December 2011

Christmas with Family

by Adrienne on December 31, 2011

This will finish up my Christmas posts. . . I think.

Christmas day we went to my Mom’s for lunch.  Here are the grandkids.

The Reagan kids.

After we ate a DELICIOUS lunch, we all gathered in the living room to open presents.

Ava and Olivia thought that Ava’s new bristle blocks would make great styling tools.  It was so cute!

Ava trying to style her own hair.

Heather and I got new coats!

Ava modeling my new scarf.  It looks cuter on her. ;)

We left my Mom’s and headed home with the kids because the girls weren’t feeling too great.  My Dad and Belinda met us there and we decided that I would take Emma and Wesley to the Winkle Christmas party and Eric would stay home with Ava.  I don’t have any pictures of that.

My Dad and Belinda spent the night and the plan was for Heather, Blake and Olivia to come over for brunch the next day and we’d have our Christmas.  Emma woke up Monday with puffy red eyes and we were afraid that she had pink eye.  (She didn’t.) We didn’t want Olivia to get it so we had to cancel those plans.  I didn’t get many great pics from Christmas with my Dad and Belinda but here are a few.

Later on that day Emma was DYING to ride her new bike so we took her out for a few minutes to try it out.

She told me she wanted to pack a snack. (Her bike has a little compartment to store things in.) She had to eat her snack before we went inside.  We were out for all of five minutes. ;)

Monday, Eric’s Dad came over to celebrate Christmas with us.

Emma loves her new pink Leapster!

We had such a wonderful Christmas this year! We feel very blessed!

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Christmas Morning

by Adrienne on December 28, 2011

I want to start out this post and say that this was the BEST Christmas morning ever!  It was so fun and I enjoyed my family so much!  Even though Emma and Ava were sick I will always remember this Christmas as a favorite.  I tried to really take the time and soak it all in.

The presents all set up and ready to go.

Emma seeing her bike for the first time!

Ava and her new baby doll stroller.

Stockings!

Ava found a ring pop in her stocking and after that she was pretty much done.

She was perfectly happy with her ring pop.  We had to open most of her presents for her.

So excited about her squinkes!

Still loving the ring pop.

Here are all of their Christmas morning gifts.

Wesley’s

Emma’s

and Ava’s

Emma and Ava got me some lotion, and Wesley got me The Beatles Rockband and an extra microphone.  Fun!

Eric got me a Keurig. I LOVE it!

Emma and Ava got Eric a Third Day CD and some Mountain Dew chapstick.

Wesley got Eric a video game.

I got Eric some clothes and a jacket.

I have to share this funny little story.  While Eric and I were exchanging gifts I happened to look over and Ava was gathering all of the ring pops she could find.  (All three kids got some in their stocking.)  When she got as many as she could carry she ran off into the other room with them! Ha! So funny!

We had cinnamon rolls for breakfast.

After breakfast the kids played with their toys for a while before we had to get ready to go to my Mom’s for lunch.

All of the excitement wore Ava out, and she took a really long winter’s nap.  With all of her new Minnie Mouses. (Minnie Mice?)

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Christmas Eve

by Adrienne on December 27, 2011

We hosted Christmas Eve with Eric’s family this year.  It was a great time with family and lots of delicious food.  I didn’t get many pictures because I was busy hostessing.  Also, Emma and Ava both started running fevers on Thursday evening. They are feeling much better now, but it was rough having them sick at Christmas.

Emma opened up something that was at the very top of her list!

She wanted the “Barbie perfect Christmas dolls” because I bought her the movie ( which is actually surprisingly good ) , and we have watched the movie about 100 times this Christmas. ;)

Poor thing. She was feeling really yucky. :(

The kids playing with their toys.

We had a great time.  The kids went to bed early because they were so excited about Christmas morning!!!

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Christmas Decorations

by Adrienne on December 27, 2011

Here are some pictures of our Christmas decorations this year.

Here is our front door.  I’ve had this wreath for a while.  I love that it’s square, but it needed something.  I got the “R” at Hobby Lobby, painted it red, and then attached it with some fishing line.

We have a tree in our dining room this year.  I talked about the tree in this post.  I wanted to keep the decorations silver, gold and more neutral.

I love this beautiful advent wreath that my Dad got for me last year.  Does anyone know where to get advent candles? I had no luck this year.

This is my little kitchen tree.

I love displaying our gingerbread house that we make every year.

This is our family room tree.  My favorite.

