Belated Holiday Updates!

Life in our home has just started to settle down for us since the HOLIDAY'S I can't even begin to tell you how busy November, December, and part of January were for us. But we are now into February and life is slowing down. Ellsie has just this week stopped asking if we are going to a CHRISTMAS PARTY! But here are a few pics and story to let you in on how our HOLIDAY"S were spent:)

THANKSGIVING IN TUCSON

I wish I had more pictures from this week to share but our camera was being repaired so I don't have much. We loaded the kids up the Tuesday before THANKSGIVING and drove to Tucson for a fabulous week. My kids are finally getting to an age where they go off and play for a bit with their cousins without my constant supervision. It was so fun to see them interact with Abbie, Brandon, and Ryan. Abbie is our little caretaker and she is so good with Ellsie. We had a great weather while we were there so we spent lots of time outside. 

CHRISTMAS!

OK, let me share a little something with you all... I AM OBSESSED WITH CHRISTMAS JAMMIES! Leading up to Christmas I search for cute Christmas jammies because I have this vision of wonderful pictures flashing through my brain. All I want is to have amazing pictures of this special day in their matching pj's! Of course things never go as planned. Christmas morning came and Nixon had completely leaked out of his diaper and soaked his adorable jammies. I quickly stop Chris from changing his clothes and demand that we get at least ONE picture of them in their matching jammies. As a result I have a very wet and frustrated son sitting in front of the tree... YEAH for the perfect photo op! 

Ahhh, much better... Shortly after the forced jammy picture we got Nixon cleaned up and put some FOOD in his mouth. He is now a very happy boy:) 

Ellsie was just elated with excitement jumping from gift to gift. This was her first year of really comprehending the entire scene and she had so much fun tearing open all her gifts! 

Nerf football. It doesn't take much to get this kid excited! 

Cousin's: Nixon, Penelope, and Ellsie

So many great memories were made this past year. I can't wait to find out what 2012 brings! 

Happy Birthday Nixon

My precious boy is one year old! I have no idea where this past year has gone. He is such a HUGE blessing and we love watching his personality really start to break through. First birthday's are not taken lightly in our home...NO WAY! We love to go all out;) I'm talking hand made banners, dinosaur cupcakes, candy station and streamers. All to get some great pictures, because it's not like Nixon will actually remember this day!  So pictures you will see.  

Do to a lighting issue we couldn't get the candy station dead on so here is a side view. 

Let me just say that if you ever decide to decorate dinosaurs like this be ready for a long night. These little suckers were small so very difficult to actually decorate! But oh so adorable:)

September is such a beautiful month in Socal so we decided to make Nixon's party a swim party. Nothing like a pool to add chaos to a party. At one point we had 13 kids in the water!

First birthday's seem to mark big "first" moments for our kids. Ellsie crawled up the stairs on her first birthday and while I thought Nixon would CRAWL on his first birthday he decided to do something a little more adventurous. HE JUMPED IN THE POOL! Nixon can stand by himself pretty good. Chris would put him at the edge of the pool and he would jump right in to Chris! It was AWESOME. 

And of course it is a right of passage to devour your first cake when turning one. It took Nixon a little while to get the hang of it but it's food so of course every bit of that cupcake was GONE! 

We had such a wonderful day Celebrating Nixon. Ellsie is still wanting to sing happy birthday to Nixon daily... so she can have cake after;) Nixon finally has some BOY toys to play with. Poor guy, he mostly play's with Ellsie's old toys. I loved every minute making this day special for him.