First Christmas

If you know me, then you know that baking is one of my favorite things. Christmas baking is on a whole other level! I triple love it! Well that pretty obvious by the pictures below...

The haul

Oreos and Sugar Cookies

No Bake and Chocolate Chip

(the same chocolate chip) and Revels Bars

Peanut Butter Blossums

and Buck Eyes

I don't think I ate lunch that day because I kept tasting my creations. And a huge thank you to Brooks who took great naps that day! We went and delivered them that night to our friends. We also watched Elf that weekend which is a Christmas MUST for me. Another night we made hot cocoa, brought some snacks and went and looked at lights. Brooks was not the happiest... but then he fell asleep. We went and saw the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners for the light contest in Keller and wow! It was impressive. It was a fun evening driving around with our little family. 

Sylvia makes these stockings for everyone and I was so happy to get Brooks'!

He's been in that stage where he HAS to be held. I needed to get ready and set him down one night so I thought maybe he'll be happy if he sat in his tub because he loves the bath! He was content while I did what I needed to do but you can see from his face he's like, "Mom... where's the water?"

Poor thing caught my cold a couple days after I had it. It was very mild in both of us so not bad. He was just sneezing and had watery eyes. We went for a walk and I was trying to take his picture and he kept making this face! I thought he was just being weird until he sneezed a minute later.

One of the days Dan was off work we drove over to the Temple in Dallas and took turns doing different sessions. Life gets a little more tricky when you have a baby (or two... or three!) but you learn how to make it do-able! I'm glad we went and the spirit that resides in the temple.

I got my Christmas nails all ready

Brooks got some new holiday clothing. Obviously he was thrilled ha!

One morning Dan and I did the ab ripper and it was so funny to watch Brooks watch us and kind of copy the video.

One weekend we watched our niece and nephew while Jen and Phill went to his company party. We had lots of small parenting victories that night. I put him to bed in a different place (and in the rock n play). He slept so good and then we woke him up, put him in his car seat, drove home and I put him back to bed at home. Then he slept for 7 hours! I was anxious to see if he'd transition well and he did.

The next night Jen came over and watched Brooks while we went to Dan's company party. I wasn't planning on going until just a couple days beforehand after we had bottle bootcamp. 

He doesn't take a bottle willingly but now I know he won't starve if I leave him. Poor thing he just doesn't understand how to do it well. Anyways we went and had dinner at Lonesome Dove with all of Dan's coworkers and it was really fun. We enjoyed our time and company. I worried a tiny bit; not about Jen but about Brooks being crazy. Sometimes I feel his behavior is a reflection of my parenting... or lack of? I'm sure other moms feel this way too. Well of course everything was fine when we got home, fed him and put him to bed.

We had Jen's family come over for Christmas Eve where we had delicious steaks for dinner. We hung out for a bit then went to the Haslet park and saw all the lights they set up. It was pretty warm outside for Christmas Eve! It started trying to rain so we headed back home, ate some ice cream, watched a movie and watched the kids open a gift. It was so fun. They headed home then Dan and I got each others' stocking ready for Christmas and went to bed.

Christmas jammies!

Christmas was on a Sunday this year and I don't remember the last time that happened. It was a relief that I only had to wrestle my tired baby for one hour instead of three. It was the Christmas program so it was filled with great music and narration. It really brought the Christmas Spirit. The week before Christmas it froze in our area and the pipes at the church froze and then flooded some of the areas! They did a lot of repairs during the week and it was very put together for church on Christmas. The only bummer was the air wasn't working. We had all the outside doors opened because this is Texas and it was like 75 degrees outside. Luckily it was windy so we got some air in the building. During the service I was getting HOT. Granted I was holding a baby but I was thinking if this keeps up, I'm going to have to get some air! A Christmas miracle happened and the air magically started working again which I'm sure all were thankful for!

We came home from church, opened the gifts from each other and family, took some naps then drove to Jen's house. There we relaxed some more, the kids showed us their new toys and we had a delicious smoked ham for dinner. After the kids went to bed and we put Brooks down we played some games then headed home. Once again he transferred really well and went right to sleep when we got home!

I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and that the spirit of Christ was present in your life!

The week after Christmas Dan took off and we enjoyed spending time with him!

One day we went to the Dallas World Aquarium and it was so fun! On the way there Brooks was falling asleep and his hat kept falling over his face. I kept moving it but then he'd fuss. It fell back over his eyes and he fell asleep so I left it. What a funny baby! You can kind of see his nose sticking out to breathe. Thug baby.

He was really good at the aquarium and I think he enjoyed looking at the fish too. We grabbed lunch together then made the drive home.

We've had a great 2016 and for most of it I was pregnant! I'm sure Dan would agree that our biggest highlight was becoming a family of three. Brooks is so fun and brings such a special spirit into our home. He's our little buddy and reminds us of what's truly important in life. I'm excited for 2017, we already have some super exciting plans!