Visit from Santa....

These last pics from Christmas eve show our visit from Santa. Yes, Santa came to visit the kids. The kids were excited to see him. Garrett kept introducing Santa to everyone. He even showed Santa the train village. Marissa asked where Lito was. Santa said that Lito had to go to work real quick. Marissa laughed in her mischevious way and let it got at that. Garrett was totally oblivious to the whole situation. Jake sat with Santa the whole time. Such a great moment for the kids. It was great to watch too!

Gingerbread House.....

More pics from Christmas eve. We waited for Marissa to come over before we started on the gingerbread kit that my mom bought for the kids. They had a lot of fun putting it together. We ALL had fun putting it together. Garrett and Marissa liked sampling the candy the best.

Christmas Eve.....

I'm a little behind on blogging these days. I know that January is almost over and I'm still posting Christmas pictures, but I have so many to share with you. So here are some pics from Christmas eve. We always go to my parents house to eat and spend time with the family. My parents set up a train set and Christmas village for the kids on the pool table. The kids love it, especially Garrett. He couldn't get enough of it. We spend the evening eating good food, playing with the kids, waiting for Santa, listening to Christmas music, just spending time with each other. We love this time of year.

Christmas Photo Shoot.....

Here is my attempt at taking some pics of the boys in front of the tree. These pics were taken a few days before Christmas. They wouldn't sit together so I had to take separate pics. Jake enjoyed wearing the Santa hat. He thought it was funny. He didn't try to take it off, which is surprising. Jake is also wearing Garrett's Christmas flannel pajamas from when he was about 20 months old. They were a tad big on Jake because he was only 15 months but I still think they looked adorable on him. As you can see, Garrett loved posing in front of our half decorated tree.

Hanging Out At The Mall.....

We had to hang out at the mall for a little bit while the Santa pictures were being printed. The kids decided to look at the Christmas setup by Santa. Of course I took the opportunity to snap some pictures of them together in their outfits (again). They are getting pretty good at posing for Mommy. They are used to me having my camera with me and saying "smile". Even Jake poses for us without too much fuss. I always worry that I'm not taking enough pictures, especially of Jake because they always say that you take a ton more pictures of your first child than your second child. I don't want Jake to be mad at me when he gets older. But now that I think about it I probably take more pictures now because of the digital camera. When Garrett was a baby we didn't have a digital camera, we had a 35mm. It's soooo much easier to take lots of pics with the digital.

Santa Pictures.....

Here are the kid's santa pictures. We took Garrett & Jake on the Friday before Christmas. We got there at opening time so we didn't have to wait. We only had to take one picture. I knew we weren't going to get Jake to smile so I was happy with this one. I'm sure you probably have noticed (or maybe you haven't) that the kids are wearing their "Holiday" outfits again. Yep, I really wanted to get my money's worth out of these so I had them wear them a few times during the Holiday Season. Plus I think they look pretty cute and handsome in them. Santa asked Garrett what he wanted and Garrett told him "Cars" things from the movie Cars. Santa also told Garrett that he looked very nice. Thanks Santa.

Decorating for Christmas....

We started decorating for Christmas the week after Thanksgiving. Mostly because Garrett is a big fan of holiday decorations. He knows that we have totes of decorations in the garage for special Holidays. He would remind us everyday that we needed to put lights up and when we put a few up he wanted to put more and more and more. So over the course of a few weeks we eventually got every single light we owned up and on display. I have to admit that decorating with and for the kids is more exciting and magical. You can just see the joy in their eyes when you first plug in the lights.

As for the Christmas tree, we jammed all of our ornaments on the top half of our artifical tree. We did this because Jake is in the stage of grabbing everything. We didn't want to have to pick up all the ornaments everyday off the floor. Garrett loved looking at every ornament and helping mommy put them up. Jake also enjoyed looking at the tree and would point at it whenever we turned the lights on.

My Birthday....

My Birthday was December 14th. I turned 33 (and I really don't mind). I share my birthday with Kathy (Marissa's mommy). Although, she is a few years younger than me (and she won't let me forget it).

We always celebrate our birthdays with my family. We get together and have dinner somewhere and then we go to one of our homes for cake and presents. This year we chose to eat at Hometown Buffet. This place has anything and everything to eat. It's very kid friendly. After dinner we went to our house to celebrate some more. We had a 7lb chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream. My friends Sherry & Mark and their son Wyatt came to celebrate with us too. We all had a great time. The kids love it whenever we celebrate anyone's birthday. They love when we sing "Happy Birthday" and they love to help blow out the candles. Fun times and fun memories. Here's to more Happy Birthdays!