Luke Meets Santa Claus!

Last night amongst all of the chaos of trying to get things ready for today, we took a break and went to ‘Christmas in Allentown’ to look at the lights. The people there are wonderful. They open up their yard and allow people to walk thru and look at each of their light displays and they provide hot chocolate and photo opportunities with Santa Claus. It is a neat little experience; even though it did put us writing Christmas cards until 11:30 p.m. and I didn’t get my cookies iced. Here are a few pictures from the night.   The girls enjoyed getting out of the house with their friends.

 

We took this same picture last year…

This fireplace was a new display this year. There is a ceiling fan hanging with lights that is not shown in the picture.  The girls thought it was cute.

Luke loved the little LED lights and all of the ‘moving’ displays the best.

His absolute favorite was these dogs. He just wanted to stand and growl and bark at them. You can see in the picture that I had to drag him away.

And since I waited t’ll the last minute to do Santa photos and I am not going to wait in line at the mall; it didn’t look like Luke was going to get to meet him. But fortunately, he was here and the kids got to take a photo with him. Luke kept hitting his hand. I am not sure if he was giving him five or if he was trying to get Anna out of his arms. But he didn’t cry and scream like the kids in front of us and behind us that were his age.

 

It was a nice night and gave us a break from our chaos.

Christmas Sunday

Here are our pictures from today…  Luke learned to say “cheese” today.

 

Christmas in Jay with Mr. Butch’s Side of the Family!

We had another wonderful Christmas today. Today we celebrated with Grandma Duncan, Aunt Gladys, the Risner’s, and Mike and Steve’s families. I am posting a few pictures from the day. We were missing Steve and Jessica today and wish that they could have been there. But other than that, it was a great day!

 

Grandma Duncan opens a present…

Aunt Gladys and Uncle Ron open presents…

We all dig in to some yummy food…

Jamie and Jennifer open some presents… And congrats to Jennifer on her graduation yesterday from South Alabama. Now, get a job!

The good thing about eating at the church this year was that there was more than enough room for everyone to spread out. The girls had their own table.

The boys had their own table. But they wouldn’t let Luke join them for fear he would throw all of his food at them.

Here is Graci!

And Isabelle!

And Lydia!

And Luke!

And Parker!

And Matthew!

And Anna!

 

Thanks to everyone for all of the gifts, yummy food, and good times!

Anna's Christmas Choir

Anna joined the Preschool Choir of our church in singing during the Evening Worship service on December 12th.

Christmas in Fort Walton Beach, FL

This past weekend we had two of our Christmas’ with Will’s family. On Friday night we had Christmas with his mom and brothers and on Saturday we had Christmas with his mom’s extended family. It was a nice time both days and lots of memories were made. Here are a few pictures of the weekend.

 

The night started with the kids begging to open their presents before dinner. We made them wait and they were finally allowed to open presents after dinner.

 

Here are all the kids in one of their photos that Will forces them all to pose for each year. They suffer through and are good sports to put up with Will and Angela trying to get just the right picture each year.

 

 

Here is Lala (Angela) with Luke. He seems to be the only nephew (or niece for that matter) that doesn’t run from her. ;)  We love you Lala!

 

Steve fried turkey’s for Saturday’s gathering with the assistance of Will. Angela and I did crafts for the other kids which left no one to take care of Luke and he found the tray of chocolate chip cookies and decided to help himself to some cookies.

 

Luke spent a lot of time trying to get to that sled in the middle of that table.

 

Surprisingly Luke did pretty good on his new sit and spin. He is already a daredevil trying to stand on it and do tricks.

 

Isabelle loves her new talking Jessie doll.

 

 

Anna loves her new sparkle shoes.

 

Here are the girls decorating their toothbrushes. These were a hit this year.

 

 

 

 

 

Here are the boys figuring something out.

 

And here are the girls sleeping in Grandma’s bed Friday night. If you’ll notice there doesn’t seem to be any room left for Grandma. They were some tired little girls.

 

A good time was had by all and they can’t wait for next year. Thanks Grandma for all the good times!

Isabelle's One Line Solo

The Children's Choir at our church presented their Christmas Musical last night. Isabelle had a one line solo in one of the songs. Here is her rendition of "Behold, That Star!"

Disney World in January 2011

I just booked our timeshare for January 2011. We are headed back to Disney World in only 92 days. We are planning to get Luke's first haircut done at the Harmony Barber Shop in the Magic Kingdom while we are there.

Disney September 2010

Yes, I know it has been a month, but we have been extremely busy and I am just now finding time to make this post. We had a blast and can’t wait to go back.

 

We left REALLY early in the morning hoping that the kids would sleep most of the way. Well…they didn’t fall back asleep until about two hours into the drive. After an uneventful drive, we made it to the All Star Sports hotel at 10 something. We let Will take a nap while we sent swimming.  After the nap and unpacking, we headed to the parks.

 

We had ten days of non stop fun! We got up early a few mornings…most days we slept late.  We tried some new rides and new restaurants. Anna became a roller coaster monster. She loved Tower of Terror and Everest. She even tried to ride them with her little arms up in the air. Isabelle stayed a chicken, we made her go on a few things and the rest of the time she just sat with Nana and Luke and played with her camera. Luke loved watching the people go by and was a great baby.

 

Even though we wore them out, I think my parents had a good time too! And they were a big help.

 

Here are a few pictures.

 

We tried OHANA upon the advice of a nice family from the UK. It was probably my least favorite place that we ate. Atmosphere was fun, but I did not enjoy the food.

 

This is a cute picture, but Luke’s very next action was to duck his head and try to get away. He wasn’t terrified of the characters, he just didn’t want them to put their mouths on him. I don’t really blame him.

 

This is our first time meeting Prince Eric. We didn’t do a ton of characters this time, but we tried to do some favorites and some we hadn’t seen before.

 

This time we did the special meet and greet for Disney Visa holders. It was not so rushed like the others.

 

Again, we have never met Jesse before, but she is one of the girl’s favorites so Will stood in line in the heat while I went to track down some ice cream for everyone.

 

Nana promised the girls she would buy them a fan from Japan and this was the picture that we took after Teppan Edo. I think it is really cute.

 

Teppan Edo is mine and Will’s new favorite restaurant. It was delicious. We can’t wait to go back. Anna and Isabelle ate with their special chop sticks for the entire meal.

 

Sorcerer Mickey is becoming a tradition for one of our family poses. I think we had a better shot, but I don’t want to go track it down in the oodles of pictures we have from our trip.

 

My INCREDIBLE Family… Luke didn’t puke on Mr. Incredible this time. That was nice.

 

Will tries to get a picture of each of the kids next to this tree every time we go.

 

Will and Luke rode the TTA-People Mover quite a bit.

 

Marie is Anna’s absolute favorite Disney Character. I think she comes home from Disney with a different stuffed Marie every time we go. At this point, I don’t think there are any that she doesn’t have. I wonder what she’ll get next time.

 

The girls with Mater and Lighting McQueen.

 

We love EPCOT!

 

Daddy ordered a milkshake for his drink and after the second one, he complained that he couldn’t hold anymore. This is what the waitress brought him. Whispering Canyon was his favorite restaurant.

 

After his second glass of coke, this is what the waitress brought Will!

 

Tusker House was by far, the best breakfast that we have ever had on Disney Property. Delicious!

 

My STRONG girls!

 

This is also a favorite pose. Too bad Isabelle wasn’t looking.

 

Ahhhh, those famous Mickey Ice Cream Bars. They are a filthy mess!

 

We saw Pirate Goofy while getting in line for Pirates.