Christmas 2011

So.... each Christmas season seems to fly by. We try to hard to remember the reason for the season and also try to help Jackson understand what "giving" is all about. This year we tried to have Jackson help us with some donations as well as with understanding that we are so lucky to have gifts under the tree.

Our holiday season was full of love and happiness even with a few 3 almost 4 year old bumps along the way. Jackson is turning into a strong willed little boy who likes to "discuss" everything. He has characteristics of both Justin and I... not always the best ones. So we are learning and growing and seem to be really trying to figure out this parenting thing... and losing our minds a bit too. Back to Christmas.

Some of our traditions/ activities this year included:
Picking out the perfect Christmas Tree
Going on a luminary walk at the Overland Park Arboretum and visiting with Santa while there
Walking through the crazy Christmas light neighborhood near our house on Thanksgiving night
Foxy Brown- our Elf on the Shelf- he gets in lots of trouble but we loved having him for the first time this year.
A trip to the Plaza to see the lights, enjoy dinner and go on a carriage ride.
Jackson's Christmas Program at preschool
Baking cookies and bring them to our neighbors
For our Christmas holiday we enjoyed a great few days together. On Christmas Eve we went to Open Gym where Jackson was able to run, jump and play for a few hours. We attended church at 4pm along with Mimi and Poppy and then headed over to JJ and Gretchen's house for a great Christmas Eve Dinner. Jackson loves crazy times with his cousin's. We then headed home to put out "reindeer" food in the front lawn, set out milk, cookies and carrots for Santa and also read 'Twas the Night Before Christmas. This year I also made some PJ's for Jackson.
Christmas morning Jackson actually slept in a bit until about 645am... then it was presents, making homemade Cinnamon rolls and staying in our PJ's until 4pm!! Mimi and Poppy were with us for the morning and Justin's Parents came for dinner and to stay the night to celebrate with us also. We spent the day relaxing and playing with our newest toys!


Some of Jackson's favorite gifts were:
Vroom Vroom Race Track
Firetruck
Glow in the Dark Watch
Fireman Boots

Football

Jackson has been taking a "Future Stars" class at a local gym. He loved it! They did 2 weeks of 3 different sports... the last sport was football. For some reason Justin and I really hope he takes to football- you know the safe sport! He is just so big and he is actually fairly fast. The first week of football was funny as Jackson was hesitant to "tackle." Today was much better and he really enjoyed tackling the dummy! He learned some basics like tucking the ball and running, passing and catching the ball.

Here are a few pictures of Jackson learning some basic skills! Fun times for sure.

Christmas Tree and Plaza Fun!

We love our tradition of cutting down a Christmas tree... well technically we go to a Christmas tree farm and pick out a pre-cut tree shipped in from up north... but still it is a fun experience and we get a real tree!

We also love our traditional trip to the Plaza to check out the lights, eat dinner and take a carriage ride! This year we rode the pumpkin carriage ride!

Boy News

We are excited to share we are expecting another boy. The sonogram showed a healthy baby boy and we are very grateful. We shared with Jackson by having him to open a box of BLUE cupcakes. I am now 20 weeks, growing a tummy and feeling the baby move a few times a day.

Thanksgiving

We hosted Thanksgiving at our home this year. Everyone was able to join except Justin's parents as his mom recent had hip replacement surgery. Alison, Josh, Max, Zoey, Ben and Em all stayed at our house. My parents and JJ's family also came over to join the fun!