Fa La La La La, La La La La!

I'm one of those people that doesn't listen to Christmas music until AFTER Thanksgiving, but once Thanksgiving is over, it's always on the radio in my car. :)  And of course, Kate has learned the words to many of the traditional Christmas favorites.  We're pretty excited that she knows more than just Jingle Bells this year, because last year that's about the only song she'd sing.  Well, that, and Frosty the Snowman! 

This past Friday was her last day of school before break and her K4 class had a Christmas performance and a party! 

We were all packed into her classroom, so the teacher asked everyone to make arrangements for other kids, so that it would be parents only.  We made arrangements and Kevin's dad watched Karsten. I think we were probably one of the only families that followed directions because there were probably 5 other "little" brothers and sisters that came along. It was crowded! But the kids did so great!

They sang some of the songs that they do every day, such as Days of the Week, Circle Time, Color songs, and My God is So Big.  Then they sang some of the Christmas songs that they had been practicing, and decided Luke 2:11.  So great!

Then on Sunday, some of our kids from church sang during our service. They sang Away in a Manger and did a great job too!  They loved being (somewhat) on the stage.  I don't think any of our kids are shy!

It can't be Christmas without some singing, right?? :) 

House Building

Just kidding - our family is NOT building a house.  We are happily settled in the same house we have been in for 8+ years.  However, Kate and I built a gingerbread house tonight in honor of Christmas Eve Eve. :)

Check out the concentration. This girl was a perfectionist, which made Mom's job even more difficult since she wanted ME to be in charge of the icing. Let's just say that gingerbread house decorating is not my gift. 

Fake smile for the win! But I think our house turned out pretty well!

Smiles for Santa?

Last week, Santa came to my work!  This worked out great, because we weren't really looking forward to going to the mall and standing in line for hours to see Santa.  One of our shareholders at work dressed up as Santa and I have to say, he was pretty impressive.

This was Karsten's first Santa visit, and I had a pretty good idea of how this was going to go.  Let's just say, she did not prove my suspicions wrong.

Karsten was less than thrilled with Santa.  She is pretty clingy to me, and didn't even want to look at Santa when I got close to him. I tried to ease her into it and when that didn't work, I just plopped her in his lap and walked off. Obviously that did not work.

Kate, of course, was so excited to see Santa and let him know that she REALLY wanted "Chase from Paw Patrol" for Christmas.

We stayed around for about 30 minutes while the kids ran around and played with each other. Karsten is in a running-everywhere phase so she would take off, and then she would realize that she was running toward Santa, so she'd quickly stop and then change directions.

She was much more excited about dinner later than night than the jolly 'ole man in the red suit.

Maybe next year...

Christmas Card 2015

For the past few years, I've linked up with Faith to share our Christmas cards, and I figured this year shouldn't be any different.

We had family pictures done back in late-October, and these were also Karsten's 1-year pictures. I'll share the rest of our family photos in a separate post later, but that's where these came from. :)  So without any further ado, here is our 2015 card...

And now a look back at some of our cards in previous years, starting with 2014...

And 2013...

Oh and who can forget the Great Christmas Card Debacle of 2012...

And that's it!  For our family, the month of December is a time to celebrate the joy and GIFT that is Jesus Christ.  While we definitely focus on his birth during December, all year long we try to remember that his birth, life, death, and resurrection are what the true gift of Christmas is. Through Him we are able to have life.

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

Sunday Lovin'

It probably goes without saying, but these two girls wear a lot of red during the month of December... and especially on Sundays!  Here they are this morning, ready for church!

Crafty Husband

I'm on Pinterest and often find things that I'd love to do, but they're just a bit much for me.  I do not regularly use power tools. :)  So of course, a lot of the pallet projects are a bit out of my league, though I do love a lot of them!

However, about a week ago, Kevin saw a Christmas tree pallet that someone had done and shared on Facebook.  He definitely wouldn't have seen it on Pinterest since he does NOT have an account.  (Let's face it, Pinterest is probably a pretty female-dominated social media platform anyway!)  So, he saw a picture, said "I can do that" and decided to take this on as a Daddy/Daughter project with Kate.

So this is what they did last weekend...

For obvious reasons, Kate was left out of the cutting portion of this activity, but she sure loved the rest and took control of the lights...

Not sure why the picture below shows the wood grain. It looks like solid painted green in real life.  They did a great job! And now this thing is plugged in and lighting up our back yard.  Kate LOVES to pull into the driveway and see it sitting there.

And now that Kevin has taken on a Pinterest project on his own, and done such a great job at it, I may be making a list for him of things to do! :) 

Thanksgiving in Charleston Part 3

My aunt had an early Christmas gift for the little kids when we were all together over Thanksgiving - new Christmas pajamas!

It was so funny because when I got there, one of the first things I told my mom was that I needed to go get the girls some Christmas PJs, and when my cousin got there she said the same thing. What a perfect surprise!

One of the girl cousins....

Kate got to hold the littlest cousin, Miller.  I know it was just a year ago but it seems like forever ago that Karsten was that small!

And of course we got one of all of the cousins!

Great way to kick off the Christmas season. :)