Some Christmas Photos

We spent Christmas at Willa's parents home. We had a great time! On Christmas Eve the whole family got together and shared a fun evening of pizza (much to my mother's dismay), cheeseballs, taco dip and oodles of cookies! We then were able to read an abbreviated version of the Christmas story (a children's edition) and celebrate by giving presents. The presents were opened in about 2 minutes...record speed for sure! It was a lot of fun for everyone!

A picture of all four kids...Graham, Porter, Suzanne and Ellie!

Cute Graham Moments

I just wanted to share a few cute moments with Graham recently. I know if I don't write them down that I will forget them, so I need to get busy writing! :)

On Saturday we went to our church's Christmas production of Unwrapped, an original musical. It was really good. They provided childcare during that, so afterwards we went to pick Graham up. He happily came out to greet us in the hallway. Then he quickly ran over to a bulletin board that had cute little gingerbread men that the preschool children had made and decorated. Well, I told him to say goodbye. I meant to say goodbye to the nursery workers, however he looked at the gingerbread men and said "Goodbye Curious George!". The gingerbread men were brown and I could see the resemblance. It was pretty cute.

The other cute moment happened this week. We transitioned Graham to a toddler bed and he has been doing wonderfully with it! We're really proud of how good he's been. We haven't had one single issue, he loves being able to climb in and out of bed and is so excited about it. We know that this could change and he could suddenly decide not to stay in bed, but for now we are showering him with praise.

The second night of sleeping in his big boy bed, we were hosting Bible Study at our home. Our study started at 7, and that was a bit early for his bedtime. Ellie was already in bed and not other children were here, so we told him to play in his room for a little bit. We put his train set in his room and he played nicely for about 15 minutes. Then he started to come out. I decided to go ahead and put him to bed. I allowed him to put his trains in bed with him, but he wanted more of the train set. I said no. So, he went to bed without any fussing, however a few hours later right before I was going to bed I checked in on him.

Sure enough...every single piece of his train set, plus the plastic storage bin we store it in were in his bed with him. He was sound asleep, however one single movement by him would've sent it crashing to the ground. We quietly picked it up and put it back on the floor. The next morning when I went to get him out of bed everything was back in his bed with him. We never heard a peep out of him, so it must have been the first thing he did when he woke up! Too cute! :)

Baby Dedication

Ellie's baby dedication was this past Sunday, November 27th. We were excited to have her dedicated and looking forward to that special time at church. The name Eleanor means 'light' and her middle name, Kate, means 'pure'. We wanted to pick a verse out for her that would reflect the meaning of her name. We finally settled on Matthew 5:16 "Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.". Our desire for Ellie's life is just that. That she would grow to love the Lord and to serve Him, and in doing that others would see Him through her life. That she would reach others by her faith and actions!

We were surprised by my mother on the day before Ellie's dedication. She called and asked if it would be ok for her to come down! Um...YES!! So, she came down and joined us for the special day. It was great to have her here for a visit. We made a trip to the park and had a lot of fun just hanging out at the house. The kids were sad to see her leave, but we were all so thankful for the short visit and that she could be a part of Ellie's dedication.

In other news, Ellie was sick recently. We believe she had Roseola. She had a high fever for several days, then broke out in a rash. She was miserable during this time and just laid around. It ended up being about a two week time frame from the time she started coming down with it until she was back to her normal self. However, it seemed to then be overnight that she began crawling, could sit up on her own, could go from sitting to crawling and vice versa and also began cutting teeth!! She literally grew up overnight it seemed! We're so thankful though that she's back to her happy smiley self!

Here's a few pictures from Ellie's baby dedication weekend!

And, yes...Graham did try to escape! ;) He was very quiet, but a little on the active side while on stage!