Change Is Going To Do You Good

Life has many seasons and this past year was what I felt like as a holding season. 2010 and even some of 2009 have been a waiting period. We've not been twiddling our thumbs by any means, but I have a sense that 2011 is going to hold big changes. Change can be scary. However, this time I'm excited about change.

Some change is going to have to come from me though. I'm not really making resolutions this year, but I do want to refocus on some areas of my life. I want to read more, budget better, savor more moments and foster better friendships. Here's to savoring the last moments of 2010 with a little pictorial reflection. My sister-in-law had the great idea to do this.

Dave's Birthday

Valentine's Day

My birthday

Rodeo

Easter
Blue Bell Factory in Brenham

Indiana Jones appearance at our nephew's birthday

Mother's Day

Father's Day

Gavin's Birthday

Fourth of July

San Diego to visit my dear friend

Play time with more dear friends

Labor Day

Halloween

Running of the Turkeys on Thanksgiving

Christmas

Welcome New Year!

Christmas Pondering

This Christmas had to be one of the best that I can remember in the past few years. I think most of that had to do with my attitude and some priorities that were made. All I kept thinking of was from Luke 2:19, "But Mary treasured all these things, pondering them in her heart." And that's exactly what I tried to do this year. There were less activities, less baking which added up to more time with my favorite boys and more contentment in my heart.
One of this year's favorite Christmas memories was singing Happy Birthday to baby Jesus. Gavin has a Fisher Price baby Jesus that he plays with in his pretend manger scene. On Christmas Eve, I was telling Gavin that tomorrow is Jesus' birthday and asked if he wanted to practice singing Happy Birthday to him. So I sang, with Gavin mainly bopping his head. When we got to the end of the song, Gavin blew on Jesus' head like it was a candle. Of course, we did this about ten times because Gavin kept saying "more." I have pictures, but alas, our camera in on the fritz, so in the meantime, I'm pondering. Besides, Mary didn't have a camera.

We got some good deals on Christmas presents for Gavin but my favorite item to give him was a felt Muno I made.
For those of you without toddlers, Muno is a character from a popular children's show called Yo Gabba Gabba. It's safe to say Gavin liked it.My husband was excited because I gave him my heart all over again. Okay, so he's always had it.
This year, we tried to teach Gavin a few Christmas tunes. Most of the catchier ones are Frosty and Jingle Bells. One song that Gavin would actually try to sing instead of just bopping his head was "Oh Christmas Tree." We were eating in a Mexican restaurant and out of the blue, Gavin pointed to their Christmas tree and started singing, "Oh tree, oh tree."
Christmas Eve was also a sweet time together. We went to an early Christmas Eve service with my in-laws. Gavin sat with us in the service and did really well. The last several years, D and I have tried to make a unique Christmas Eve dinner and this year we decided on making Pork Tenderloin wrapped in Brioche with a side of couscous. For dessert, we decorated a nine inch gingerbread man that Gavin named Ga Ga.
We truly are blessed to have our family close by and saw both sides on Christmas Day. Below are a few of the picture highlights.
We're enjoying having family time this week. There's lots of playing, napping and silliness going on in the Moore household. This past year was nice, but I for one am looking forward to this new year.

Santa's Wonderland

So last night, we loaded up the car and headed out to College Station to visit Santa's Wonderland. The little man did awesome in the car for the two and a half hour trip.

About fifteen minutes down the road, we realized that we forgot the camera so we turned around for it. Little did we know that we should have just left it behind because once we got back in the car that night to come back home, only ten of our pictures were visible. Something had corrupted our camera card. I kept telling Dave, "We still have the memories." I think I was saying that more for my benefit than his.

So in an effort to capture the memories, let me paint a picture. Santa's Wonderland is set up like an Old West Town but decorated with lights and Christmas wonders galore. People were sitting around campfires, some were roasting marshmallows and hot dogs in a fire pit. The Christmas Story was playing on a big screen TV and Elvis even made an appearance. My favorite part of the evening, was taking the hayride to see all of the lighted scenes. Gavin was completely fascinated. He kept saying "more lights" while we munched on cinnamon and sugar roasted cashews. Towards the end of the hayride, they had the manger scene and then the crucifixion. The lights would show Jesus ascending into heaven and then he was surrounded by angels. After a few seconds the whole scene went dark for the next set of hay riders. The only sound we heard was "uh-oh" by my sweet cheeked boy.

