Santa came to town...

It's hard to believe that Christmas has already come and gone. I feel like December snuck up on me faster than ever before. December has been such a busy month and our weeks have been filled with lots of festivities that I intend to post in a December recap...someday...maybe before the middle of 2010... ha... But in the here and now, I have to share about our Christmas Day! Christmas was different than ever before, because for the first time in my entire life, I didn't see my Momma & Daddy on Christmas Day. That's a long story....right now, we are just thanking God that we did get to spend TODAY with them and that my mom is doing better.

On Christmas Eve night, after we put Annabelle to bed, we wrapped her presents and stuffed her stocking, and got all the cameras ready for the next morning.... Santa's presents go in our Santa bag that we got Cooper's first Christmas in 2005. We also use it sometimes to take gifts to our parents' houses on Christmas... fun...
We were so excited that we didn't have to wake Annabelle up on Christmas morning! She's a late sleeper, so we thought we may have to! She woke up early, around 7:30. She was excited to see Momma and Daddy in her room with both the video and picture camera and was all smiles...


As soon as she saw the stroller under the tree, she wanted down! She went straight for it and pulled up and started pushing it around the living room! So sweet....It's kind of wobbly with her though, since she's not a stable walker yet.

She started digging into the presents... She started trying to use her hands, then opted for biting into her packages! She loved all that paper and having an unending supply of something to put in her mouth. We both "ooohed and ahhhhed" over all the sweet things Santa left her. She was so excited.

Yall might remember Abby...Santa brought Belle mini-Abby last year and on a recent trip to PBK, Annabelle spotted big Abby and had a fit. She wanted to take her home that day and I think she thought I had lost my mind when I took the box away from her and put it back on the shelf! Thankfully, she forgot about how "mean" her momma was that day, but didn't forget about how much she wanted a big Abby, because look at that face when she opened up her doll! So sweet!!!

Another of her favorites was the pink dump truck she got. She loves playing in her brother's room, so she's had lots of experience with dumptrucks! None of us knew that they made a pink one for girls though! She loves it.

Along with Abby, she got Abby's diaper bag. She practiced giving Abby her bottle. Which was so cute, until she started realizing that she herself might like the taste of Abby's bottle... now it's turned into a teether toy for Annabelle! Ha.... Belle's BFF, Allie Claire gave her Abby's wardrobe for Christmas and man is it cute... we've (more like I've) had so much fun changing Abby's clothes and oohing and ahhhing over how cute she looks!
These pictures just about do me in. Absolute preciousness....

In the last picture, she looks like a grown up. That face is too much. It reminds me of someone, and I am not sure, but I think it's my Mom...

Last thing to open was our stockings... it was fun this year trying to find little things for AB's stocking... here's what we ended up with...

After we do presents at our house on Christmas morning, we go over to my in-laws' house. Our Christmas morning tradition is to wear our jammies and we have breakfast over there... I didn't take many pictures, since we were all in our PJ's.... here's the tree in the sunroom where we all spread out after breakfast... our niece and nephew were putting everyone's presents in piles...and yep, that's DW...in his jammies and flip flops...and gator T-Shirt... his Christmas colored jammies were dirty... what a wife. So he was in blue. Blue on Christmas. That's okay, cause I was in pink. At least brought our festive dressed baby... ha...

Daddy & AB opening presents...

Annabelle & her cousin Warren playing

It was such a fun morning, sharing in all the kids' excitement and just being together. After that, we went back to our house and spent the rest of the day playing with our new toys

and putting everything away.

Thankfully, late last night, my Mom got to come home and we were able to go to my parents' house this morning for breakfast and "Christmas morning." When we first got there, look what was sitting out with a red bow tied on it....It didn't take little miss very long to decide that it was for her! She went straight for it and stayed in it the majority of the time we were there. She had no interest in opening anything else....She loves it! She did take a tiny break from the car to play with the box it came in. Grammy knew she'd love that big box, so of course she saved it, and it was waiting in the living room for AB!

We spent the morning just hanging out with mom and dad and taking turns pushing Annabelle around the house in her car... it was nice to just relax and not have anywhere else to be. We just got to enjoy being together. We had lunch, visited Great Granny and then headed back to our house for AB's afternoon nap. Since she's been up, we've been pushing the car around our house and DW says we've almost melted the wheels! Ha...

Yes, it's hard to believe another Christmas has come and gone. It's been a good one...a different one, but a good one.

~amw~