Beginning of December

Santa has arrived at Christmas Park in downtown New Smyrna! It is free for kids to come to his little house on main street and there usually isn't a line. James was excited to talk to him about all the things he wanted (a remote control submarine and a remote control boat), but Rett kept hiding his head and saying, "scary, scary". He did however accept a peppermint from him :)

James and I went for a walk/bike ride around the neighborhood while Rett took a nap at home with my mom.We went up to the park in our neighborhood about 1/2 mile away, played for a little bit, then rode back.

Rett keeps rearranging my porcelain nativity set, so the pieces are always in different random places from the day before. I've given up on putting them where they should be. They have a little people nativity set AND their own little Christmas tree and they still mess with the big one.

The boys looooove to ride in Anthony's new truck. They get so excited if we tell them we are going in it. James also likes to bring his cars for a ride and line them up on arm rest.

Anthony was waiting with the boys in the primary room after church while I was doing some primary stuff and James drew this picture of me on the chalkboard. Usually his pictures are just scribbles on a page and don't have recognizable shapes or forms, so it was really exciting to see him do this!

Our Elf has arrived to spy on the boys for Santa! James decided that he can be "James 2" since that makes more sense than James 3 that he insisted on last year.

The elf usually just moves around to different rooms in our house, but one night he did get into the marshmallows and the chocolate icing.

We went to the New Smyrna Christmas parade for the first time this year! They close the street Anthony's office is on, so he got to get out of work early and go with us. James' school had a float in the parade and they invited kids to be on it, but I didn't think all the waiting and sitting still would work for him. I was right :)

Rett really didn't like the loud sirens, so we would cover his ears when they came by. Don't you just love his sad face??? So dang cute!

Rett had a lollipop in one hand and a candy cane in another. There was so much candy!!

We loved the floats with Florida snow! They had large bubble machines blowing thick bubbles that looked like snow.

One float threw out a Christmas elf hat, so Rett wore it for a few seconds.

This is just the beginning, we have so much Christmas fun planned! We have our ward party, another Christmas parade, a musical fireside where I am playing my flute in 4 different songs, James' school Christmas play, and our 10 year anniversary (!!) all in the span of one week!