It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Now that Thanksgiving was over and Daddy was home it was finally time to decorate the tree. One of my favorite little simple traditions that we've created is making sure we all decorate the tree together. As crazy as November and December can be for basketball coach's families, we will wait and our coach will make the time to decorate the tree all together. These are the sweetest moments I pray we never forget.

I love that kids don't know or care about the "perfect" Christmas tree and that their favorite ornaments are the paper gingerbread man they made at school or the hand print angel!

Everything with these girls was so sweet this year so lots of pictures in this post leading up to Christmas.

 

 

Just a little family walk around the neighborhood, but nothing is boring with these two!

Helping send out our Christmas cards!

Christmas cupcakes with friends!

   

Poor 3rd children have to sit and scream while their bigs make cupcakes and their Mommy's document!

 

Having a little Christmas moment with my five stockings, a decorated tree and the Pentatonix Christmas Special. What you can't see is the sweet sleeping baby in my arms or the girls wrestling on the couch!

With 3 littles and during basketball season, sometimes it's hard to find time for just one. I was excited when we found a night for me take Jordan to the local Nutcracker arts performance at a historic home in town. I anticipated this "big girl" Christmas adventure all week, but then when it started snowing on the way there it turned into this perfect Christmas experience. What a sweet Christmas moment with my biggest girl.

 

"SNOW"

 

The interactive Nutcracker performance was pretty neat. Each room was a different scene and in the first room they let the kids put an ornament on the tree. I put my camera away immediately after she was scared of the Mouse King, but I wish I could have captured her face watching the Snow Queen. She came home and told Daddy all about the "beautiful ballerina with the big white skirt and the crown on her head".

Snowing!

Back to decorating...I forgot I had this little tree for the girls to decorate and in true Jordan and Taylor fashion, they decorated in their princess dresses.

If I had a dollar for every time Taylor made this face for a picture!

Christmas crafts! Making ornaments to put on top of our presents.

"Taylor, smile!"

Playing with snapchat to keep us entertained and I just couldn't leave this one out. Sweetest reindeer I know :)

Jordan had a big week of performances with her school Christmas program and her Christmas showcase at dance. I love watching Jordan with her classes and how big she has gotten. She watched the music and dance teacher to make sure she was doing everything just exactly as she was supposed to. But she knew EVERY word and EVERY dance move and was so proud of herself at the end. We were glad Gamma and Poppy could come to celebrate Gamma's birthday and watch the Christmas program. 

"Jesus is my very BEST friend, I will love him to the end" coming out of the mouths of pre-schoolers is a sweet sweet sound. 

Being silly at dance

"When I grow up I want to be a ballerina, so I'm going to practice a lot"

Every time I asked Taylor what she wanted to ask Santa to bring her for Christmas she said "I don't want to talk about it right now". But the ONE thing that she asked for when I would ask her a thousand questions about what she wanted was a pink sparkle pen. Before Santa could even get here, her favorite teacher at school sent her home with this. She was so excited she carried it all over the house. Sweet Taylor girl and the simplest things that can make her happy. And our sweet teachers at school sure do make dropping them off each day much easier!

It's not Christmas season without some basketball and trying to entertain these two during Daddy's game!

 

Being the biggest girl writing names on our presents, drinking her hot chocolate like a grown up,

and standing on the furniture on her blanket with the Elfie watching tv. Ok maybe sometimes she is just a 4 year old!

 

We headed to College Station for a couple of days while Daddy was on his last road trip before Christmas. Making cookies with Gamma!

Taylor just a little late to the "Smile with Gamma" request

I always love when Taylor does the "What is Jordan doing" look.

Poor baby Colton has not been in this post at all, but he gets his own post next for being a big 3 months old! He just had to check out these beautiful cookies!

 

 Love when we get to hang out with this family when we're in town!

Gamma is the best at making sure we have pictures of our kids, but is never in the picture. She does so much for our little family and loves my kids something big! She would do anything for them and is still taking care of me whenever I need her to be. I try to say thank you as much as I can, but I hope she always knows how appreciative we are of everything she does for us and how my kids adore her! Love you mom!

This girl is really developing her own little personality. She loves to be held and she knows it! She knows that when Colton is being held that we can't hold her, so as soon as we put him down she announces that now we can hold her for a long time! She is not the easiest audience with unfamiliar people, but once you get her she loves so big! She is talking up a storm and loves singing her own versions of songs that you're not allowed to correct.

Always twirling in the tiny gazebo they call "Repunzel's Tower"

and all is fun until someone falls and gets a fat lip! Taylor falls about 30 times a day, it's hard learning to move around when your feet keep growing so fast!

Taylor also LOVES her baby Colton. "Can I see Colton's face?" "Can I play with Colton?" We just have to teach her to control her body a bit so she'll stop putting her knee on his face! :)

Photo Shoot outside of Daddy's last game before Christmas!

"Look at the flowers, take our picture!"

Don't mind me girls: the house is a mess, i'm trying to take care of your brother and the it's 3 days before Christmas and we are baking and cooking and wrapping.

Getting ready for Christmas this year was so much fun with our littles. Seeing Christmas through their eyes from talking about the joy of Baby Jesus being born to buying gifts for others and anticipating what Santa will bring as been so precious! I know they don't fully understand it yet, but the pieces they do are so sweet. We had so much fun with decorations, Christmas songs, wrapping, baking, Christmas programs and Christmas outfits!