Holiday Happenings

This Christmas Post is Fully Loaded with photos, so I won't bore you with lots of words! :)

First, I wanted to show off one of my Christmas presents from Rick and Evelyn: a portrait lens for my Nikon. It rocks! I need more practice, but what fabulous results I've seen thus far:

Miss Blue Eyes

The Smirk

The bro The Other Half

The Father-in-Law, the world's best grill captain!

I figure I might get more use out of the new lens when Abby's a little older. It's only a manual focus, which can be difficult with a 19-month-old trying to sit still! OK, now on to the festivities.

We went to LV for a full week--and what a wonderful, relaxing trip it was. This year, Christmas was so fun with Abby. While she still doesn't really "get" Christmas, she enjoyed pulling on some tissue paper and playing with her new toys. Oh, and anytime she saw a picture of Santa, whether an ornament, on wrapping paper, in a book, she "ho-ho-hoed!!" It's funny, actually. This Christmas season, she has been FASCINATED with Santa. At our Kroger, they had a big Santa statue near the dairy section, and every time we went to the grocery store, and she saw Santa, she'd point and "ho-ho-ho." Well, we went there this morning, and she "ho-ho-hoed" at the spot where Santa USED to be, got this really confused expression on her face (when she realized she was ho-ho-hoing to nothing), and with her palms facing up, shoulders hunched asked, "Where'd he go?" Too funny.

Picture time.

The Three Tenners before Christmas Eve service. I just LOVE Christmas Eve service at our Methodist Church. The candlelight singing of "Silent Night" gets me every time.

BeBe (formerly known as Grammie. Abby has decided on a new name!!), Abby, and Pops (or as Abby would say, "Baaaaaaah".) Abby giving BeBe the "Big Hug." She only does it upon special request. Matt, me, Chris, and his favorite niece Abby. He is IN LOVE with that little girl!!
Abby on her new Pooh Trike. She would have slept on that thing if we would have let her!
Just me and Roo
Papa, Abby, and Pops. She could do no wrong around them this past week!

On Christmas morning, after waking up and opening gifts, we headed to Shreveport to visit Matt's family at his grandmother's house. Honey is looking beautiful as always. I hope I look that good when I'm her age! Those Bryant women have GREAT genes. We Craddock women only have good genes when it comes to being over-emotional and having a keen eye for grammatical errors. :(
Evelyn and RickThis was my mom's gift to Rick. It's the perfect gift because it combines his two favorite things: his love of grilling and his granddaughter! My crazy Grandma. She is the funniest 88-year-old I know!! While in Longview, we figured out her "Gangsta Name" would be Vanilla Loafer. She loved it! She looks like a Vanilla Loafer, doesn't she? ha! Abby on that Pooh Trike again.
While the guys played golf Friday, the gals went to KidStation. She got in free, so no complaints there! Here she is in the ball pit.
Abby's obsession with buses continues to grow. Santa brought her one for Christmas. As you can see by this picture, she obviously didn't understand what I meant when I said she "could ride on a bus one day".... Hmmm...
The little munchkin getting herself into precarious situations. Small space=magnet for toddler.
Here is Abby with my cousin Holly's twin girls, Sarah and Rachel. They had a good ol' time running around and opening up presents. This was the best picture I could get!
Mom, Dad, Uncle Scooter, Aunt Mollie, and Grandma in Tyler
The cousins: Chris, Matt, me, Holly, Clint, and John
Here is the lone picture I got of Emily and Jason. :( Check out the AWESOME A&M blanket we got for baby Clark. He's not allowed to spit up on it. Ever. However, if Revellie were to drool on it, it would mean classes were canceled for 24 hours. HA HA!

Just the two of us
So, that's our Christmas. We had a great time in LV. I hope you and your family had a blessed, relaxing holiday as well!

Merry Christmas!

Happy Holidays! I thought I'd post our Christmas card because I ran out of time and energy (and stamps!) to mail any more out, so if you didn't get one, here is your virtual card! :) By the way, did any of you know that it's DIFFICULT to have a one year old sit and pose for Christmas card pictures?? :) Miraculously, we got one good one of all three of us, and voila!

At my Mom's Group Christmas party yesterday, the kids all made ornaments. How cute and ridiculously EASY is this ornament? Paint the kid's fingers, press on an ornament. Let dry. Then, with Sharpies, decorate. Instant Snowman Ornament! How cute is that?!

This is the ornament Abby painted at Mother's Day Out. It graces the Christmas tree, of course!

Here's the munchkin rockin' on her horse.

And here's just a sweet picture that I took of her.

I hope y'all have a very MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! Enjoy your time with friends and family!

Artist Abby

I really have NO time to spend blogging right now, but I just had to post these pics really quick. Between shopping for the last Christmas presents on the list, wrapping presents, straightening up the house, getting started on laundry, etc., little time is left for blogging. Oh well!

