfast. Bobby ate at least 3 pieces of french toast within a matter of minutes and Amaryllis ate almost 2 slices herself! Afterward, she went to take a nap.

10:00am we turned the TV onto ABC to watch Disney's Christmas parade and Bobby got out another toy that he had gotten from Beca and Pappy, a Disney Hero's Fort. Boy did he love this toy and played with it (with about a fifteen minute break to eat lunch) until we left for the Billman's house at 2:30pm!!!

We enjoyed our time at the Billman's. The kids got to open a few more presents and we ate a wonderful dinner with friends. After, the Wii's came out (yes, that's plural, so the adults could play on one and the kids on the other). It was a nice relaxing time with friends. We got home around 9:30pm and put the kids to bed and now I"m ready to wind down too.

I would be posting pictures now too, BUT the batteries to our digital camera's died!! Perfect timing, huh? So Bob was sweet enough to run to Walgreen's last night and pick up a disposable one. Hopefully I haven't lost the knack for taking pictures on regular film, and waiting to see what they look like is a bummer too. But with that and the video camera, I know that we will have the memories saved!

And with that, I hope that everyone who reads this has had a very Merry Christmas, full of love and peace and giving!

Letter to Santa

For the past 2 years, Bobby has written a letter to Santa. Last year, it was so hard for me to write everything down. This year I decided to video his letter so that I could get everything down and not have to stop his thought process. You can watch it here!

O Christmas Tree

Yesterday afternoon Bob picked Bobby up from school and got to stay home for about an hour so that we could decorate the tree as a family!!! We got the tree last Thursday, so it's been sitting in the house undecorated for days! So while Amaryllis was napping I got the decorations out of the attic and put the lights on before the boys got home, that way we could start when thy got here. Bobby was so funny when he walked in the door!! He just loves Christmas decorations and was so happy that the tree had lights and the tree skirt was on!!! Bobby dove right into the box, without asking, to start decorating!!! It was so funny to see him pull out ornaments, asking if that particular one was his and so on. And as usual, he picked ONE spot of the tree and hung a bunch of ornaments right there. After telling him to try and hang them other places, he did!

Amaryllis was too much too! She wanted all the ornaments herself, of course. We had to watch to make sure that she didn't try eating the hooks. She did get to hang one or two on with the help of Daddy, but she also wanted to take them off again!! The bottom of our tree looks bare, Daddy's attempt to try and keep Amaryllis away!! We'll see if it works. She's been over to see the tree a few times, but we'll have to keep our eyes on her for sure!

After all was done, our tree is wonderful! Just perfect for this family!

POTTY TIME!!

So, I know that I'm a crazy mother. One of the things that prove it is that I start to potty train my kids when they start walking. And since Amaryllis started walking 2 weeks ago, I thought it would be fun to start and see what she does!! Learning from Bobby, I know when the prime times to take her to sit on the potty are and so we sat 4 different times today! Three out of those four time she did something in the potty!! I couldn't believe it!! Trust me, I realize that it really means nothing and I was lucky to get her to go on the potty, but it's a start! She even went poopoo once!! She did try to touch it and we waved bye to it as we flushed, I don't think that she wanted to see it go! It was funny!! Well, it looks like we are gonna be sitting in the bathroom more often now! She really enjoyed just sitting there and playing with the bathroom toys, the toys only used in the tub! Maybe Santa will be able to find a few new ones for her so that she'll have some more toys to play with while she sits on the potty!!

And now it gets interesting...

A High Country Christmas Carol

Friday evening was world premiere of A High Country Christmas Carole by Robert Inman.

From the website: "Blowing Rock Stage Company veteran playwright, Robert Inman, brings the Dickens classic to the modern stage. Set in the Depression-era North Carolina mountains, A High Country Christmas Carol is the story of a curmudgeonly country store owner Silas McTavish, who rediscovers the magic of Christmas with the help of an unexpected Christmas Eve visitor."

As Amaryllis stayed in te lobby with Daddy, Bobby and I went in to watch. Of course Bobby knows most of the cast, as we are friends with them. It was a great show!! Bobby was a little worried over the scene in the graveyard. Trying to explain to him that it's the characters that die and not the people, he was so worried about Uncle Gary (not Silas) and the baby (played by a doll)!! Uncle gary and Auntie Melvin were his 2 favorite charcters. And although Amaryllis didn't watch the show, she heard the applause from the lobby and had to come in to clap her hoorays for the cast!

