December is always gone too too too fast! We had a wonderful Christmas season - a great program at church that we were extremely busy with, fun times with friends, sweet moments with our babies, and great family time!
Pre-church pics by the tree. This is post-Connor pushing Annalee over, her screaming, him screaming, sorries and kisses. Phew. All I wanted was a picture by the tree. ;)
Connor and his "Christmas Cow" Chick-fil-a hat!
Oh yes..really getting into the tradition this year! Connor worked hard on the gingerbread cookies and mommy worked even harder....re-rolling and re-chilling after Connor would cut out a cookie and immediately cut another pretty much right on top of it. :)
The boys with their ties - ready to party! Connor's tie was Jonathan's when he was little. :)
Our friends Helen and Sammy with Annalee.
The Justice family lives right by this town called McAdenville - literally nicknamed "Christmas Town USA". Everyone who lives there MUST light up their house, and while they are all different, they were all in the same color scheme with white, red, and green Christmas lights. I couldn't even begin to count the number of enormous trees filled with lights and beautifully decorated houses and churches. We really enjoyed driving through (um, it's also free...you can drive or even walk!) and the best part was Connor's excitement as he pointed out everything he saw!
Just like Connor's first Christmas, we were going to be in NY for Christmas Eve so we decided to see if Santa would come a little early...we picked the best cookies in hopes that he would come...
Reading "The Night Before Christmas" with Daddy...Annalee's first time for the "Christmas Eve" tradition. How do you like our skinny tree in our bedroom? It's our first tree from when we got married! :)
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care...in hopes that they wouldn't break because this was my first attempt at sewing since 8th grade home ec! Tried to make them like my mother's beautiful stockings that she made when we were little...they will have names cross stitched on by next Christmas! On another note, I LOVED having Grandma and Grandpa's nativity on my mantle this year...this is the first year that Jonathan and I have had a mantle in our house, and our first Christmas in our "new" house!
Looks like Santa decided that Connor and Annalee were good enough for an early visit!
The shopping cart was for both of our kiddos and tucked back almost behind the tree. Connor located it and took it for a few spins around the house right away. He pretty much stores everything inside of it...out of his sissy's reach!
Annalee got her first Cabbage Patch baby doll.
Both of our kids got some books and some clothes.
Annalee enjoyed rolling herself under the tree. That night, all four of us laid under the tree together to enjoy the smell and the lights!
Connor got some moose slippers and legos! The legos keep him busy for a loooooong time. :)
That night, Sarahann and Jay came to stay with us on their trip down to Georgia. We enjoyed dinner together on my Christmas present from Jonathan - Spode Christmas dinnerware! YAY!
What is Annalee so happy about?
Oh yes, first cookie. Gingerbread, of course!
Sadly, the next night we undecorated the tree (we were in NY too long to leave a live tree up) and dragged it out to the yard. I remembered AFTER that, that there were no pictures of the outside of our FIRST Christmas at the house! So, I ran out and took one...but you used to be able to see the lights of the tree in the 3 windows on the right. Beautiful anyway, love all of our candles and our door "swag" we had instead of a wreath this year!
Sarahann snagged this shot early in the morning before they left with the sun streaming in. Love it!
Merry Christmas!
By the way...it is totally appropriate that I am doing Christmas posts in January, because I'm pretty sure it will take months before Connor stops singing Christmas songs and asking where all the Christmas lights are every time we get in the car!
