Christmas in Jackson

We headed down to Jackson to spend time with Bert's family the day after the girls got out of school.  Aunt Carrie had flown in earlier that day and the girls were SO excited to see her!  

Emily and Hannah both helped in the kitchen a good bit on Friday, but I only got a picture of Hannah chopping nuts with Aunt Carrie.    

Aunt Carrie and some of her nieces and nephews while we waited on everyone else to get there.  

Grandmama helped the kids make these fun reindeer out of Rolos, pretzels and a piece of a cherry.  They didn't turn out exactly how she was planning but the kids definitely had fun and they were tasty.  

We had a big dinner together on Friday night with lots of Bert's extended family.  Bert's Grandma enjoyed getting to see the girls and let Abby play with her phone for awhile.  She can disable a phone in seconds but I'm not sure if she did that to Grandma's or not.  

Mamaw spent the night at Jeff and Linda's house with us on Friday night.  She loves all of us so well and we loved getting to spend time with her!  

After we at the yummy chili and Linda had made she had a game for us to play together.  I snapped a picture of the people on the couch laughing during the game.  Rosemary has her head thrown back laughing so hard and I thought it was sweet.  It was a fun game!  

On Saturday afternoon we enjoyed opening presents from Bert's parents and siblings and more celebrating. 

Aunt Carrie with a lot of her nieces and nephews.  

Bert's other sister, Alison, is still in Uganda (has been there since mid August) working to adopt Rosemary's two biological siblings.  They are older than Rosemary, and Stephen and Alison have been in the adoption process for them for years.  We are so thankful they are close to coming home and can't wait to welcome them with open arms.  Alison's missed Stephen and her other two kids so much while she's been away, but is not giving up the fight to have her whole family (all 6 of them) together.  We missed all three of them at Christmas this year, but we're already looking forward to all being together soon!  

Grandmama and Pawpaw with 8 of their grandkids!  

We loved our visit and we're so thankful for a big, fun family to celebrate special holidays with.  We are blessed for sure!!

Celebrating Papa Stan's 60th!

My Dad turned 60 this year so we wanted to celebrate big!  Stanley and Alisha got to town on Thursday night and we got there on Friday night.  On Saturday morning we went to Paul Anderson Park to take picture in the sleigh.  We did this as a family 3 years ago, but we were missing Alisha, Ressie and Abby so it was time for a re-do.  

Watts family picture! 

The whole group!

I really loved this picture of Mimi and Papa with all 6 grandkids!  They are all looking at the camera, 5 out of 6 are smiling and Abby looks pleasant....THAT is a success!  

After the pictures we drove back to Mimi and Papa's house for our Gingerbread house making competition.  Stanley and Daddy put the houses together the night before so our job was just to decorate them.  Each team had the exact (and I mean exact....Mimi was very particular about it) same amount of candy that we divided up the night before. Mimi volunteered to be Abby's partner and then each kid drew an adult name.  The two adults leftover were on a team together and that ended up being Daddy and Katherine. 

Here are pictures of our teams and houses. 

I think Claire and I did a great job, but our house actually fell a few hours after we made it, which Claire was sad about. We had everyone that was coming to the party that night vote on which house they liked the best and we did get a few votes (which made my baby happy) even though our house was flat.  Stanley strategically placed some of our trees on top of the house to make it look like a tree had fallen on the house.  

These two were the winners although Brett may have dug in the cabinet to find some blue food coloring.  After they won Emily was proudly telling people "we cheated." Ha!  

We planned a surprise party for Daddy that night. He came home from work a little early and we tried to hide some things, but he ended up figuring it out.  He said the 3 grills outside was what tipped him off that it wasn't just us. Ha! 

The guys grilled hamburgers and hotdogs and we had plenty sides and desserts.  Daddy had several different people drive hours to be there....he is loved!  

After we ate we played a video that Bert made (with pictures that my mom had gotten together for him).  Bert did an awesome job on the video and it was so fun to watch all together.  In the middle of the video he had interviewed each of the 6 grandkids and asked them different questions about Papa. Soooo sweet!  

The cake mom is holding is a monstrosity (seven layers!).  I loved this picture of Daddy smiling at the girls while we are singing to him.  

I'm so thankful for my dad.  My whole life he's always made sure we know how much he loves us and now he's doing to the same thing for his grandkids.  He gives big hugs, good advice and is happiest when he's with his family.  And we love being with him.  I love you, Daddy, and I'm so thankful that I get to be your daughter.  Happy Birthday!!  

Our First Snow of the Winter

We had a snowfall that was just enough to play in one day in early December.  It was beautiful and fun and didn't really stick to the roads...So I thought it was pretty perfect!  

Bert didn't measure it, but we think we probably got about 3 inches.  

That first night it started to snow we took a short walk down the street, which the girls thought was super fun!  

I loved this picture of Emily and Hannah walking up the street together.  I pray all four of our girls are the best of friends.  

The next day Bert and the big three got back out in it and played for awhile before it started to melt.  

This little nugget and I stayed in and I'm not sure that she was overly excited about it. 

Bert, Emily and Hannah built a big snowman that stayed with us for dayssss.    

We enjoyed this snow and we wouldn't mind one or two more....especially if they are as short and sweet as this one.  

Piedmont Park Fire Dept Christmas Party

Bert is the new volunteer chaplain for Piedmont Park Fire Department, which is just down the road from our church.  He has a uniform on order, but he's promised me that he won't be running into burning buildings just because he has a uniform so I'm good with it. 

Bert really is looking forward to getting to know the guys at the station and working on building relationships with them.  

We were all invited to the PPFD Christmas party and the girls were so excited that SANTA came too!  He had a gift for each child. 

