Dave, Amy, Cashel and Peter visit

Our good friends now live in Oregon but we are so thankful they have lots of family in WA and are willing to make a trip up our way to visit for a day. I didn't get the camera out as often as I should have but managed to snag a few phtos.

My sister had gotten us a gingerbread man to decorate and after the boys went to bed Cashel got to stay up and decorate it, she did a great job!

Ta Da!!

Before they were getting ready to leave, we woke Jaydon up to say good-bye. He doesn't do so well waking up when it is not on his own terms so he always needs a bit of snuggle time. Here Jeremy was letting him watch "C is for Cookie" by the Cookie Monster and of course Cashel and Peter got to enjoy it was well.

We had a fun visit and just wish it could last a bit longer.

At home enjoying some presents

Jaydon sure did enjoy his days of celebrating, however, he was not as into opening presents as I had thought he would be. There were certainly some he was excited to dig into but after one or two he would wear out and want to just play with what he had and not open any of his others. He sure has a lot of family and friends who spoil him and we are all so thankful for the love we are shown by so many.

Here you can see his football tent and his new train set both of which he loved.

Even Higgins loved Jaydon's presents, he and Lily have played and slept in the tent which is currently hosting many of the plush stuffed animals and toys Jaydon received.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! We woke up at Grandma's and did stockings in the morning, then hung out for awhile before heading down to my step-grandparents' house in Tacoma to visit with my dad and Diane's side of the family. It was a whirlwind of travel but it was a great day visiting with family.

Atta boy, just dump everything out!

Doing some pull-ups to work off all the Christmas goodies.

The family at the table eating a lovely ham dinner!

Christmas Eve!

My mom's family always does Christmas on Christmas Eve and this year was no exception. A fun tradition when there are young kids who believe in Santa around is to have the child go out 'looking' for Santa in the car while the other people clean and get all the presents out. Then we notify the driver when we are ready and when Santa is here. My uncle used to play Santa when we were kids and this year my mom got her next door neighbor to do it for Jaydon. Quite a fun tradition for us and such a joy for the kids to get to find Santa at home giving out some presents before he heads on to the next house.

Jeremy and Jaydon getting ready to go out looking for Santa after dinner.

Low and behold, they got home and Santa was there!

Santa gave Jaydon a special gift but as you can see Jaydon had a hard time taking his eyes off Santa.

Finally getting ready to open his gift, yes Santa did listen and Jaydon got an apple, some bunny crackers and some dried apple pieces. (Sure made for a nice easy gift, I can only hope Jaydon will continue to put inexpensive snacks on his wish list).

After Santa left and had a cookie, Jaydon got to select a cookie to enjoy!

His Grandma and Gram spoiled him with a Skoot bike, it is a very nice balance bike that Jaydon immediately enjoyed.

Auntie Jenny and Uncle L also did a great job by getting Jaydon this stuffed Giraffe. Jaydon was so excited he played tackle with it for quite some time.

Opening more gifts.

Giraffe riding his bike.

New head lamps for the cousins. Sorry I didn't get very many photos of the family. Those dang toddlers tend to steal the show.

A video of our Santa delivery.

Attempts at the Family Christmas Card Photo

Wow, if you recieved our Christmas card you saw that we didn't actually get a photo of the whole family together. The holidays sure started out a bit hectic this year and between coaching, traveling, having houseguests and just having a toddler we only tried a couple attempts to get the family photo. I decided to share the sequence with you just for laughs. As you can see by the end the cats had definitely had enough.

Injury

It is a bit strange, Jaydon has an injury and we cannot figure out what is really wrong. On Friday he was jumping around in one of the big bouncy houses and sort of crumpled down and cried owie. He then limped and didn't want to walk on his left foot/leg. After a trip to the Dr. that evening we decided on no x-rays because he was putting pressure on it, but that he should stay off of it and rest as much as possible (oh so easy with a very active two year old). So after watching a bit more Sesame Street then we care to we got him to rest. By Sunday he was still limping quite a bit so we decided to take him in for x-rays. They did the foot (not the leg) and didn't find anything. Thus figuring a sprain and to let him use it but monitor it. The injury seemed quite a bit better after last evening of being able to be on it and walk around but then tody he had another instance of just falling over (not even doing anything) and really crying because it hurt. We may be in for more Dr. trips or we might just have to try going back to takign it really easy for awhile. Seems weird to have a young kid like that be able to sprain their ankle with such loose tendons and ligaments but that appears to be the best answer at this point. Unfortunately, it really sucks to try and keep him not as active and he still can't quite communicate with us everything that is going on. Send good healing vibes and prayers his way!

Stockings!

So excited! My stepmom is a knitter and while I had a homemade stocking from my childhood we didn't really have a family set of stockings and I wanted some that coordinated so Diane volunteered to make us matching ones! Dad and Diane arrived in town yesterday and brought with them the new stockings! They are great, I am so pleased! We have already planned out what baby girls stocking will look like to be added to the mix for next year.

The cat stockings we have had for quite awhile, and while I love my cats dearly I am not going to ask Nana to knit us some cat stockings too!