Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

We started getting in the Christmas spirit by going to Fantasy of Trees the day after Thanksgiving.  It was much busier this year than last so Baylor & Hudson had to stay in their stroller while we looked at all of the trees.  Their patience for riding started wearing thin so we found some places to get out and play.  They all had fun riding on the plasma cars, but it was hard to catch all three of them in one picture (Griffin was trying to help me out, but his brothers weren't being super cooperative).

Griffin and Baylor had fun on the carousel, but Hudson still wanted to play it safe and ride on the bench. 

After playing, the boys all enjoyed a cookie that they had decorated.

On Saturday, we went to breakfast at Long's and then to Mayo's to pick out our Christmas tree. The boys were more excited about this Smokey statue they found than they were about finding the perfect tree!

On Sunday, December 1st, the boys woke up to cinnamon rolls and all of the gingerbread house supplies.  We also started the advent calendar and Griffin's first surprise was a Lego character which is what he is holding in this picture. These are packaged so that you don't know which character you'll get--it turned out to be the Abominable Snowman, whom Griffin had never heard of before.  Griffin decorated his big Candy Cottage that I had bought at Fantasy of Trees last year, and Baylor & Hudson decorated two smaller ones that I ordered after using the big one and deciding that it was one of the best products ever!

Elgie, our Elf on the Shelf, also showed up on December 1st.  He thought Griffin did such a good job on the gingerbread house that he decided that's where he would land when he came back the next day.

We decided to forego the professional pictures with Santa at F32 that we've done for 5 years straight. Instead, we just made sure we got a cute one of all the boys with Santa when we went to Ms. Sherri's annual "Cookies with Santa" party on Wednesday, December 11th.

On Friday, Dec. 13th, I took the day off from school to go to Baylor and Hudson's school nativity pageant. Since Griffin had performed in this same pageant for 4 years, we thought he would have fun watching his brothers sing so we checked him out for school for a couple of hours to join us for the nativity and then lunch. Even from several rows back, we could distinctly hear Hudson singing in his deep, silly voice!

On Sunday, December 22nd, we went to Pop & Chaz's for dinner and presents.  All three boys got new UT hats and Baylor & Hudson quickly put theirs on before digging into their other gifts. really into Legos so Pop & Chaz got him three new sets as well as this "Lego-head" for storage.

On Christmas Eve, we went to church with my family and then went to Pop & Chaz's house for dinner with Matt's family. I tried to get a picture of Baylor & Hudson with Pop, but they wouldn't sit on his lap. They told me to sit on his lap...so we all sat on Pop's lap for a picture!  It was a late night so when we got home the boys quickly got into their reindeer pajamas and we put out cookies for Santa.  Griffin was so worried that Santa was going to come before he got to sleep and that he wouldn't come to our house.

On Christmas morning, we got up early and the boys checked out their gifts from Santa and Momma & Daddy.  Griffin also had presents to give to everyone --he had used his library points at school to "buy" gifts for me and his brothers and Mimi had also taken him shopping to pick out a few little presents for us.

After breakfast and presents at our house, we went to Mimi & Papaw Al's house.  This picture was taken when we first got there, but Baylor is already looking tired!

After much more present opening, Baylor, Hudson, and Hollins decided that they'd had enough of the Christmas festivities and would just go wrestle on the couch (that is Hudson that is stripped down to his diaper--this boy usually takes his clothes off about as soon as he gets through the door at home!).

After we finished up at Mimi and Papaw Al's, we went home for a much needed nap for the little boys and some quiet time for everyone else.  That evening, Weezy came over for dinner and gifts.  Every time I asked Baylor & Hudson what they wanted for Christmas, Baylor said "Buzz" and Hudson said "Woody."  They never gave me any specifics and they never gave me any other answer.  Well, Weezy came through with Buzz & Woody lovies, t-shirts, and dinnerware.  Griffin's big present was Skylander Swap Force for the Wii, which had been a late addition to Griffin's Christmas list (after Santa had already finished his shopping!).

Bebe and Lacy also stopped by after dinner.  Lacy brought two boxes full of clothes for the boys.  By the time this picture was taken, Baylor & Hudson had both changed out of their Christmas shirts and into two of their new shirts and Griffin had put on the robe that was a gift from Harper.

Aunt Lacy gave us a Dollywood season pass for a gift and we decided to make our first visit on December 28th, It ended up being a pretty chilly day and it started drizzling later that afternoon, but we managed to stay warm and squeeze in some fun before the weather ran us off (we sought a few minutes of shelter in the arcade and played a little air hockey and skee-ball).  We're looking forward to more visits this spring and summer when it's a little warmer!

