Christmas Adam

"True happiness consists not in the multitude of friends, but in their worth and choice."

A new tradition was started today.

My friend came over with her 2 children and we spent the whole day baking!

I didn't realize how much I love to bake and try new recipes.

We had a lot of fun - especially our children.

We decided to call this day

Christmas Adam

since it is the day before Christmas Eve.

So now we have several kinds of cookies, glazed almonds, and peanut brittle to share on Christmas day.

Only 2 days left until Christmas.

Tomorrow we will go to mass in the afternoon.

Two of our children will sing in the choir.

We will show our children the beautiful manger scene and take a family

picture up by the altar.

After, we will take our children out for dinner.

It is the one day a year we take them all out to a "nicer" restaurant.

It's nice because restaurants are not crowded on Christmas Eve.

Then we will come home and hang up our stockings, sprinkle reindeer food on our lawn, then go online to check where Santa is before heading to bed.



Small Vent

"We tend to forget that happiness doesn't come as a result of getting something we don't have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have."

First I will have a small vent.

The other night my husband and I watched the Best Commercials of 2011 on TBS.

We wanted to watch something with humor.

It was ok.

The last commercial was about cats with thumbs.

Our oldest came downstairs and caught the last commercial with us.

We enjoyed the cats because we have had (and still have) cats

with "thumbs."

Anyways, then the host came on and said "You know what's scarier than cats with thumbs? Cats with Tourettes." Then he started cussing (it was bleeped out of course.) But you could clearly tell the "f" word was being yelled.

That was a huge mood breaker.

Why do people think that is funny? It's not. Tourettes is real. Swearing is not always part of Tourettes, but it was with our oldest and it is with our 3rd son.

There is also a book on Amazon that is called Pets with Tourettes. It's a bunch of photos of animals cursing. How is that acceptable?

Ok. Done.

Our kiddos are on break from school for 2 weeks. Love it!

Today we are just taking it easy.

Everyone is playing nicely together while Cam and I hang out in my bed.

Cam didn't want to sleep last night. We were up until 2:00am, so this is nice.

I bought huge gingerbread men cookies and stuff to decorate them.

That is our only plans today.

Only 4 days until Christmas!

Cameron - 6mths

"Don't ever change yourself to impress someone, because they should be impressed that you don't change to please others."

Today was a good day.

It started out a little "painful." Someday I will figure out why I wake

up with headaches often. Thankfully it is Saturday so Tommy could help me out.

I was able to stay in bed until I felt better - not alone of course. I had at least 1 child with me at all times. At one point I had 6.

Tom ran out to take Ethan and Rachel to their Church Choir Christmas party and to do a quick errand.

But my oldest, Brandon, came up and checked on me and brought me hot tea.

He is very good to me.

Once I felt better, it was time to get our Family Room ready for our Christmas tree. We spent some time cleaning while we had Christmas music playing. We finally got our tree up late in the afternoon. 

Somehow our day got away from us and we decided not to go through all the boxes to find our ornaments tonight. We will decorate tomorrow.

Instead, we ordered pizza and watched a Christmas movie. We also made some hot apple cider and just relaxed.

Cameron is 6 months old today!

Time to try rice cereal!
Cam seemed to really enjoy having "real" food. He sat in his highchair and had an audience of siblings surrounding him. He did well.
Cameron also started clapping his hands today. So cute. 
And he was letting out  big laughs this evening. Sarah was running across the floor in front of him then jumping on a box. Cam thought that was the funniest thing. He was on his belly holding his head up to watch Sarah, then he'd just start giggling and rolling around on the floor.
Sarah loved being the "star" of Cam's show and making him laugh.
Cameron is working on sitting up on his own. Still needs a little support, but he does get around the room by rolling. And he grabs everything!
He is also a big talker. No words - though he says MaaaaMaaaa when he is whining. That kind of counts - but a lot of babbling.

Christmas is my favorite day of the year.
I can't wait! I love everything about it!
Church, family, lights, music,...
Tomorrow we are going to mass then to a nursing home to sing Christmas Carols. A few weeks ago we spent an afternoon at our church wrapping and filling up shoe boxes for Operation Christmas Child. Our children really enjoyed helping others. I know they will love bringing joy to others tomorrow too.
This is what gets me into the spirit of Christmas.
Sharing God's blessings with others.


Cameron James' 1st Christmas

Our Family 2011