Christmas and New Year's 2012

We had a really great Christmas and New Year's this year!  It was wonderful to be with family.  :)  Here are the holidays in a nutshell...

We went to Bass Pro Shops to try to visit Santa, but the line was crazy long so we just played on some expensive all-terrain vehicles instead... pretending we were the Duck Dynasty family...  

... and then we left and went a little closer to home to see Santa.  And had some good snuggle time while we waited.  J and E kept asking for hugging pictures and we were only too happy to oblige...

Reid wouldn't sit with Santa at all, but J and E did this year!  They even told him what they wanted, although J tried to explain that he wanted the Angry Birds game that you have to pay for on the iPad and Santa didn't really get that... and clueless Mommy just stood there and didn't explain to Santa what it was, so J thought Santa wasn't going to pull through and got a little frustrated.  The picture we have that we paid for from the actual Santa place is priceless... J looks totally annoyed and we threw Reid in there and he's terrified.  Definitely a keeper, but our scanner is packed up in a box so you'll just have to imagine it.  :)

The boys had their Christmas music program at school... Emmett did great and sang the whole time and Jackson just stood there without doing any motions or singing at all!  At least he behaved, though.  He just doesn't like to perform, I guess, because he will sing at the top of his lungs at home.  Phil and I have heard "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" about 562 times since Thanksgiving.  Oh, and we bought a new little video camera so we have some good video of their performance but not a lot of pictures.  But I didn't want to bore everyone with the video that only Phil and I would appreciate.  :)

Right before Christmas we went to my parents' house for the holiday weekend and played with cousins...

...and we went to a model train show that the boys were just entranced by...

 

...and then it was Christmas Eve and we took pics in matching pajamas and set out cookies and milk for Santa (and sprinkled "reindeer food" that Emmett made in school in the yard - so cute!)...

...and we had a wonderful Christmas morning with all of our family.  Again, we got a lot of precious, priceless videos but not so many pictures this year.  J and E were so happy and thankful and excited this year... it was so great!  And they really understand the Christmas story now, which is wonderful, too.  I just loved hearing them tell me the story of Jesus's birth in their own words.

We were only able to stay in Ocala until the day after Christmas since Phil had to go back to work, but he had quite a few days off around New Year's, so we got to spend some quality family time together at home. Here are the boys sporting their matching Superman tees (Dad has one, too) that they are obsessed with.  This was right before we tried to go family bike-riding, which turned out to be a no-go since it was FREEZING (well, freezing for Florida, that is)!

We spent a few minutes riding around the parking lot before we couldn't take the wind any longer.
It was a nice idea, though.

This is a really dark, awful pic but it's the only one I had so I'm posting it anyway.  On New Year's Eve Phil and I had a wonderful dinner with our good friends Blood and Kelly.  Blood was our squadron commander in the 95th Fighter Squadron the last time we were stationed here, and we both happen to be back here again at the same time.  We just love them and have such a good time together and were so happy to be able to spend the holiday with them.  Blood retired from the AF a few months ago and is training to fly with Fed Ex right now, so they'll be moving in a few months. :(  Kelly has graciously offered to stay with the boys when I go into labor, and what a total blessing and relief that is! This was such a fun dinner!  B and K's two college-age daughters stayed with the boys so we could enjoy a night out.  It was great!

New Year's Day was just gorgeous.  I have to say that we had been a little jealous of all of the snow we missed back in Oregon this year (they got a TON!) but you just can't beat spending two hours at the beach on a warm, sunny New Year's Day.