I could do an entire post on ornaments.  I love love love ornaments!  I usually get ornaments for Christmas every year and I love it!

This is one that my Dad and Belinda got for us last year.  It’s a big hit with the kids.  At least once a day, I have to turn it on for them. ( It plays the Mickey Mouse Club song.)

This is the ornament that we got at Disney this year.

An ornament that Eric’s Dad and his wife gave us last year.  This is one of my favorites.

Ava’s first Christmas ornament.

Our stockings.  I bought them from Pottery Barn after Emma’s first Christmas and I think they were $15.

Our nativity.

This is how I displayed our Christmas cards this year.  I LOVE getting Christmas cards!

The church from our Christmas village.

Another little nativity.

One of the end tables next to the couch.  This is Emma’s MDO picture from this year.  I would eventually like to frame all of our old Christmas card pictures and set them out at Christmas.  I haven’t gotten very far with that.

The other end table.

This was our Christmas project from Pinterest this year.  I love how it turned out!

Wesley’s tree.

This is his new ornament.  He really enjoyed watching it count down to Christmas!

The stocking that Heather made for Wesley for his first Christmas.

Emma and Ava’s princess tree.

Wow! That was a lot of pictures!!!

I have a lot of Christmas stuff to blog about.  It was such a fun Christmas this year!

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Miracle on Main Street

by Adrienne on December 20, 2011

A couple of weeks ago was the children’s program at our church.  The play was called “Miracle on Main Street”.  The play is about a group of kids that want to have their Nativity pageant in the town square, but the mayor won’t let them because it’s not politically correct.  The kids stand up for what they believe and joyfully proclaim their faith.

The Park Place Kids choir.

Wesley got a role as one of the carolers.  He did such an amazing job, and we were so proud of him.  He really enjoys acting, and it seems to come very naturally for him.

The Park Place Kids preschool choir also performed “O Come All Ye Faithful” during the Nativity scene.  Emma was an angel.

Funny Story:  Emma kept telling me that she wanted to sing her “gumby song”.  I kept saying, “Emma I don’t know the gumby song”.  She finally sang it to me, ” Oh gumby you faithful. . .”  ;)

She didn’t do much singing on stage, but she was very serious about the motions.

It was such a blessing to watch the children of our church using their gifts and talents to honor our King!  They all worked so hard and I was blown away at how wonderful they all did!

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Christmas Traditions

by Adrienne on December 17, 2011

I have several major Christmas events to blog about but still don’t have the pictures edited yet.  I’m going to try to get caught up this week.

I am loving Christmas this year with my family! Tonight we took the kids to look at Christmas lights, but first we let them each open a little present from us.  We started the tradition last year of giving them each an ornament for Christmas, and it was a pretty big hit.

Wesley got the Christmas countdown ornament that he has been wanting for a long time.  He was super excited.  He hung it on the tree in his room.

Emma got a pretty Tinkerbell ornament.

And Ava got a Minnie Mouse ornament.  I think she was pretty pleased with it. :)

After the kids opened the ornaments and hung them on the tree we loaded up the van and headed out to look at Christmas lights.  We made a quick stop at the Starbucks drive thru first.

We had a good night, even though I don’t think Emma and Ava really “get” looking at lights yet.  They were both asleep before we started back home.  Looking forward to many more Christmases of ornaments and lights.

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Emma is 4!

by Adrienne on December 5, 2011

Sunday was Emma’s 4th birthday, and since we had already had her party,  we wanted to do something fun for her.  She told us she wanted to go to Dollywood.  Wesley’s best buddy Wyatt’s birthday party was Sunday afternoon, so he hung out with the Giffords all day so he wouldn’t miss that.

After church we kicked off the celebrating by eating at McCalisters or “Calisters” as Emma calls it.  It was her pick.

Ava eating her pickle.

When we got to Dollywood, Emma saw this giant snowman and said she wanted her picture made with it.

We rode the 50′s cars.  The girls both LOVE this ride!

Our big 4 year old!

Riding the carousel

Riding the pigs.

And the ducks.

We all had fun on the tea cups.

We went into this section called “Santa’s workshop” they had crafts, and a place to see Santa.  They also had a giant wall that looked like a coloring page.  Emma could have stayed here all day!

As we left we walked through and looked at all of the lights! It was so beautiful!

Emma wanted some cottton candy.

Yummmm.

More of the lights.

It was such a fun day!

