Pre-Christmas Festivities!

Christmas is such an exciting time, especially with little ones! Grady was absolutely giddy through all of December (which meant Landon was too!), so we tried to do a lot of fun activities and really enjoy the season. After decorating the tree and putting all the Christmas decorations up, the next task was to write letters to Santa. Grady decided early on that he only wanted two things for Christmas: a marble tower and play-dough. Landon just said he wanted toys. :)

And the most exciting part...putting the letters in the mailbox!

Landon made some ornaments in our playgroup that we brought home and cooked, so Grady got to help decorate them. He was of course thrilled that we had made him a "G" ornament. :)

We also had our first professional family photo shoot! (I found a great deal on groupon, so decided to go for it.) We got some pretty cute pictures out of it. The funny part about this picture of Grady below is that Landon was lost somewhere in these bushes....he fell down in them, and we literally lost him for a few seconds!

Here's sweetie #1....

And sweetie #2....

Brandon took this picture later that day... I think he looks so much like me when I was little here! (And something about this picture really shows his sneaky side.) 

Grady had a special Christmas program at preschool, which basically entailed singing several Christmas carols and jingling some bells. It was of course super cute (as always)! It's so funny because we always see so much of ourselves in Grady. He's a bit shy in school (not at home!), so while every other child was frantically searching for their parents and waving, Grady was purposely looking the other way trying not to make eye contact with us. Brandon and I were both shy when we were little (me more so than him!), and that's exactly what we would have done in a situation like this. The good part is we totally "get" this little guy and were not one bit offended! You'll notice in all the pictures he's looking the other way....he he. We were proud of him though because he did sing (well, kind of) and shook his jingle bells.

Kelly and Hannah came up a few days early (before Christmas), so we got to spend some time with them as well! We had dinner one night at Carleen and Kevin's house and made a gingerbread house, which they all loved (especially Kevin!). :)

Hannah relaxing with Carleen.... decorating a gingerbread house is exhausting!

Stay tuned for Christmas pics! :)