Merry Christmas!

One the morning of Christmas Eve, Santa put one present under the tree for each of the kids and Gage opened his when he woke at the crack of dawn. Savannah woke up later, came into the kitchen pouting and said "Santa only brought us ONE present".  Poor thing was so disappointed. But, we explained that it wasn't Christmas, but Santa left one present for a special surprise this morning.  Christmas morning she woke up, took a look under the tree, realized that she had hit the jackpot and ran around screaming for everyone to get out of bed and LOOK!  Although it was nice to be home at Christmas, we all missed our families....  Savannah's favorite was a big Belle princess castle and Gage's favorite is a tie between a little t-ball baseball toy, tools, and a pound-a-peg. As I post this, he is pounding Smidge's paw with a plastic hammer :-)

Counting the days to Christmas!

Our trees are up. The one upstairs has no ornaments on the bottom two feet. The one downstairs only has ornaments on the bottom 3 feet (that is Savannah's tree). Smidge is going crazy in the tree. Last year's gingerbread house decorating ended in a temper tantrum and candy being thrown across the kitchen with Grammy. This year's gingerbread decorating went muuuchhh smoother, thankfully!

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree

Lifting weights and sitting amidst boxes of beer...could these children possibly belong to Adam?

Sweet home Alabama??

We had a chance to do some nice things while in 'bama...like the children's museum (where Gage would NOT leave the little farm truck that had a gear shift and a real old radio in the dashboard to play with), Dreamland BBQ for ribs (which Gage LOVED while Savannah ate only white bread) and a neighborhood Christmas stroll. Santa brought  the kids presents (how did he KNOW we were going to be there??) during the stroll and we had a chance to take a horse and carriage ride while we sang Christmas carols. Brrrrr....

A fall visit to Connecticut

The kids and Mommy took a trip to CT to visit and were greeted by much colder weather than we have in SC this time of year. We visited Grammy's moo cows every day and fed them lots of pumpkins (everyone keeps dropping off their pumpkins for the cows now that Halloween is over). Gage loved the cows and said mmm...mmmmm...mmmm everytime we saw them. We brought Savannah's costume and trick or treated for a little extension of Halloween, too. We spent time a day with our cousin Kristine and "Baby Elizabeth" at the Air Museum, and a little more time with them visiting the fire house in Middlebury. Uncle Bobby took Gage for a little ride in Engine 3, and both of them loved wearing cousin Kevin's fire helmet -- very heavy!!! Grandpa Pauly's birthday was during our visit, so Savannah decided he needed brownies AND cupcakes AND cake. So, she and Grammy made them all.  We also visited Great Grandma Rooney and Savannah got her first Swedish dala horse - okay, she got 3 of them! Thanks Gram!!

Halloween has come and gone....

First trip to Greenville Children's Museum

Savannah had the day off school on Friday, so we zipped up to the Children's Museum in Greenville for a little fun with our good friends Noel and Natalie. The museum is just over a year old and all of the kids had a blast. Gage loved the water exhibit especially for "tadpoles" (and got drenched, despite his smock) and Savannah and Natalie loved the kaleidoscope at the entrance - a giant hanging jungle gym to crawl up into. Natalie got scared at the top, so Savannah held her had and helped her the whole way down. They are so sweet together. We're excited for all the trick or treating fun we have coming up later this week!

More fall fun....

playing in the hay barn and the "corn box"....

apple picking

We have had beautiful fall weather here lately...cool in the mornings and warm during the day. We drove up to Bryson's in Long Creek to pick apples. At home, Savannah and Mommy made a couple of apple pies from scratch...which seemed to take wayyy too long for Daddy, who was anxiously awaiting them. The best part of the trip was bringing a few gallons of *real* (unpasteurized) apple cider home - everyone in the family says yummmmmm......

Hayrides, pumpkin patches, and corn mazes, oh my!

It's hard to believe that it was a YEAR ago that we went to Denver Down for the corn maze, pumpkin patch, etc. How time flies. Gage was just a little guy whose head didn't even come above the top of the BabyBjorn. This year he ran around, had a hard time sitting still on the hayride, loved playing in the corn "sandbox", but was a little unsure of walking on the giant piles of hay in the haybarn. Savannah was not interested in having her picture taken, but I snuck one while she was swinging on the tire horse. She had a LOT of fun in the hay barn and playing ducky races with the old water pumps, just like she did last year.  It was beautiful weather and we had the whole place to ourselves for the Mom's Club!