oh...the joys of December

I love December. I love getting my Christmas decorations up, and EARLY. For a couple of reasons.


1. They are a PAIN, so might as well get to see them up for as long as possible.
2. The kids LOVE decorating. They remember EACH and EVERY thing we have stored up in the attic for 11 months, and love getting them out & putting them in the EXACT spot that they were in the year before.
3. I love my nativity that I got a couple of years ago. It's simple, even been broken a couple of times, but I love it.
4. Christmas lights are just beautiful!
5. It's a really cool tradition that our family has! And it's MY family!!
6. They are a pain, so might as well get to see them up for as long as possible. :)

This year it was BRANDON who was most excited about decorating!!

Camron was into his book, and not into the tree. For about 10 minutes.

Then it was the two of them...the whole time. Blake and I put on the lights, and that's about it!! (Yes, we still had to put lights on the tree. Old school. BUT, we did get a NEW tree on clearance that's pre-lit! Welcome to the 21st century Taylors.)

Boys...the whole time!

Where's Mom?? Cooking chicken fried backstrap in the kitchen (totally NOT healthy) making a HUGE mess. With sick-o Cowboy. Cowboy, GIT out of my kitchen!

Where are the boys? Under the tree of course!

We did find about 40% of the ornaments on the bottom branches. Think that was Brandon.

Then a couple days later, Cam got sick. When you don't have a bed tray, I improvise.

Hey...it worked! Ramen noodles, in bed. No mess.

Brandon was NOT happy about the situation. He wanted ramen in bed. With an ironing board. It just wasn't fair.

Then, it snowed. Not as much as our family in Houston, but it snowed.

The kids had their Christmas program. (Cam & his friend Logan. Who looks very tall in this picture)

Brandon and a bunch of kids I don't know. (He stood there with his arm like this the whole time. He didn't want his bell falling off.)

My boys.

Camron's Class Christmas Party (One of the perks of being one of the room mom's...you're @ every function!)

Then came CHRISTMAS EVE!! So fun, beautiful, and rewarding. We had our Church's Christmas Eve service @ Anhalt Hall again, our 4th year. We missed last year since we were in Colorado, which made this year that more special. I missed it!! Great job Brooke, on all your hard work putting it on...AGAIN!

Happy Family

The boys looked SO handsome, and had a great time. (Brandon's khaki pants didn't fit anymore, which we found out about 15 minutes before we left. The kid's growing like a weed!)

Then we get ready for Santa. We checked the Santa radar online, Camron designed the cookies, put them by the fireplace...

Went outside to throw the reindeer food so Santa could find our house...

Came back in, and LUCY, bad dog, had eaten Santa's cookies. We busted her. So, we put the non-designed ones out, and Camron decided to write a note.

Guess we'll go to sleep and see if he still comes. Even without his special cookies.