Us 'n Stuff

Slow in the bloggin' world for us at this time. We've just been finishing up our Christmas fun (traditions, parties, etc.). School is still in session until the end of this week! Can you believe that? A few more parties there. We aren't going anywhere for Christmas this year. We will spend it at home, with friends and then off to Christopher's parent's house in the evening. Here's a little of us:

Christopher has been keeping our house warm with a nice roarin', roastin' fire these past few days! It's been cooooold! Anyone have any chestnuts?

Caden is fascinated by an open flame...much supervision is needed. He does really well with "HOT". He's learned his lesson one to many times (with other various "hot" items) in the past.
Mr. Cat is still being fed a regular diet of tuna fish from a can. Poor thing! Caden has known him his whole life! Christopher & the boys during our home Christmas photo session! Boy, do I have handsome men in my life!

My little lady and I during our photo session!
I'm just lovin' the functionality of one of my White Elephant gifts! So comfy and useful! Of course, the rubber chicken was the rage of our last party!
Classic Gavin photo op! No need to explain his personality! I love this kid! Never a dull moment!

Mushroom head, G-man!

He's also a Lego maniac! Guess what he wants for Christmas?
Some variation to a Lego's Mars Mission set. He likes to first build his lego kits by the book, and then construct his own version.
I had to include this b.c, seriously, this is a site to see! When does this ever happen!?!?!

Gavin transformed out! There's always 'more than meets the eye' with this kid!
Reese having some dolly movie time.
A little cold, Reese? Is it time to turn the heater on?!?
This is how Reese fingers the number 2. Texas Hook 'Em fan in training? Too cute!


Reese's Christmas solo shot.
Caden being his cute self!

Caden rockin' around the Christmas tree!

Caden gone incognito, ready for destruction and mischief.

Yes, this is gross! However, it must be preserved for prosperity sake...proof of his heinous ways once he has a child of his own! He threw a whole roll of TP in the toilet. There wasn't a drop left in the bowl. The question is, was there anything else in there?

And just one more shot of what Caden put in his mouth the other day. Yes, that is a wasp! He ate it along with some pretzels and then decided he didn't want it anymore and chucked it onto my carpet. Too bad Fear Factor has been cancelled! He could have won his mother a lot of money!
Lastly, in case there was any doubt what TIME it is:

Santa's Village..."not the REAL one"

The kids surprised us a little last night. We try to add a little Christmas each year by going to the Santa's Village in Richardson. Gavin had to point out this year that we were not going to the REAL Santa's Village...it's not in Texas. So, we pretended.

The kids have a blast going to all the little shops and houses in the village. Inside each place is a craft or activity to do or even animals to pet.

You can even wait in a long line to sit on Santa's lap (which we prefer not to do) or feed reindeer with "magic feed". The grounds are very ornate with decorated trees and lights galore!

This year however, we were met with more whines and cries from the kids! We could have had less of that! They were cold this year. It dipped into the low 50's and we are all cold wimps!

Not sure if we will attempt this activity again unless the temps are a little more comfortable! Unfortunately, this is the last weekend and we had to give it a try! We didn't stay long, maybe 45 minutes, but we were all able to find some holiday cheer and were happy to leave and find some hot chocolate!

A Christmas Grinch!

A Christmas Grinch hit (quite literally) our family the other night, in the form of an UNINSURED, HIT & RUN, rear-end nightmare! Ugh! We were on our way to a family (all 5 of us) outing to the gym, stopped at a red light minding our own business. BAM! Gigantic truck hits us from behind and then drives away! Thank goodness we weren't in the Honda...we'd be dead! Every one is fine. Just some sore necks and backs, headaches, dealing with our insurance company, deductibles, new car seats, time missed out on other opportunities...and our car going into the shop until after Christmas! What a headache! We could use a little holiday cheer! Anyone have some to share? Please do!

Cyclops Gingerboy & more...

A special thanks to Grandma & Pa Haslam for supplying our FHE craft/treat for last night. They sent the kids a Gingerbread kit and the kids went crazy with it! Here are the results:

Gavin and Reese examining the pound of candy that came with the kit!