Hannah was especially ecstatic and it was precious.  

Abby wasn't not so sure.  When he called her name she didn't even want to take the present from him, much less sit on his knee.  

Claire was excited too!  There were probably 20 kids at the party and all the kids got their gifts from Santa and walked back to their seats to open them, but Claire got her gift from him and opened it right there in his lap.  Ha! 

Emily wasn't jumping around as much as Hannah, but you could tell she was really excited too!  

I had to get a sibling pic with Santa since we didn't make it to the Roper Mountain Lights this year.  

We really enjoyed our time getting to meet lots of people and eating good food.  We are incredibly thankful for the men and women who work for PPFD and how they protect and serve our community!

Family Dinner Party

One night the girls asked if we could eat dinner in the dining room.  We don't do it often because of the carpet, but they were so excited we agreed.  They got all dressed up (Hannah and Emily helped to get Claire and Abby dressed up) while Bert and I were cooking.  They set the table the table and were so excited they were about to burst.  Nights like this remind me that it's definitely the little things.  

Emily wanted pictures of everyone's attire for the night.  

Claire insisted on wearing this vest over her party dress (much to Emily's dismay).  

Hannah wanted her hair in a bun so I put it up before she got dressed.  After Claire saw it she wanted one too of course.  

Ready to eat!  

Sometimes we like to play the staring game and we did that night.  Bert caught a picture of Emily and Hannah playing and I thought it was so sweet. We've learned a few things since we've started playing this game more often.  

1.)  Bert's very good at this game and I am very terrible.  

2.)  Hannah gets her skills from Bert and Emily gets her skills from me.  

3.)  Hannah can beat Emily and me in a hot second and it makes her happy.  Ha!  

It's nights like this that I want to remember.  

School Christmas Parties

I helped out with Hannah's Christmas party on the Friday before they got out of school.  I was pleased that all three of the girls' Christmas parties were at different times this year so that we could be at all of them.  

We started out the party by making Gingerbread houses.  The kids had fun but it didn't go so well.  This is Hannah's table for the moment.  They switch them around every couple weeks it seems like, but Remy and Penny are her two best friends at school (the ones she talks about all the time) and they both happen to be at her table right now, so that's fun!  Remy is across from her and his mom is an amazing 1st grade teacher at our school.  I would be so excited if Hannah got his mom as a teacher next year.  Penny is sitting to Hannah's left and her mom is a speech therapist at our school.  

This was Hannah's finished product.  Ha!  

After "making" and eating the Gingerbread houses it was time to get their gift from their Secret Santa.  They had so much fun giving a gift to one of their friends (they had to keep the gift to under $5)....they had all drawn a name at their Thanksgiving party.  

Hannah got this cute book and had me read it right in the middle of the chaos.  A few of her friends started listening too!  

I enjoyed getting to be there with my sweet kindergartner!  

Claire's school performance and party was on the morning Tuesday the 19th.  Mommies and daddies and grandparents were all packed in the room to see their little three year olds.  I caught Claire signing "I Love You" to her Daddy just before they started singing.  She left it there for awhile.  She was so excited to have both of us there.  

This age is so cute to watch.  The little boy to Claire's left kept bending over and then standing up and pulling up his shirt.  Ha!  There is a mom in the corner of this picture who was trying to talk her son into singing, but he couldn't be convinced.  They have 10 cute kids in their class.  

We loved getting to be there to cheer on our girl and we appreciated Ms. Sherry watching Abby.  The school asks that you not bring siblings to parties, which is a bit of a pain, but it is fun to have one on one time with our little preschooler.  

Emily's party was the same day as Claire's but in the afternoon.  Ms. Sonja came over to watch Claire and Abby was napping the whole time.  I only got this ONE picture at Emily's party.

They had fun eating Christmas themed food and rotating to different stations.  We had two craft stations and two game stations.  Emily was especially excited about the ornament that she made.  

I had so much fun getting to celebrate Christmas with all my girls and their friends.  All three parties were super cute and sweet!  

Church Christmas Performance

Emily, Hannah and Claire had their church Christmas performance on December 3rd.  Pawpaw and Grandmama drove up on Saturday so they could be here for it and we enjoyed also getting to watch the SEC championship with them and cheer on the Dawgs together.  

I didn't ask them to pose like this, but they were all snuggled up to Grandmama and Pawpaw after they got here so I ran to get my phone. 

We enjoyed having Grandmama and Pawpaw at church with us on Sunday morning.  She took a picture of each of the girls before we headed out the door.  

Mimi and Papa arrived that afternoon so that they could be here for the performance that night.  We enjoyed spending several hours relaxing with everyone.  

I've enjoyed working with the Play and Praise kids (3 years old through K-5) again this year. We've consistently had a good number of kids each week and they have been so sweet. 

Getting ready to take the stage!

Claire wanted to stand beside Hannah.  

During our performance at the elast Spring Claire stood on the stage with her arms crossed and a big scowl on her face during a large chunk of the performance.  This time I can't remember if she smiled much, but she didn't scowl, used the instruments and maybe even sang a little.  Go Claire!  

Hannah looks tall here, but it's probably because she's between two three-year-olds.  

This was Emily's third play with the big kids choir and I've never seen her work so hard to memorize her lines and learn every song and motion.  She wanted to practice all the time and we were really proud of her hard work.  It showed as she knew that play backwards and forwards.

The play that they did was called "Out of the Box" and it really was super cute.  Emily and three of the other girls were "angel cheerleaders."

My friend Shannon got a picture of Emily during one of her speaking parts.  I love that you can see how much expression she was using!

The whole gang after the show!  

All the grandparents headed back to their houses after the show but we were thankful they made the trip up to be with us! 

And we were super proud of all three girls!