We spent New Year's Eve with our friends Sarah & Bo and their two kids, Brody & Anna. We were home by about 9:30 to get the kids in bed, but I almost stayed awake until midnight--I looked at the clock at 11:45 and then again at 2:00!  On New Year's Day, Holly, Jason, Harper and Hollins came over for dinner--Matt smoked his first Boston Butt on the Big Green Egg that was our present from Pop & Chaz, but it was a pizza dinner for the kiddos.

Fall wrap-up

We stayed quite busy this fall (but when are we not busy???) so here are some of the highlights of August-November.

August meant back to school for everyone.  Griffin started Kindergarten at Bearden Elementary, and Baylor & Hudson started in the 2-year old class at West Hills Baptist.

Griffin played soccer in the fall the past two years, but he decided that he'd rather play baseball this fall.  

We always had to take plastic bats and balls for Baylor & Hudson to play with during the games. When they didn't have Matt pitching to them or weren't busy throwing their balls and then chasing after them, they had fun climbing up and down on the bleachers.

 

 Is this not the sweetest picture of Baylor?  I just love the way his big blue eyes show up and that sweet little half-smile.

Here are a few pictures from a fun day at the zoo.

Hudson is typically my "wild child" but sometimes he is very timid.  Baylor was excited to ride on the big gorilla on the zoo carousel, but Hudson would only sit on the bench--he wanted nothing to do with any of the carousel animals, not even the ones that don't go up and down.

Pop and Chaz gave all three boys UT jerseys and helmets.  For several days, they barely took them off....especially Hudson.  Here they are after their baths one night--Griffin and Hudson had to put their jerseys back on one more time before bed.  It is rare for me to be able to catch all three boys together, being sweet to each other, and actually looking at the camera!  After a sweet picture snuggled up together in the rocking chair, we had to do some silly faces.

October proved to be very busy.  In early October, we celebrated cousin Hollins' 3rd birthday at The Little Gym.  Baylor & Hudson definitely enjoyed the birthday cupcakes and ice cream! 

 On October 14, we celebrated the boys' half birthday with cupcakes at home.  

 

We started fall break with a slumber party with Harper.

We also spent a day with Mimi at Oakes Farm. The slide was a favorite for all of them. The little boys enjoyed the sandbox while Mimi took Griffin to the giant jumping "pillow." We fed the goats a LOT!  

All three boys had a great time, and we picked out the pumpkin that would become our jack-o-lantern.

On October 26th, I ran the CrossKnox 15K.  This was the longest race I'd done since having kids so Matt brought all of the boys out to cheer me on.  Since the race ended at Bearden Elementary, we played on the playground for a little while afterwards.

It's always fun dressing the twins alike, but having twins at Halloween presents a fun opportunity for coordinating costumes.  For their first Halloween, Baylor & Hudson stayed in the stroller which I turned into Mater to go with Griffin's Lightning McQueen costume.  For their second Halloween, they were both pumpkins because I found a second one  exactly like the one I'd used for Griffin at that age.  So this year I really wanted to come up with two costumes that weren't exactly alike but that belonged together.  Griffin and I brainstormed together, ran several of our better ideas past Baylor & Hudson, and we finally settled on Buzz Lightyear and Woody from Toy Story.  Weezy had given Griffin a pair of cowboy boots when he was little, but he never really wanted to wear them.  I pulled them out one night a couple of weeks before Halloween to see if they were going to work for the Woody costume (at the time, we had not decided who would be Buzz and who would be Woody).  Both of the boys wanted to try them on, but Baylor was so excited about them that he couldn't even wait to get a diaper and jammies on!

For the next couple of weeks, I kept asking the boys which character they each wanted to be.  For a little while, they kept changing their answers.  I was afraid that we might end up having two Buzzes or two Woody's.  However, they finally settled on their costumes--Baylor would be Buzz and Hudson would be Woody.  Griffin had known for months what he wanted to be--Donnie from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The first picture below is from our ride on the 3 Rivers Rambler a few days before Halloween.  The second is from Halloween night at Weezy's house, the starting point of our trick-or-treating.

 For Thanksgiving, as is tradition, we went to Mimi and Papaw Al's house for brunch and the parade.  We tried to get a cute picture of all 5 cousins together, but that is quite a feat.  We did manage to get them all in one shot, but as you can see they weren't all happy to sit and pose!

For Thanksgiving dinner, we went to Weezy's house and were joined by Bebe and Lacy.