Cheetos In The Car

one word..........
MESSY!

Santa at Grandma's House

We went to VCA to see Santa. Man, that guy
gets around! Festivities in Round Rock, Austin,
Georgetown, retirement apartments!

While we were there we saw Landon and his
family.

How can the grass be so green
right before Christmas? TEXAS!

I think every picture has Annie's silky
and/or her Velveteen Rabbit either in
hand or very close by!

Here we have Santa (aka Dan) and Royanne.

My Santa baby. This is the dress she got
for the Kinderdance Christmas performance.

Silly Fun

Little Dancer

Nathaniel and Royanne

It took me a while, but I have been meaning to post
these pictures. Julie's baby almost had Royanne's
birthday, so they are very close in age.
Below, their first Halloween pictures. We both
put our sweet babies in cold, wet pumpkins!

NATHANIEL

ANNIE

Fun With Our Church Home Group

After a good lunch of brisket, smoked pork loin,
sausage, chicken breast, 2 salads, fried okra,
french bread and crescent rolls, (did I forget
anything?!) the kiddos made graham
cracker houses. I expected a lot bigger
mess than what we got!

Then, Royanne found the piano and she and
Dylan began to make music (noise) together.
Derrell distracted them with 2 talking, moving
Christmas toys that played off one another,
and then the hip-hop singing
penguin! What a hit that was!

Feet OFF the floor!


You know the song "Rockin' 'Round The
Christmas Tree"?
Well, they were a rockin' !!

Flying hair!

Hysteria and Dylan. A cute match!

Island Climber

I caught her climbing & used the video camera
on my phone. This is how she does it:

Early Visit With Santa

The things you do when you have a child!
We bundled them up and braved the after 5pm
40 degree weather
to attend the Christmas stroll on the square
and to see Santa.

Roberta, Mimi, Bruce and I really enjoyed seeing
the kids enjoy the Bethlehem setting and the live
Nativity scene.

You never know when you will run across Dean.
I have known this kind and wonderful man for many
years. He so enjoys playing Santa. Abby pulled his
beard to see if it was real. She's been questioning
Santa's authenticity.

It was a very fun night!

Murray Christmas

The Murrays had the first gingerbread house
construction party of the season. Kay made cute
little invitations and Abby & Liam invited one
friend each: Lauren and Vincent. Vincent's
little brother Ryan tagged along, as did Royanne.

There were a lot of choices for the
decorations. The boys' mom, Eva, stayed
to help and visit.

This is the tree in the dining room. [Remember,
I mentioned there is a tree in just about
every room].

The dining room tree is aqua
and copper.

Abby and Lauren.

Liam and Vincent.


This is a house Kay and Royanne started
in the afternoon, before the party. That white
blob is 3 marshmallows supported by a
toothpick: a snowman, of course!

Royanne's in the making.

Construction.

Blue mouth: she ate something.

Silly Liam.

Vincent and Liam.

She wanted gum balls in the "yard".
Bruce helped her glue them down with icing.

Living room fireplace, next to the spectacular
tree.

Pizza and the sillies.

Tree in TV room upstairs.

Tree in Abby's room.
All pink and lime green.

Tree in Liam's room.

Thanksgiving

This year we went to Round Rock for
Thanksgiving. With the MAACO
opening soon, no time to go to Ft.
Worth. Grandma has a book we write in every
Thanksgiving. We write
who all got together, which house, what we
ate, what games we played, and anything else
to mark the occasion.
Thanksgiving is also close to Bonner's
birthday. He's 24 this year! That doesn't
seem possible! He was unable to come, but
we still kept his food request on the menu:
Mimi's homemade, dripping in sauce,
BBQ ribs!

The day before Thanksgiving, we were
decorating the tree. Annie is so excited
about Christmas! To make it more pleasant,
we went and bought plastic decorations. We let
her pick the colors. She picked a big package of
blue and silver. Currently, blue is her favorite
color.

It is better to have plastic than always saying
"NO!"
She hung some blueberry flavored blue candy
canes on the bottom branches.


I found some white and blue jungle bells.
We had a few holes we needed to fill!

Grandma and Annie watching a Christmas
movie.

Liam and Annie had their very own table.

Mimi helped Abby with a pilgrim look.

Still with the apron from lunch, Liam and Annie
go for a spin. They love playing together so much.

Royanne's first experience with hot chocolate.
It was barely cold enough for it.

She loves marshmallows so much. Due to planting
and harvesting a lot with her daddy, she
suggested they plant some marshmallows,
so that we always have some.

This tree in Kay's house: WAIT! All of the
trees......they look like they are from Macy's or
Dillards or something! Pictures just don't
do them justice. (They have a tree in all but
one room, and the bathrooms, of course).

Closeup.

Closeup.

Closeup.

Later in the afternoon, Royanne helped
Amanda make some cookies for a soldier
friend.

Royanne gets to help a lot at home, and I
think she fully expected to be able to help
dump ingredients.

Supervising the mixing.

Tasting the batter.

On the ride home. We didn't even make it
out of the neighborhood before she was
snoozin'.