Jocelyn's Birthday and Christmas Eve

On Christmas Eve this year, we had our traditional celebratory dinner with family and a small party for Jocelyn's birthday. After the delicious feast Julie prepared, the little ones got to open just a few presents in anticipation of Santa's arrival later that night.

Nana got Jocelyn the play ice cream set she had been asking for the past few weeks...


...and it had the desired effect!


Nana also got Ian a giant container of toy cars, and quite honestly I have never, ever seen a child be that excited when opening a present. It was pretty cool to watch.


We had a princess cake (of course) for Jocelyn's birthday, which went perfectly with the new dress that Nana had also bought her for her birthday. She and Ian loved getting yet another special treat to eat.


Overall, it was so wonderful to be able to celebrate with family on such a special night!

The Nutcracker

Jocelyn, Grammie and I went to see the Nutcracker last weekend and Jocelyn loved it! She had been fighting a bug but insisted on going anyway. This is a shot of her waiting for the doors to open - she doesn't look like a girl who had a 103.6 temp the night before! In fact, she made the crowd laugh by asking the announcer on stage where the "ballerina" was when he stopped speaking!

Grammie wanted to buy Jocelyn something to remember the day by - Jocelyn picked out an ornament for the Christmas tree...

A nutcracker...in purple of course!

Snuggling with me at intermission...

And imitating the beautiful dancers for us!
Thanks Grammie!! We had a wonderful afternoon!

Edaville Railroad Visit

Jocelyn and Ian were very excited to visit the Edaville railroad again, after we had so much fun last year! First up was a ride on the Ferris wheel. Ian was too small to ride it last year, so he was all kinds of fired up to get on this year. Here he is showing off how tall he's gotten.


While we waited in line, they were fascinated with watching how high up the wheel would take them.


They could barely wait until it was our turn to pile in together...


...and they got such a kick out of seeing Momma with the camera every time our car came around!


Later we warmed up by taking a ride on the train that circles the grounds. They liked the Christmas lights that the train passed so much that they asked to go on the train again after it got dark.


After that it was time for the merry-go-round, which we also rode multiple times.


And then, just before leaving, Jocelyn asked to have her picture taken with the giant Santa near the front entrance. What a wonderful time we all had!

Decorating Gingerbread Cookies

Jocelyn and Ian's school has an annual lunch to thank all the volunteers who help out in the classrooms and make the school such a special place. This year, Momma made some delicious gingerbread cookies for dessert, and enlisted Jocelyn to help decorate them.


To go with the cookies, Momma made thank-you cards with these photos attached. We thought they were so darn cute that we had to put them on the blog too!

Making Gingerbread Houses

One of the Christmas traditions that Jocelyn and Ian enjoy most is the chance to make their own gingerbread houses. We usually do it the long weekend after Thanksgiving. When they got started this year, they were very focused on the task at hand...


...but after a while it became less about building houses than about sampling the frosting and candy decorations, as it usually does.


Jocelyn came back strong to show off some nice handiwork on her house's lawn.


And Ian stripped down to his union suit to pose with the finished products!

Happy Thanksgiving

We are very late in posting photos from Thanksgiving...we've been so caught up in getting ready for Christmas! Here are a few shots, including this one, which is the closest we came to a decent family photo this year:


It's so nice to have so many of the kids in the family get together for Thanksgiving every year. We were missing Stephanie this year from the crew that normally goes to my Mom's, but the rest were kind enough to pose for a group shot.


And here's a nice shot of the ladies after we all enjoyed the wonderful dinner my Mom prepared.


It was so nice to have Julie's parents join us again this year too...the more the merrier! Happy Turkey Day everyone!

Happy Ween! (As Ian Called It)

Belle and Spiderman getting ready for the big night!

Ian's making his new angry face for the camera...

And Jocelyn and Ian with their silly faces!!

We had a blast going around the neighborhood and started with a pretty big group of kids...

 

Ultimately, one of Ian and Jocelyn's neighbor, Ainsley, showed Ian and Jocelyn the ropes around the hood! We had a great night and the kids are already asking if they can do it again!