When I dropped off Abby this morning at MDO, two pieces of art were waiting for me. Here is the future Artist's paintings:

First, I call this one "Candy Cane." (original, huh?) It looks like the teachers may have helped guide her hand a bit on this. That's OK with me. And WHAT PENMANSHIP!!! Ladies and gentlemen, do you know any other 19 month olds who can write their name so precisely?? ;)
This one I call "Poor Reindeer." Yes, folks, that's a reindeer. Apparently the teachers weren't around to help guide Abby as to where to place the eyes, nose, and antlers. You know what though? I LOVE IT! I wouldn't have it any other way!!! However, if this reindeer were to come to life, I'm fairly certain he wouldn't be allowed to guide Santa's sleigh. Can you imagine the look on little Susie's face when she spies out the window Christmas Eve and sees THIS over her house?? Can I get an Amen? That's all I got.

Small Town Christmas

My top three annoyances at the moment:

1. Someone broke into Matt's car on Saturday night and stole his garage door opener. We're not certain if he accidentally left the car unlocked or someone broke into it discreetly. Either way, it's pretty darn annoying. I think the people were going down the alley, because they got into a neighbor's car too. So, $67 later, we have two new, re-programmed garage door openers. I told Matt we should post a big sign on our garage door that says, "If you touch any of our property again, we will SHOOT TO KILL. We have a .22 shotgun, and we're not afraid to use it!" What do you think?? :)

2. Traffic. It took Matt 2 (yes, two!) hours to get to work this morning. Heck, that's about how long it takes us to get from Allen to the outskirts of Longview if traffic's moving along nicely. I swear. There's 1/4 inch of ice on the ground and people freak out. Allen schools even closed today! I bet Northerners would laugh their tails off if they knew schools were closed here in parts of Texas!!

3. Stomach bugs. I got this stomach bug that's been going around, and let me tell you, it knocked me on my butt! Most people I know only got the 24-hour one, but I guess I picked up the 72 hour one. Holy cow! I swear when I'm sick like that, I can't comprehend how anyone could be bullemic!___________________________________

OK, enough ranting. Now onto the pics. We traveled to Prosper (which might as well be Oklahoma as far away as our pals live!) to its annual Christmas Festival. Prosper is a town of about 5,000 people, and our old neighbors now live up there, and what a great time we had! It's always great to get together with them. Too bad we're not in the old neighborhood where we were just across the street from one another! Here are some pics from our outing. Thanks Melissa for being the photographer! (By the way, how I managed to surivive this in the middle of my bug is beyond me!)

Here's the fam with Santa. Abby had a Deer-in-the-headlight look on her face the whole time. She was overwhelmed with all of the sights and sounds, I think!

She got to ride a pony!
Abby with her pals Emily and Kendall Abby and Kendall on the "Prosper Express"How cute are they! How is it that all 5 year olds love kids littler than them??

Snowman Abby

Somehow, I got talked into riding the Choo-Choo Train with Abby. I tried to convince Matt to ride, but if I could barely fit in the train car, then I was fairly certain Matt's 6'6" frame wouldn't be possible!

I felt like Buddy The Elf.

Can you spot the one person out of place???? Oh, the things we do for our children!

And because I started with my grievances, I'll end with my joys:

1. When we ask Abby what Santa says, she replies "Ho Ho Ho." It is too cute! So, any time she sees Santa, whether it's on a card, wrapping paper, an ornament, etc., she says, "Ho Ho Ho." Well, the movie Elf was playing at the Prosper Christmas Festival, and the scene came on where Santa was in the department store, and Buddy The Elf realizes it's not the "real" Santa and attacks him in front of all of the kids in line. Remember that part? He pulls on his beard, etc., to prove that he's a "fake"? Well, Abby was watching that scene, and she started to scream bloody murder because Santa was getting beat up!! How adorable is that?! I assured her that Santa was A-OK, and we went by to sit on his lap just so she wouldn't be traumatized for life! :)

2. A HUGE Thank You to my wonderful hubby for taking charge yesterday. I was laid up in bed for the majority of the day, and what a blessing it was that he had already planned to take yesterday off from work! He and Abby got in some great bonding time, and Mommy got some much-needed rest. Luckily today, I am feeling human once again! So, thank you Matt for taking such great care of me and little Roo!! :)

Just Pics

Here are some pics from the past few days.

Dada and little Roo
Sporting her super cute Christmas outfit (Thanks, Nana and Papa!) Please excuse the tag I had yet to cut off! You may also notice she's walking around in my shoes!

In these next few pictures, you will surely notice a trend.

Pointing at...Bob the cat from across the street.

...the mailman

...Swiper on Dora The Explorer. She loves when that crazy fox comes on the screen. Her obsession with all things Dora is an entire post in itself!

...an airplane

...the same airplane without the crazy look of excitement on her face

And here Abby demonstrates how she could win First Place in the "Miss Fake Cry" Contest.

Sweet girl--now that's more like it. :)

Abby and her Dada check out the airplane (another huge fascination of hers.)

Like two peas in a pod

Until next time!