Thursday, December 18, 2008

Jack's Christmas program

Jack's school had their annual Christmas program yesterday. It is always a riot! This is my fourth year to have a child in the program and it always makes me laugh. It is so funny to watch the kids...some pick their nose, some just stand there with stage fright, and others are not the least bit interested in singing and decide to goof off. While many do actually sing, they tend to scream out the words to the songs! Jack was no exception to this last rule. He was a reindeer during part of it. They sang "Away in a Manger", "Jingle Bells", "The Virgin Mary Had a Baby Boy", "Ten Little Angels in a Band" and "We Wish You a Merry Christmas". Quite a lot for four year olds if you ask me! God Bless those Wee School teachers!!!

Some of the video is dark, but at least you will get the idea. Jack is on the bottom row in the center.



You can't see Jack in this video, but you can definitely hear all of the kids shouting the words to the song "Ten Little Angels in a Band". So cute!



Here are a few photos too.



The Christmas card photo

Oh how I always dread taking the photo for our annual Christmas card! Of course, Heather is the easiest to photograph and I know her mouth gets tired from keeping a constant smile! She has to since we never know when I will get the perfect shot. Will is normally pretty cooperative and always photogenic. Jack on the other hand is a completely different story. He is not cooperative and absolutely HATES having his photo taken these days, at least by someone other than himself! I took 143 photos of the three of them together. I finally decided to get some individual shots just in case I didn't get "the one" and could just use three separate poses for the card. I was actually shocked that I did end up with one great shot. Whew! I'm glad that is over for another year! I think the kids are too!!




Here are some funny shots that I took of Jack that night. This will give you an idea of what I had to work with. I call this "The Many Faces of Jack". Enjoy!


Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful time spending Thanksgiving with Matt, Erin, Alex & Maggie! We were so happy they decided to make that long drive and spend the holiday week with us! The kids had so much fun getting to know each other again. I really wished we lived closer so they could see each other more. While they were in town we celebrated Will's 7th birthday at a local movie theater. We also took the kids to the Memphis Children's Museum & the Memphis Zoo.

We had a full house on Thanksgiving day and were happy that Dad and Melissa were willing to make the drive up as well to spend the holiday with us. They visited with us on Thanksgiving day and then again on that Friday. My grandmother came with them on Thanksgiving and we were able to get some memorable family photos of the generations.

It was a perfect way to spend the week! Here are some photos from their visit.






Will is 7!

It is so true that our children grow up so fast. It seems like only yesterday Heather was a little girl playing with her horses and now she is a young woman and in her second year of college! They grow up in the blink of an eye!

Now Will is seven and that is even harder for me to believe! He was such a little guy and very content. He didn't fuss much and still doesn't to this day. He was a good sleeper right from the start. He was always a happy baby and very social. He has always loved to learn new things and is still constantly quizzing us. He has a very tender heart. He loves his daddy and wants to grow up to be just like him! He was our first son and we couldn't be more proud of him!

He wanted to have his party at a local theater this year and they saw "Madagascar 2". He was joined by cousins, friends from school, church and Cub Scouts. He had a blast!

Will with his best friend from school, Hunter, and his cousin, Alex.


On his actual birthday, we took Will and Jack to Chuck E. Cheese. Heather and Andy tagged along too! The kids had so much fun eating pizza and playing all of the games. I think they collected a total of 520 tickets that they traded in for "prizes", in other words junk! Afterwards, we took Will to Target and let him pick out his birthday gifts from us. He chose some Star Wars figures and two ships and a book on how to make paper airplanes. I can't tell you how many paper airplanes I have folded in the past two weeks. :)
You can click on any of these photos to enlarge them.




Will w/the one and only Chuck E. Cheese
See, I told you they were with us!
Jack's favorite "game" ~ I love his eyes in this one!

Playing some Skee-ball and winning more tickets!
He will be trying out for Nascar next!

Monday, December 8, 2008

Jack & the video camera

Well, I may have to throw out my idea of posting videos...at least videos of Jack, that is. He HATES cameras these days! Enjoy!

Welcome to our blog!



I know we are all so busy these days, so I thought it might be a good thing to set up a blog about the things that are going on in our house. I think this will be a great way to show off photos and even some videos of the kids, plus serve as a journal for me to look back on.
I wish I had been better about writing down funny things the kids have done and said over the years. I always thought I would never forget...how could I, as these are my sweet children? Wrong! I know as we all get older this will only get worse.

As I am sure you already know, I take A LOT of photos! I am quickly running out of space on my harddrive to store all of them! I should be better about emailing them to everyone, especially since I take so much pride in actually shooting them. I hope this blog will inspire me to share more of them with you.

Please leave your thoughts or even a simple "hello" in the comments.