Presents, presents, presents.

So, at our house I've made a conscious effort to keep the presents to a minimum. But Santa always brings too much. I really don't know how to nicely ask the big guy to chill. I've explained to Kaitlyn that Santa must always ask Mom and Dad about her presents first, and that Santa must take toys to all the good girls and boys, so he can't over-extend himself at our house. Unfortunately, although I tell Kaitlyn this, apparently Joe, our elf, hasn't passed the word on to Santa. Undermining Mom and Dad is bad Joe. Bad elf.

Santa must have thought Evan need to harass Kaitlyn a little more...with a rope. A real rope. For cows. Awesome! And you can't rope without a hat. Or a plaid shirt and jeans. Oh, wait, he already had the shirt and jeans.

Hope you can run really fast in those boots.

Note the vacuum cleaner. That's me. Always cleaning. Just kidding. That's where we keep it so we'll use it occasionally. Yep, right in the living room.

From Halloween to Christmas

Poor Thanksgiving. It gets no love. And I really like Thanksgiving. There are no presents, you have a reason to take a brief holiday, you eat good food, and you usually get to see family. What's not to love. Unfortunately, my kids speed right past Thanksgiving. I think they think it's just annoying sitting right there in the middle of Halloween and Christmas. It's like a speed bump to presents. And according to pictures, I'm not much better. I have no pictures of Thanksgiving. But I have multiple pictures taken AROUND Thanksgiving, all having a Christmas theme. See what I mean. No love.

LSU pre-Thanksgiving. But...the last home game, so I'm not complaining. This is the real Santa by the way. Not that Wal-Mart fake. His reindeer dropped him off. Hotty Toddy!

Okay, so I don't actually know the date on this photo, but I'm pretty sure it was shortly after Thanksgiving. and it's definitely cute. But he could've been a turkey. just sayin'...

I don't think the song called for antlers, but why not?

Pre-decoration tv watching. Thank goodness we got these boxes down a day or two early. Where on earth would they have lain otherwise?

Christmas card photo time. My favorite. Not. But in addition to this being a great last card with only two kids...yep, you heard it here first, there will be three kids next year...this is also the site of our new house. So this is the last year, hopefully, that there are only trees in the background.

The banner (in picture above) says it all. An EARLY happy birthday Jesus.

Priorities

A compilation of Kaitlyn's priorities this year as demonstrated in snippets of conversation: Evan asked, "Daddy, will you come upstairs and watch me ride buckaroo?" "I can't. First thing I have to do is mow the front yard." To which Kaitlyn replied, "well, the first thing I have to do is dogpile mama."

Or this: "Do I have the same stuff [on my plate] as Evan?" "Does it matter?" To which Evan, who has identified the direction of this conversation, replies, "Yes, it matters."

Or this conversation with Kaitlyn immediately after learning that we are having another baby: "Can I hold it? ... Mama, what am I gonna wear to the hospital when this baby is born?"

Priorities...

Trick or Treat

Halloween is so stressful. I asked the kids to pick out costumes early so that I could order or buy them in time. Of course, Evan changed his mind about 40 times. I think we went from cowboy to Batman to fireman to Buzz Lightyear to Woody to Superman, etc. You get the picture. I finally pinned him down to Woody though I'm pretty sure he wished he was Buzz Lightyear when the actual trick or treating came along. And he's already asking what he can be for next year. Kaitlyn, on the other hand, picked her costume and was, thankfully, pretty satisfied with it. Naturally it was cold on halloween, so she had to wear a shirt under her costume, but that made Mom extremely happy since it was a bit skimpy (translation did not cover her from head to toe) for a 5 year old.

Wonder Woman and Woody ready to go trick or treating

The full costume effect

Fueling up for a long, hard night of knocking on doors

Little Oaks 2011

As is our custom, we met Ginny and Jerry down at Little Oaks, but this year because of schedules and whatnot, we didn't go until September. Although the wait between last year and this year about killed Kaitlyn and me, September turned out to be fantastic. The weather-after the first day-was excellent and not too hot, the beach and restaurants were not too crowded. The kids had a terrific time and, as I told Jim, this was the first year I can remember also being able to really enjoy the beach with kids. In addition, we enjoyed an incredibly intense yahtzee tournament with Ginny and Jerry. I'm positive Ginny cheated as she won pretty much every round. And there were a lot of rounds. Though I'm not sure how you cheat at yahtzee, I'm going to figure it out for next year.

The first day--rain pretty much all day

Our annual family beach picture

Kaitlyn, Evan, and Baby Jane hitchin' a ride in Evan's dump truck

Playing in the ocean between sand bars

The Big 3....

