A few of my favorite things...

I'm not sure if it's the fact that I've had this song from The Sound Of Music stuck in my head or that I simply have some favorite things. Whichever it is, I'm going to share with you a few of my favorite Christmas things that we have on display around our house.

I got this ornament right after 9-11-01. I still remember standing in the aisle at Target and getting teary eyed as I bought it. It's one of the first ornaments I hang on our tree every year and make sure it's front and center.

 I got the the Merry Christmas slate at Hobby Lobby last year simply because this reminds me of my Grandma. She loved poinsettias and this is totally something she would have loved. I also got this music box bell at a garage sell several years ago and love it for the same reason.

 These milk glass jars and homemade snowman are from my mother-in-laws significant other. He made these Santa figures by hand out of a piece of wood and then painted them. He gave one to each of our kids and we proudly display them on the shelf in our living room every Christmas.

These carolers belonged to Michael's grandma. After she passed away the grandkids divided up her Christmas decorations and we were blessed with these. I think they resemble our boys. They proudly sit on top of our piano.

This is probably my most favorite Christmas decoration. I grew up with this in my house and remember it well as a young girl. It plays music when you wind it up and Santa and Mrs. Clause spin around, very slowly. It brings back wonderful memories of my childhood Christmases.

Michael's mom gave this to us one Christmas years ago. It appears to go with a set of some kind but we've always just displayed it by itself. It's the doorway that leads to nowhere, LOL.

This nativity set was also in my family growing up. I would always be the one to set it up and admire it. I just find the figures so adorable and I love the stable.

Those are a few of my favorite things! Merry Christmas everyone!

Advent 2013

Our family loves doing a meaningful advent activity every year. In years past we have enjoyed wrapping up all our Christmas books and then unwrapping one book each night and reading it by the Christmas tree.  We did that for several years and then needed to change things up due to our kids getting older. We've also enjoyed doing the traditional advent calendar with scripture reading and lighting candles. Then last year we had a lot of fun with this project, you can read about it on this blog post. We also enjoyed doing this. Elf on the Shelf was fun but something we won't be repeating this year, it would have been more fun to do this when the kids were younger. As for this year, my daughter and I looked on Pintrest to get some ideas for advent activities and found an idea we liked and then created our own version of it. We are so excited to start on December 1st. We are using our Christmas countdown calendar and instead of finding a piece of candy in each pocket, there will be a family activity to do for that day. Here are the activities we came up with:

Read The Polar Express

Share 3 reasons why each person in the family is special to you

Have a family game night

Dinner by candle light

Make tin can luminaries

Make a popcorn string

Go look at Christmas lights

Go on a family night walk

Make cookies

Make a fire in the fireplace and listen to Christmas music

Roast marshmallows 0utside

Cut snowflake decorations

Make gift tags

Read the birth of Jesus from the Bible

Face time with out of town relatives

Make hot chocolate with marshmallows and sprinkles

It’s breakfast for dinner tonight

Watch a Christmas movie with popcorn and root beer floats

Have an indoor picnic by the Christmas tree

Make homemade pizzas

Go out to dinner

Find a new recipe and make it as a family

Have a dance party

Make a Christmas ornament

We then printed them out, cut them up, and placed them in the pockets. I had my calendar beside me to make sure some of the activities that are more extensive happen on evenings that we are available. 

We are so excited to start this on December 1st! It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Family pictures 2013

It's been two years since we have done family pictures. It was time to update! My dad and I really enjoy photography so we teamed up and did our family photos together. I got some great ones of he and my mom and my dad got some great ones of the five of us. We even used the tripod and got some with all 7 of us. We had a great time. Here are some of the keepers.

October ramblings

I love having an iPhone because I always have a camera on hand with a click of a button. I love capturing normal life moments as they pass me by. For starters, this may sound silly but I love seeing my kids do their chores. It brings a big cheesy grin to my face and makes me realize I am doing something right as a mom and someday our boys will have an appreciative wife knowing that they don't hesitate to help around the house and Anna's future husband will love that she is quite the domestic girl and knows how to get things done. Here is Jadon on dishwash and recycling duty (the dreaded chore around our house.)

 Can you say spoiled? I have no words. Pathetic maybe?

 I love my crock pot, that's all.

 Our bushes back by our pool bloomed, always a great reminder to me of God's love. It seems they always bloom at just the right time when I'm needing that reminder.

 It's Fall so you know what that means, it's time to make clothes for the stuffed animals so they don't get cold. Anna took some old socks and made them sweaters. How adorable!

 I glanced over one night and saw this. I sure love them. It's not that often they all sit in a cute little row like this. Photo op for sure.

 The boys are getting into air softing so this is a common sight in our house lately.

 I had no idea this picture was being taken of me. I guess this is what I look like when I'm watching TV, at least I think that's what I'm doing. It must have been a serious show. :/

mommy fail, mommy to the rescue

I had a mommy fail. Anna was super excited for picture day at school. Since she has been homeschooled up until this year, this would be her first time participating in school photos and she was so excited!!!!!! We wrote it on our calendars, we talked about what she would wear, how we would do her hair, and all that jazz. I remember thinking about it earlier in the week and then come Wednesday night it had completely escaped my brain. Anna went to school on Thursday morning wearing an outfit, an all brown one- nothing fancy and very plain. She did her own hair and I waved goodbye at drop off not even questioning why some little girls were dressed so fancy getting our of their cars. I went to pick Anna up after school and knew immedietly when I saw her face that something was wrong. I connected the dots in the short walk she had to the car (us moms are cool like that) and by the time she closed the car door she was crying and so sad that she WAS THE ONLY ONE in her whole class that forgot it was picture day. I guess picture day is a big deal in 3rd grade. I listened, I comforted, I apolagized, and I told her I would make it up to her. What a blessing it is that I'm a photographer and have some pretty amazing skills (yes I just bragged). So we decided to do our own little photo shoot and if I do say so myself, I'm pretty sure these are better than any school picture she will get (yes I bragged again, it's my blog so I'm cool with that). All is well in her world now. 

A trip to remember

How can it be October already! Seriously, I'm still wondering where September went and it's now October. But I'm not complaining because October is my most favorite time of year here in AZ. We usher in cool mornings and evenings, we finally get to air out our house after a long hot summer, and we get to remove the solar screens and brighten up our house during the daytime. I just love everything about it! Fall is the most wonderful time of the year. So let's do a little catch up post, for starters we will revisit September for a bit. Michael and I got to go away for the weekend, just us two, for the whole weekend. Did I mention it was just us two? And we were alone with no kids, just him and I. Yep, it was amazing. I actually didn't know it was possible for me to be that relaxed and to have no responsibilities. I treasured those three days and Michael and I made some great memories. Here is a little peek into our time away in San Diego. :)