Christmas '08 ...Continued....

DECEMBER 25, 2008

Christmas Morning....
It's a tradition that we wait for everyone to wake up before any presents are opened. Then we let them rip open their gifts, one at a time so they can all see what each other got.
Jackson is a little hard to handle, since he wouldn't wait and just wanted to open everything ;o)

BUT...his first present, he didn't have to open. He woke up, came downstairs and saw his Cars tent and ran to it....


Then the girls dug in...

MCQUEEN!!!
It was a Christmas made up of various Cars toys and a bunch of Planet Heroes ;o)
And even an Imaginext Castle!


As for the girls, they got their clothes from Limited Too, some jammies...Jenna got her snowboard and Hannah Montana beanbag chair, they both got Webkinz and a couple Kooky Klickerz pens. I know they got more, I just can't remember ;o(
BUT
the highlight of their Christmas morning, was getting their phones. I wish I had a pic of them opening them up...but I have something even better! A VIDEO!
But for some odd reason, I can never upload video to bogger ;o(
I will try to upload it to my FB page, but can't promise anything...

After all that, we had our yummy traditional breakfast of Breakfast Bake then cleaned up and headed out to my brother's...

CHRISTMAS 2008

DECEMBER 24, 2008

First, I want to share a couple of pictures of our Christmas tree. We got a new one...FINALLY! Our old one was a hand me down from my Dad, which he got from someone else; So it was super old! I have had that tree since 1996, so it was time for a new one ;o) Then...this super cute pic of Jackson.
I think it was taken on Dec. 22, after the girl's Church Christmas service.
He was smiling so wide and kinda standing still, so I had to snap a quick pic ;o)

Here he is on Christmas Eve, hanging out with Hall the Moose (he got Hal from his sisters for Christmas).

Every year, we spend a few hours on Christmas Eve with my Grandma and my Dad's family. O forgot my camera, so I have no pics of that ;o(
Jackson was, of course, running around like crazy and making friends with my cousin's little boy, Ayden. They were soooo stinkin' cute, running around, getting into trouble...playing in the bubbler in the hallway. I am sure it was all Jackson's idea...he's a bad influence ;o)

ANYWAY--after we got home, everyone cozied up in their jammies and we watched A Christmas Story.

This year was THE FIRST year that Dave actually helped me wrap presents. He did pretty good, except for his shotty job on Jenna's snowboard...lol...
You can kinda see it, off to the right.

This is a pic I shot after we "set up" their gifts under the tree.
I sure do love our new tree!!

All I want for Christmas...is a NICE pic of my 3 kids; WHAT a workout!

DECEMBER 4, 2008

Trying to get Christmas pics taken of the kids has turned into a marathon of chasing, bribing and an overage of screaming...by Jackson...


Look at how nice my girls are smiling...while trying to tame their brother...LOL...they are just too sweet ;o)
This is only ONE of many failed attempts, but I will spare you all the heartache of seeing poor Jackson suffer through having to sit still for more than 5 seconds at a time...lol

I did get a couple of nice shots of the girls, by themselves...I did want a pic of all 3 by themselves for a collage, but yeah...you can see that wasn't going to work ;o(


My 13 year old, Haley


10 yr. old Jenna


This is THE best shot that I got of all three together. Yes, we had to BRIBE Jackson to sit still for...I think it was 4 seconds...with a Candy Cane.


Here is the finished product.
With a bunch of help from Photoshop and a ton of free online scrapbooking papers and elements; I think our Christmas '08 picture turned out pretty good!

Christmas Cookies

DECEMBER 13, 2008

Every year, my mom and my sister come over and we spend the whole day baking cookies, making candy and spending time together. It's usually around the middle of December.
This was the first year that Jackson was able to help out ;o)


Let's just say he had his fill of cookie dough...lol


Jackson, my Mom and Jenna - She's busy rolling out the dough with my broken rolling pin...Jackson broke it ;o(
Only one of the handles busted off, so it was still usable.


Here is part of Haley, helping out with the Peanut Butter balls, or maybe she was putting caramel on the pecans??...yummmmm!


...just a bit of our supplies.


Just a teeny bit of the cookies ;o)

So, we made over 100 Peanut Butter Balls, countless Pecan Turtles, 2 bags of Peppermint Bark and dozens and dozens of sugar and chocolate chip cookies. OH...we can't forget the yummy Peanut Butter Kiss cookies -- Can't wait til next December!!