Yep, no 3-0 here. Just 3. After stressing about Kaitlyn's birthday and planning a birthday for Evan with some other friends that completely fell apart, we resorted to the First Baptist CLC. I must confess, this was an excellent fall back and will likely be at the top of our birthday party list of ideas for quite some time.... like next year. Jim and I decorated the CLC dining area while Evan and his classmates played ball and chase in the gym. We had cupcakes and ice cream for everyone and then a Buzz Lightyear pinata to entertain the kids. After school, we opened presents at the house. He loves a birthday. Well, he loves his birthday. Not so much anyone elses.

Evan and Rex roaring together.

Obsessed with Toy Story. And while he's obsessed, Kaitlyn will "help" him with his other presents.

Finally, something other than Toy Story. And he looks happy. Maybe.

First Day of School

Although Kaitlyn attended Bramlett last year for Pre-K, her real first day of school was Kindergarten 2011. She is in Mandy James' class, and she knows a few of the kids in there with her. I can only hope that Kindergarten is not like Pre-K where she cried everyday of the first semester--yes, every single day. My fingers are crossed.

Same Old Same Old Summer Fun

 This year Kaitlyn really took off with her swimming. She is so comfortable in the water that she hardly ever uses any of her floats, jumps off the diving board at birthday parties, and helps me try to teach Evan how to swim: together, point, shoot is our mantra. Instead of signing Evan up for swim lessons, I decided I'd give it a try. Over the course of the summer, he has gotten better...marginally. But I'm gonna keep at it, and we'll see how it goes this summer and next.

More important (to him) are things like trucks and buckets as you can see from these conversation excerpts I've had with him: "Mama, are you going to buy me another truck?" "I just bought you a new truck. You have it right there in your hand." Raising the empty hand, "I know, but this hand needs one." Or this, in response to the typical "what did you do at school today" question: "I had a bucket on my head and the shovel was my sword so the bear wouldn't get me."

Blueberry Hill

Well, actually no hill here. Just blueberries--in abundance. Every Saturday for a while, we went out to the farm to pick blueberries off Nana's blueberry bushes. As you can see, Kaitlyn helped. Sort of.

On second thought, it doesn't appear she helped at all. But she sure was rockin' that dress, crown and pirate belt.

The Most Fun Birthday Ever--repeated

Well, I'm not sure it was as much fun the second time around. You can judge for yourselves. Evan was certainly more aware this time around. He woke up intending to play his own games and ignore completely Kaitlyn's special day. He came downstairs fired up and pretending to be "Buddy" (really Woody from Toy Story). "Heeelllloooo Jessie!" But Kaitlyn's response set him straight. "I'm not Jessie, I'm Birthday Kaitlyn." "Heeelllloooo Birthday Kaitlyn!" He got the message.

Kaitlyn really did have a great day. She had a few friends to the house. They ruined our yard, made a mess of the kitchen and living room floors with wet grassy feet, destroyed the upstairs, and got icing everywhere. It was fantastic!

Graduation already

Yep, Kaitlyn's definitely smart. Unfortunately I'm only talking about Weekday Education (preschool) graduation and not high school or college graduation. That would have been awesome and really affordable. Nonetheless, we were very proud of our graduate, cap, gown and all.

Hippity Hoppity Easter

Good heavens, talk about busy. Just before Easter break, Kaitlyn and her Pre-K class enjoyed a morning of egg hunting and playing at Avent Park. Then, on Easter Sunday, Kaitlyn and Evan put on their new swim cover-ups from Gamma and ran down stairs to see what the Easter bunny brought them. After lunch we had an egg hunt in the backyard for Kaitlyn, Evan, and Andie. And that afternoon, we went to see Ginny and Jerry at Laura's where Kaitlyn and Evan hunted eggs once more. So much candy. And we haven't even finished Valentine's candy yet.

Friends down on the farm

This year we decided to enjoy Saturday mornings at the farm more. So for a couple of weekends we invited a small group of friends out for breakfast and mimosas or bloody marys. The kids seem to really enjoy it, so when we heard that Matt Wells and family were coming to town, we decided to make the farm the gathering place for folks. The kids had a blast playing on tractors and the swing set, and we adults had a great time catching up. And taking pictures.

This was taken before the party. Like right before. Jim finished this patio area the morning of the get together.

Bo and Colton. Colton liked the big tractor almost as much as Evan.

Matt, Holly, and James.

Evan racing the Carmean twins. I didn't have the heart to tell him Otis probably wouldn't win this one.