Christmas Time

We have been having a lot of fun the past few weeks enjoying many fun Christmas activities. I think we have been to every Santa in town!

 At the Bass Pro Shop. We went with a few friends to see Santa and have fun at the Winter Wonderland set up they have. Kev helped Cooper at the rifle target shoot and both kids rode on the fun little carousel with deer, elk, moose and bears.

 Our ward had a fun Christmas breakfast. It was really fun! I thought a breakfast wouldn't be as fun but it was nice to wake up and start the day with a party. Kev finished work at 8:45 that morning and the party started at 9:30 so he had just enough time to change and help me load up the car. I was so happy he was able to make it! They had singing, little crafts and games for the kids and then Santa came at the end.

 We went down to the River Walk with some friends. It was crowded and I am always a little disappointed in the lights down there. There is the potential to make it spectacular if they would take some decorating tips from temple square, but every year all they do is dangle strands from the branches straight down. Oh well the best part down town it the tree in front of the Alamo, it is awesome! And there was a sweet little Mr. and Mrs. Claus sitting with candy canes and taking pictures with kids. No lines, no awkward moments taking pictures next to the professional photographer, just kids going up and taking pictures. Cooper and Caden are such cute little friends!

 

 Last Saturday we had reservations to sit with Santa for milk and cookies at Sea World. I thought it was fun, we were at a table right by Santa's chair and the kids were able to watch him and see him without the crowds. Every time Cooper sees Santa he asks for a Monster Truck. I was using the Monster Truck as motivation to get him potty trained. Well Christmas is tomorrow and we have taken a few steps back from the process, I planned to just hold on to the truck until he had it down, but after so many requests to Santa I can't not give it to him, oh well!

Maggie hates Santa. Every time.

We were able to get dressed up, drop the kids off at a friends house, and go to Kevin's work Christmas party. The party wasn't too exciting but a night out with my sweetie was!

We have been doing the Elf on the Shelf. Cooper loves it. I hoped Elf would get Cooper excited to use the potty so that Elf could report that to Santa, but it only worked the first few days. So 12 days before Christmas I decided to do something different with Elf. Each day Elf would show up with one or two pieces to our Nativity. This was great because I felt too overwhelmed to sit down and make the whole Nativity but this way I just had to make a few pieces every other day or so and yesterday Elf delivered the last piece. It was really fun and made Cooper excited each day and gave me a chance to teach Cooper about each piece of the Nativity.

I got the templates for this from pinterest. Check it out here.

I strayed from the templates a little and made my own donkey.

We have enjoyed spending so much time together as a family and with friends. I think I wore Kev out but we had fun. We went on a bike ride to look at Christmas lights. It may become a new Texas tradition, it was so fun! One night we had friends over for family home evening, we watched a few of the Mormon Message Christmas videos and then we made gingerbread houses.

We also had a little Christmas party get together. Three other families came over for Nacho Bar and Minute to Win it games. It was super fun and funny.

 This game was making a tree of cups, they had a minute to stack the cups and unstack them.

This was my favorite, cookie face, they had one minute to move a cookie from their forehead into their mouth using only their face muscles. Each couple had to get two cookies total. It was hilarious to watch!

 This one we had to move an ornament into a certain tile square but the only way we could move it was by fanning it with empty boxes (gifts)

 This one was also funny, you had to hang ornaments onto a string by working together and only using your mouths.

and then there was an ornament toss, tossing ornaments through a wreath and into a bowl. I am glad that everyone was a good sport to participate because it was fun!

 

I can't believe Christmas is tomorrow! I love this time of year. I love the feeling of love and service all around. I feel so blessed that even though we are away from family we still have so many people we love to spend time with this holiday season. Kevin has to work a little today and tomorrow, but I am so happy that he is on a rotation that will still allow him to spend a lot of time with us. Having him around to celebrate makes life pretty awesome!