Christmas celebration #4

We celebrated our 4th and final Christmas with my sister and her family Monday. We exchanged presents and spent some time together playing at the house. The native Texans were craving some good Mexican food, so we went to Chuys for lunch and spent the majority of the time taking pictures of each other on our cell phones so our pictures will pop up with caller I.D. Out of the 12 of us, there were 9 camera phones going. We looked like major dorks, but it was fun!

The boys LOVE wrestling with Trent and Trevor.

After exchanging gifts, we headed over to our favorite spot to take pictures. You can see how much the kids have grown from my Christmas posts last year here and here.

The 4 Ts
Tatum, Taylor, Trent and Trevor

Finally a decent family shot! Woo hoo!

Christmas celebration #3

the lake house biker gang

4 1/2 year old Jake riding his bike with no training wheels!

One of my favorite pictures ever!

Giving us their mean, biker growls

I love that these pictures of the boys really capture their sweet little personalities!

The kids love going on golf cart rides with Gege.


Happy Holidays!

Merry Christmas!

The boys were ready bright and early to go see the goodies Santa brought them Christmas morning.

It was so early when we all went to see the presents, the sun wasn't even up yet.

Emmy and Abby

Jake

Our Christmas tradition is that Santa leaves a note every year in the boys' stockings for them to hunt for their last present. This year, Emmy and Abby read the clues and helped them find their presents. Santa surprised them with new robots and they were so excited.

The boys LOVED their new bikes. Austin did great riding his new big boy bike. He likes to call it his "little tiny big boy bike". Ethan hopped right on his big bike and zoomed around.

We had a great Christmas and we hope your family did too! Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve

Our Christmas Eve started off just like everyone else's. We watched Kai climb way up high in a tall, scrawny tree to get a wooden airplane for the boys and then watched him jump in a freezing cold lake. This year it was his turn to take the plunge since the Aggies lost to Texas. The weather wasn't near as cold as it was for poor Eric last year.

That afternoon, we opened presents and had fun playing with our new toys.

Ethan made Blue Rat a present and even wrapped it for him.

One of my favorite presents is a personalized sign with our names on it from Eric's mom.

The boys had fun playing ball with Eric.

The kids went to bed early in anticipitation of Santa's arrival. It was so fun to see them so excited!

a long winters nap

We spent the first couple of days of our holiday vacation bundled up at the lake house. It was freezing cold outside and it felt so good to do absolutely nothing but relax indoors. The kids had fun playing together, while the grownups ate, napped, played games, read books and ate some more. I don't think I've ever been so lazy and it felt great!

My attempt at capturing just how chilly it was outside.

Christmas celebration #1

Saturday we loaded up the car with presents and luggage until we couldn't fit one more thing in it. We had the cargo carrier on top and the cargo hitch on back. We did save room for our two kids and the dog. Poor Kirby had to sit on a blanket on a folded down car seat. She didn't seem to mind even though we were in the car for a total of 6 hours. The boys are great little travelers and enjoyed watching movies to pass the time.

Our first stop was to Nanny and Papa's house for a mini Christmas.

Nanny and her girls

Cousin Stacy, Kip, Kristi and Kori Beth

Papa and his girls

The kids had fun playing on Nanny and Papa's fun hill

Nanny made 4 beautiful quilts to give her 4 grandchildren. We drew numbers to see which one we each would get. I drew a gorgeous quilt hand embroidered with the 48 state flowers. There were only 48 states at the time the pattern was made, so that tells you how old it is. It's very special to us and we will treasure it always.

After the party, we headed on our 5 hour journey to the lake house. We made it safely and we are ready to spend our days playing with family and relaxing!