Christmas Day in the Morning

Making sugar cookies for Santa. Jace topped Christmas Eve night off with a split lip...at least we didn't have to visit the emergency room. That was my gift from Santa!

We had a little shin-dig at our house on Christmas Eve and all the kids were left unsupervised in the basement while the adults played games. If you look hard enough you can see blue play dough smashed into the carpet!

It was the simple gifts like racquetballs, a plastic lawnmower, and "Don't Spill the Beans" that made Santa a hit! Jace is still carrying at least one racquetball in his hand...Jace even helped the racquetball say the breakfast prayer.

Even though we had no snow, the boys had fun chiseling and "mowing" the ice.

We had a very nice and relaxing Christmas and everyone was happy! Thank you all for your Christmas cards. We feel very blessed this holiday season!

Below zero and two staples in the head...sums up this Sunday!

We woke up today to negative degree weather and a day of pre-Christmas church to look forward to! After the opening song of "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear," Jace fell and hit his head on the bottom of the pew. I quickly rushed him out, with him screaming and my face flushed. Before I was out of the chapel, I glanced at him and I saw a gash in his head and red fluid drizzling down onto his nice white shirt. Our home teacher is conveniently a doctor (and also a childhood friend of Kim, Mike, and Clay) and took a look at it and decided it needed staples. They came back from urgent care two staples later, just in time for Jace to go to nursery the last hour. What a trooper!

Because of his stained shirt, Jace sported an over-sized shirt from the Branch's lost and found, and of course, he had to have the tag cut out of it, like the rest of his shirts!!!

Now for some happy pictures: Rebecca was fine on Santa's lap until she took a glance at who was holding her, and then the fun was over! For Christmas Jace wants racquetballs and Ronnie wants Don't Spill the Beans...we'll see what Santa can do.

Have a very Merry Christmas from US!!!!

O Christmas Tree

Our present in 2008!

Present 2008 with present 2006 and 2004, ever the goofs!

Ron and I treated ourselves to a full-sized tree this year. Since we were married, we have been using a two foot Christmas tree Rachelle had in her room as a kid. The candy canes are all gone and many of the gingerbread men have been mutilated by our little "presents", but at least the lights still glow (knock on wood!) and the balls are shatter proof! Merry Christmas!

Once Upon a Potty

Sorry I did not sensor this video. We can't watch this video enough! Just in case you are wondering where Jace's two front teeth are, he fell down the stairs in Iowa...a week after the baby was born, about 45 minutes after we arrived back from Wisconsin during the flooding in Iowa, and a week before we moved to St. Louis...yes, all those events in a three week time period. He fractured the roots on both teeth...crazy times but we survived.

Thanksgiving in Kansas!

On Tuesday we left for Kansas City, Kansas, and spent two nights at the Great Wolf lodge/indoor water park. We all loved it and got our fill of water. When we needed a little break from too much fun, we visited a nearby outdoor mall with great stores. We tried to bribe Ronnie with delicious delicacies from the chocolate store if he would go down the big water slides, but he refused, which surprised us.

On Thanksgiving we drove further into Kansas to visit Ron's sister, Nicole, and her fun family.

Great Wolf Lodge

Our water babies!

Watch out for that big bucket! It dumps 1000 gallons of water every 5 minutes!

The Babcocks-thanks for the great food, great fun, and great conversation! It really was a fabulous trip and the kids loved being with their cousins!