I have been wanting to have the kids' pictures taken for a while now (It's so frustrating trying to do it myself), so when my sister and I took the kids to get pictures with Santa, we took them to Kiddie Kandids as well. Kaden wasn't cooperating the best and kept his bottom lip tucked in, but what can you do? I think they turned out cute anyway.


Cousin Jaxon, Kairi, and Kaden

We went to Jared's parents on Christmas Eve for dinner and each kid was given a pair of pajamas. The cousins always look so cute with their matching pjs. I took a picture of Kairi and Dominic, they are 5 weeks apart. Kaden didn't want to sit still to have his pic taken with Dawson.

We opened presents Christmas morning, Kairi was having so much fun playing with all the new things, even the paper and boxes. Kaden loved unwrapping everything, he unwrapped all of Jared's gifts too.

Kaden got a ton of cars, which I was planning to save half for next year too, but oh well.

Both kids got cute hats from the grandparents, too bad Kaden wont wear hats right now. Here's Kairi with her kitty hat my mom made.

After opening gifts we got ready and headed down to my parents' house. We watched some Christmas shows and Kaden was having fun getting licked by the dog. Kairi was feeling a little shy and started crying when my dad tried to make her laugh. Im sure she'll grow out of the stranger anxiety stage soon.

We had dinner and then headed home. I love spending time with family so it was nice that most everyone was able to be there. It was a great Christmas, and having kids made it all the better.

We went to the mall yesterday to see Santa Claus and get pictures taken. We had to wait in line for a while and Kairi fell asleep, I had to wake her up to sit on Santa's lap so she wasn't happy. Kaden was hungry and wanted to run around until he noticed Santa was giving out candy, then he was exited to see him. This is Kairi's first Christmas and Kaden's third. I think he's still too young to really get into the whole Santa Claus thing, but at least this year I know he will be excited when he gets to open his presents. I think i'll be nice and let him stay up later tonight so he can watch the Muppet Christmas Carol with us, and maybe we'll get to sleep in.

I finished another page a little while ago, this one has a tree with Autumn leaves attached with velcro. You take all the leaves off and put them into the drawstring bag. I havn't worked on any pages since this one, i've taken on a couple other projects i want to get done first. So once those are done i'll work on more pages. My next one will have roads for Kaden's matchbox cars to drive on.

Kaden loves going for rides in the wagon when we go to get the mail, even with the weather being so cold he still wanted me to take him for a ride. So I got a big blanket and bundled them up in their coats and took them around the block a couple of times. You can't tell by their faces in the pictures but they both really enjoyed it.

Kaden and I went out to rake the leaves while Kairi was napping. There are usually a lot of leaves since both of our neighbors don't rake so the wind just blows them where they collect in our yard and I get stuck cleaning up after 3 trees. One more reason I want to get a fence. Kaden had a lot of fun jumping in and running through the pile, so that made me feel a little better about having to rake them up.

This year we celebrated Thanksgiving at home. We usually have Thanksgiving with Jared's family, but all of us had been sick with the flu earlier in the week and didn't want to risk passing it on to anyone else. So I figured I'd just have a little fun and attempt cooking my first turkey. I bought the smallest one I could find and cooked it in a small roaster oven. And despite following all instructions and tips that I could find it still turned out over cooked. I blame the roaster oven. Better over cooked than under cooked though, right? It was still good food, not bad for my first try. Maybe I should buy more whole chickens and practice with those in case we get sick again next year.