Mima Bird

Amaryllis is at that fun fun stage of starting to copy what people are doing!!! Just yesterday she started signing "Please" and is so cute when she does it!! Now I need to refresh some of my signs and start using them more and more for her!! Bobby really gets into it to, so that should be fun for him too!! Oh, how I wish that I was fluent, what a dream! And today, she was in her room and went to one of Bobby's games, Wack-a-mole Tower, picked up the hammer and started "playing" the game!! It was so cute! Of course, she can't hit the thing hard enough to make the game work, and the hammer is quite heavy, I was afraid that she'd knock herself out instead!! HA!! But it was cute anyway! I love this stage, it means she's getting more independent!! I am NOT waiting for the day that she talks back to me though!

Thanksgiving, Black Friday and yet another snow day!

Well, it's nice to be on the internet again today since I haven't been able to get on since Saturday!! It went down and is still down, but our neighbor is letting me get on hers!! YEAH!!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving though and I hope that everyone else did too!! We enjoyed the day over at Lisa and Gary's place. The day started with watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade, Bob wouldn't have it any other way!! We headed off to Lisa and Gary's house on a commercial break and watched the rest over there. I made pumpkin pancakes for all of us and they were very yummy!! The rest of our friends came over around 2pm and we ate around 3:30!! It was so yummy! everyone brought a dish and we all ended up munching all day. It was a pretty nice day outside, so Bobby and Brooklyn got to play outside a lot, always nice! Amaryllis was wonderful and got passed around, as long as she's getting attention!! Both kids ate very well and Amaryllis snacked on turkey and ham later too!! Lisa made drinks for everyone with Parma, a pomogranite liqueur! They were very yummy!!! Later in the day, we played a game called celbrity salad bowl, Bob and I were on the same team and did pretty well! Eca and Drew brought over the Wii, which Bobby and Brooklyn had a blast playing together! Later in the evening, the other adults played poker and I sat on the computer looking at ads and planning my Friday morning shopping!!! Then they switched and played dominoes, so I joined in the fun. We ended up not leaving there until almost 2am!!!!!! And both kids were awake!! So I dropped Bob and the kids off at home and went SHOPPING!!!





The outlets near our house opened at midnight for Black Friday!! I talked Eca into going with me... hahaha!! She had never been shopping on black friday!! So we hit the outlet mall at 2am with coffee in hand!! And since we got started late, we headed to Hickory (where all of the stores are) after we left the outlets!! We made it down there at about 4:30am, and Toys R US was due to open at 5am. They had on the little kids sofa's that I had wanted to get Amaryllis for her birthday and hadn't gotten her yet! Oops! Well, she got it!! and we were out of there by 5:15am and on our way to Best Buy!! In line to check out of Best Buy at about 5:30am!! HA!! It was quite a line, but it moved pretty well and by the time we were out of that store, Target (which is next to it) was just opening!! So into Target we went!! Got stuff there and that line was so CrAZY!!! It basically wrapped around the whole store! It was fine though and moved well, so we were out of their at around 7am! Got some breakfast at McD's and off to WalMart! Got some stuff there and had NO LINES!!!!!!!! Then we went to Big Lots (got nothing there) and another WalMart and back up the mtn by 11am!!! I dropped Eca off and hit the WalMart and Kmart up here before picking the kids up!! Brought the kids home, fed them some lunch and all 3 of us took naps until 5pm!!!! What a fun day!

Saturday was the parade in town. The kids and I went while Bob helped man the coffee shop, and boy were they busy!! YEAH! I forgot to bring the camera, but both kids enjoyed watching the parade, and Bobby enjoyed getting the candy! It was cold and rainy, but we walked down to see the tree and then rushed home to get the car and go to the grocery store to get more stuff for the coffee shop!!!

Yesterday we went to church and that's about it, and today is another snow day for the kids! It started out as a 2 hour delay!! It's been snowing on and off all morning! Our new neighbor, Bernie, is over. His mom had called to see if I could take him to school cause of the delay and since it got cancelled, we have Bernie. The boys are being AWESOME right now playing with trains in the bedroom, and the baby is sleeping in the pack and play in my room!!! AAHHHH!! A little peace and quiet for me since the boys were CRAZY this morning!!