At age 4 Emma:

  • Is so girly! She loves anything pink or princessy.
  • She loves to play with dolls,  Disney princesses, and loves to dress up.
  • She loves to “help out” with Ava.  And they have really started playing together, which I’m really excited about.
  • She loves for me to read the book “Baby Dear”.  It’s an old Golden Book by Eloise Wilkens.  And she loves the Rhyme Bible Storybook.  ( She has some of it memorized.)
  • She is LOVING Mother’s Day Out!  She looks forward to it every week!
  • Is still very tall for her age.  People usually ask me if she’s in Kindergarten.
  • She can write her name.  She loves to point out letters to me.  Especially the letters that are in Wesley Emma and Ava.
  • Her favorite TV shows are Max and Ruby and Caillou.
  • Her favorite movie is Tangled.
  • Her favorite princesses are Ariel and Rapunzel.
  • She loves animals.
  • She has recently started sleeping on the top bunk of her bed.
  • She adores her big brother!  As girly as she is, she LOVES to play super-heros with Wesley.  She likes to be Spider-girl.
  • She loves to eat grilled cheese, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, cheerios, apples, strawberries, ice cream and macaroni and cheese.
  • She can NOT leave home without lip gloss or chapstick!

We love you very much Emma! Happy Birthday!

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More Birthday Fun

by Adrienne on December 4, 2011

Today Eric’s Dad and his wife Rhonda came over for a visit, and to see the birthday girl.  They brought Emma some more furniture for her doll house and the minivan.  She was so happy!

Eric’s Dad (Peepaw), Eric and the kids.

The Reagan men.  Three generations.

Emma and Peepaw ( wearing Ava’s bow.)

Peepaw and Ava.

Peepaw and Wesley wrestling.

We had a great visit!

The other day I got these new markers that work on chalkboards, and I let the kids color with them.  I was so excited because Emma wrote her name for the first time! ( It’s written in green in the bottom right hand corner and in pink on the top right.)  It’s going to be hard to erase this chalkboard, so I had to take a picture of it!  We still need to work on her E but I am so proud of her!

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Emma’s 4th Birthday Party

by Adrienne on December 3, 2011

This afternoon we celebrated Emma’s birthday at Build-a-Bear.  All in all it was a really fun party.  It was a little stressful for the parents (at least for me it was).  I think a lot of that had to do with having to keep up with Ava during the party.  She was a little wild. Ha! Anyway, the kids seemed to have a blast and I know that Emma LOVED it.

First all of the girls picked out their bears (or animals).

Then they formed a circle and played a game.  They were all instructed to put their bears on the floor in the middle of the circle.  Ava kept picking them up and trying to hand them back to everyone. :)

Silly girls. ( I can tell you right now they don’t pay that lady enough!)

Emma with her puppy named. . .”Puppy”.

Making a wish!

Stuffing “Puppy”.

Washing “Puppy”.

I forgot to take a picture of Puppy’s outfit.  Emma picked out a red elf dress, Santa hat, and red sparkly shoes.

All of Emma’s guests.  We are truly blessed to have each one of these little girls in our lives.  Love them!

After the party we went to the food court for cookie cake and presents.

The party table.

Emma opening her presents.

And the moment I have been waiting for. . .

We she loves her!

Back at home with all of her gifts.

Her sweet Daddy playing Barbies with her.  Melts me. :)

Emma and Kit.

This is Ava and her bear “Snowflake”.

Wesley didn’t make a bear, but he did get a new Karate outfit for his bear at home.

This is Emma’s bear signed by all of her friends.

It was a really fun day and a successful party for my sweet 4 year old (on Sunday) little girl.

I will end with this funny picture of Ava.  What a ham!

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A Few Things

by Adrienne on December 1, 2011

Today Emma had her little birthday celebration at Mother’s Day Out.  She took cookies and juice for her little class and she was so excited about it!

She came home wearing this crown.  Apparently she was queen of her class for the day.  We also went to Party City after school and she picked out a balloon for her party tomorrow.

Yesterday my little Ava goo turned 18 months old.  I can’t believe how much she has grown and changed in the last few months.

I kept trying to get a good picture of her, but every time I asked her to “say cheese” she would frown and say “NO”.  She is a little bit of a mess these days.  She keeps me on my toes because she is into everything!  She is also so sweet and so snuggly she just melts our hearts!

This evening, Wesley went to the Kids Karate Games at his Karate school.  He competed in the forms and sword sparring and he won the gold medal for the first place in forms.  We are so proud of him!

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