Time to get busy and construct the Gingerbread house.
We didn't waste anytime getting the candy piled on as fast as we could! Less time for the candy to find its way into their mouths!
Reese took it upon herself to decorate this little man. She made sure he only had one eye. "'Cuz that's all he needs! Silly goose egg, Daddy!" - Reese
The completed project! I suppose this is Cyclops Gingerboy's little house of holiday horror!
Of course, this is what the house looks like today! That must have been some party! Cyclops is missing too!

Reese's 1st Dance Recital

"It's my special day today!"-Reese

Today was Reese's winter recital for her dance class! She has been waiting for this day to come since September when she first started dance. For the last month or so she's been singing and dancing "Nuttin' for Christmas" around the house or in the car. (This is the song that she's been rehearsing for her tap number.) She'll have the song played on repeat in the car and sing along for half and hour...easy! Yesterday morning Christopher and I woke up to her singing this song quite loudly from her bed. She did not disappoint in her performance tonight. Here's the run down.

After Granna arrived to town we headed over to the High School Auditorium for a little Holidazzle Dance Recital! Reese was pretty excited to perform up until she saw all the people and the stage she was about to perform on! I too started to get a little nervous seeing how Ms. Renee (Reese's dance instructor) specifically said she was putting Reese right in the middle with the older girls being that Reese was doing so well with her dance. They try to keep the girls that will freeze or run off the stage on the sides and the girls that will actually perform in the middle. Needless to say, I too was a little concerned. Here's Reese sitting back in the make-up room waiting for all the other girls to arrive.

Here she is getting a little anxious about me leaving her and she going onto a dark stage to wait for her performance. (They were the opening act.)
Reese started to cry as Ms. Renee swooped her up in her arms and took her on stage. I ran back to the auditorium to sit with the family. At this point, I was not expecting her to do well and was just praying that she would not cry or run off on stage. Now, you'll have to excuse the following pictures (and video). I should NEVER leave Christopher in charge of these things!

Here's Reese (just left of the gingerbread foot) as the curtain's opened. She had tears in her eyes as she stood there waiting for the music. I was praying for a miracle at this point. She was cute though standing all sassy and pouty with her arms crossed.

As soon as the music started and not a second later, I kid you not, she perked right up and was the star of the show!

Check her out on video! Again, please excuse the poor video. We had to film it with our camera as our video camera is on the fritz! Oh, that, and Christopher doesn't pay attention to what he's doing behind the camera either!

Part two of the same song!

We were so proud of her! While she was on stage the lady sitting next to me leaned over and said, "take a look at the little one in the middle...she couldn't be but 3 and is really movin'." This proud mom leaned on over and said, "that's my daughter!" Yes, I was beaming from ear to ear the entire performance! Her class is the Pre-school Playhouse for 3 to 5 year olds (so your expectations could't be that high) and she was tappin' her little heart out! I was really surprised that she could somewhat memorize a routine. She really loves to perform.

Here she is after her performance back stage where we picked her up! She got a prize for her performance! A butterfly and ribbon do-da!

Then we headed on out to Applebee's for dinner! We couldn't talk Reese into anything BUT Applebee's. Whatever. It was her "special day" so we let her decide. Here we are chillin' in the A/C (it was hot and muggy today) at Applebee's.
Here's a shot of Caden throwing his sippy cup all over the dirty floor. Don't have anything with him in it today, so I thought I'd put this up! lol.

Reese and her favorite drink...bottled Root Beer.

Granna and Reese feelin' the love! She reeeeally loved having her Granna at her performance! Thank you Granna for taking the time to drive out to see Reese dance!

Could Reese be any more of a messy eater? Geez, kid!

Daddy with Gavin and Reese with some take out!

Reese is already madly talking about her Spring recital. This is the big one. The one that costs mommy and daddy a small fortune in costume and recital fee's and she will perform 2 to 3 times. We all can't wait! Stay tuned!