It was a special family outing to which I do have these two pictures:

Christmas Books

Because Christmas is upon us and I've been rushing around like a mad woman getting everything done in order not to be a mad woman (makes perfect sense, right?), my little blog has yet again been neglected. I thought perhaps, I could share the books that we have been reading each night with the wee one.

Gavin has enough Christmas books to maybe read twice over the 25 days leading up to Christmas. Some would only have to be read once. So, each night he picks out two for me and D to read to him. I'm trying to hide those that get read in order to read a different one each night.

Tonight just so happens to be two musical books. The first was the traditional Frosty the Snowman.


The book is written strictly by the words of the song. Gavin especially likes the "thumpety, thump, thump" part, complete with words and head bop.

The other book we read was Silent Night.

I knew there were other verses, but I had no idea just how many. In this book, Gavin pushes the star and it plays the tune. The poor little star is struggling at this point and doesn't completely finish the song before it dies down.

We're are loving this bedtime routine. After Christmas, I'll pack up all of the Christmas books for next year so they will be fresh and new. Hopefully, I'll get to post a few more of the books we read in the coming weeks.

A Grateful Heart

Here's a list of just the few things I am grateful for that occurred this past week:

1. Being home all week with Gavin and half of it with my hunny.

2. Playing under the kitchen table with those two.
3. Getting the house decorated for Christmas and even a present or two wrapped.

4. Seeing my grandmother get more beautiful each year.

5. Getting spontaneous bear hugs from my two-year old.

6. Having that same two-year old be my big helper and really seeing him getting the grasp of obedience.
7. D creating a Winter Wonderland with the outside Christmas lights.
8. Enjoying Thanksgiving with both sides of our family.

9. Being chased by a dragon.

10. Partaking in the annual dressing making collaboration.
11. Watching Gavin and his cousins play in the same water fountain at my grandparents' house that me and my cousins played in.

12. Listening to what everyone had to be thankful for around the dinner table and hearing my son shock us by clearly saying, "I don't know."
13. Playing games to work off Thanksgiving lunch.


15. Watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.
16. Snuggling with Gavin while watching Sesame Street.
17. Singing Happy Birthday to my 85 year old grandfather.
18. Being almost done Christmas shopping.
19. Having a date night with my hunny even if it was only to Starbucks and Target.
20. Having the energy to act completely silly so three little boys under the age of 6 would simultaneously smile for the camera.
As you can see, it was a week I was truly thankful for.

Just Go With It

I can't say there has been one thing in particular that has kept me from updating this dear old blog lately, but rather just life happening at the usual rapid pace. I will never say that being a stay-at-home mom is not a full time job, because it is, but I find myself trying to do the job of a stay-at-home mom the way I would like plus have a full time job outside the home. At some point, something has to give and I guess it will be this blog sometimes. Thankfully the week-long Thanksgiving vacation came just in time.

A few weeks ago, Gavin started taking his socks off and putting them on his hands like sock puppets. We would come in his room in the mornings or after nap time and find him like this.
So, we decided to get old socks and make puppets for him. With the use of some felt, hot glue and wiggly eyes, Francois and Reggie were born.
And since the glue gun was already hot, we decided to make a pine cone turkey. Basically we cut out felt for the legs and beak; glued on wiggly eyes and loosely added the colorful feathers.
When I originally saw this idea somewhere, you were supposed to hide the feathers and have the child find them. Since Gavin's a bit young, I decided it would be more fun to "fly" the turkey, later named Gobble Gobble, around the room and let Gavin collect the feathers. The joys of pure delight did not happen. What I got where gnashing of the teeth and wailing because I was apparently destroying this beloved turkey. All was well when I showed him we just stick the feathers back in. Gavin even took a "few" laps around the house with his new favorite game.
For Thanksgiving, we may take Gobble Gobble along for some hide and seek fun with the cousins. I'm excited to get to see all of those cousins starting tomorrow. We might even let the little cousins play too.