A snowy morning!

We finally took some time to play in the snow this morning. Abby could hardly wait and helped me organize the toys in all the toy boxes, just so she could go outside. She put her own snow pants on (they're hot pink so she totally loves them and I got them for three bucks at a yard sale!)and her own boots. Abby's boots light up, very cool!
Christian had a complete melt down while I was trying to get him ready to go out. He was like this last year too, but I was hoping it was just a phase. He hates to wear snow pants and hates mitten/gloves even more. Of course he forgets about all his sorrow once he's outside.

I just love this outfit on Nate, because it's what Christian wore last year. The hat is just the cutest! I'm glad it's getting a little more wear! Are you noticing the feet?? Someone's mommy forgot to pack their boots today and of course I noticed this AFTER everyone was dressed. I tried, unsuccessfully, to find Christian's boots from last year. They're somewhere in my crawl space, not a great place for a woman seven months pregnant. Finally we decided to go on a snow hike and walk to Abby and Nates house to retrieve the boots (probably what we should have done in the first place). Nate was a great sport about this.

Abby is quite a daredevil! She decided to try to take her sled down the sliding board. The sliding board has a nice coating of ice on it. Thankfully the sled was a little too big to haul up the ladder, so the kids had a good time zooming down the slide in their snow suits.

It is awfully hard to sled when your yard is basically flat, but Christian and Abby made the most of it. Abby seriously tried to push herself for at least 30 min.

Waiting for a push!
I just love to see Christian's rosy little cheeks when he comes in from the cold.

Our First Snow of the Year!

This morning started out with great excitement. Last night we moved the train table into Christian's bedroom. Normally Christian takes awhile to wake up, but this morning he was up at 7:30 and immediately got out of bed and started playing with his trains. It's funny how all you have to do it move something and all the sudden it gets new life. This train table has always been a hit since Christian's friend Noah gave it to him last year, after Noah got some new things for Christmas. But it's 1pm and the train track is still put together and the boys have spent at least 2-3 hours in Christian's room playing. Nate seriously needs some trains of his own since Christian only allows him to play with certain ones. I also have realized that I need to get some Thomas buildings to go with this set up. I think it would make Thomas' adventures even more interesting. All Thomas gets to do right now is go over bridges and crash into other trains.

The next big excitement was the snow. It started snowing around 7am (it wasn't supposed to start until this afternoon) and it has continued to snow all morning. We have at least 3 inches now.
The kids ended up playing in the snow on our way to the car (they were not totally dressed for it). The boys were especially thrilled to see the snow, probably because they have few if any memories of snow from last year. We finally got in the car and headed to our playgroup at church.
After a rather treacherous drive to church we made it to our Christmas party at Moms Connect. I love this picture of the kids getting ready for snack. Look at their hands, they're getting ready to pray.
Nate and Christian enjoying their Christmas brownies!

And here is the reason we HAD to head out in the snow to playgroup this morning. Santa Claus was going to be there and unfortunately I had told Abby about this yesterday. She was worried all morning that he wasn't going to be able to make it. As you can see, he did make it.

Abby was excited to see Santa but a little hesitant about sitting on his lap, so she stood in front of him. On the way home she said to me, "Can you believe he put his arm around me?" She did tell Santa that she wants an American girl doll named "Kit." Not to worry...I know for a fact that it has already been taken care of.

This is the best I could do with the boys. They were excited to see "ho ho ho" but they had no interest in sitting on his lap. Christian did manage to tell him that he wants James (a Thomas Train) for Christmas, but that was about it. This Santa was quite impressive. There was nothing fake about the hair or beard and Christian was thrilled with his jingle bell belt.

Emma just walked home from the bus stop. She got out of school two hours early. This presented a bit of a dilemma for me. I knew that Emma was wearing dress shoes this morning and none of the sidewalks have been shoveled, but all three kids are sleeping so I couldn't really go get her from the bus. The poor girl ended up walking home and her feet were freezing when she got here, but I was more upset about it than she was. I made her some hot chocolate and told her she could watch a Christmas movie while everyone else is napping and she's as happy as can be. The bag you see in her hand is a bag full of surprises for her family. They had a Secret Santa Shop at school today and Grandmom Brinkley gave Emma money so she could go. I'm impressed with Emma's choices for each of her family members. We're going to do a little wrapping this afternoon. I just love how delighted Emma is about giving!!

My word it's been a busy day and we've got hours to go before bedtime!

Girly Stuff!

For two and half years our home has been ruled by boy stuff. Trains seem to clutter every room, trucks and airplanes are in every toy basket and tackling is just a way of life. We only watched "choo choos" or CARs on TV. Then, back in August, the girliest little pink girl came into our lives. Abby loves everything tiny, pink, cute and girly. She has been tollerating this boy stuff for over three months now and today she finally got her own space!! We have slowly been converting the guest room into a girls room. This is going to be Abby's special room that she will share with our new baby when she arrives in Feb. I had already purchased some adorable Pottery Barn bedding for the baby's crib (great deal at a yard sale...don't worry I didn't spend $300 on it) and I found matching bedding for Abby on Ebay. Uncle Ryan and I bought Abby a new twin bed this weekend and her new bedding and curtains arrived today. She is thrilled!! The sweetest thing was when she said to me; "Auntie Judy it's so cute and we both got our favorite color. You love yellow and I love pink, so now we both can be happy."
I'll take some pictures of the completed room when we get it completed. Right now it is still, very much, a work in progress. I intend to have everything in place by Christmas!! I can't stand to wait until the last minute, especially with a baby coming.

Counting Down to Christmas!!

Today Christian, Abby and I made Advent Chains. Nathan had no interest in this activity, he just wanted his binkie (it was close to nap time). The chain consists of 25 pieces of construction paper that we decorate with different Christmas symbols, then we loop them all together. Tomorrow we will start cutting one link off the chain each day until we get to Christmas! Christian has a creative little mind; when we finished the chain he got down on the floor and started pulling it around like a train. Apparently all these pieces of paper linked together make him think of a train. I can see the connection.
Abby was so creative at coming up with different symbols to draw. I was thinking of all the traditional things like angels, a manger scene, ornaments, wreaths, trees, etc. but Abby was coming up with things like hot chocolate, snowflakes and gingerbread men. She did not want us to repeat any symbols on her chain, so we really had to brainstorm to come up with 25 different things. By the way...Abby is wearing her favorite sweatshirt in this picture. She loves all things pink and princess!
Just a cute picture of my precious boy!! We went to AC Moore today, not realizing that they were having a huge one day sale. The place was insane and we stood in line for at least 25 min. just to buy our Christmas paper for this project and a few things we need for our upcoming Happy Birthday Jesus party. I thought about leaving and coming back another day, but once you get three kids in the car with coats and shoes and sippy cups there's no turning back. Christian was so good sitting in the cart. He spent his time looking around the store counting Santas. Abby on the other hand was entertaining everyone else in line by dancing around and playing hide-and-go-seek with Nathan behind a variety of different displays. It sounds cute, but it really was a little stressful. I just love it when my parenting skills are put to the test in front of a bunch of people standing in line with nothing better to do than observe our chaos.

Thanksgiving 2007 Part 2

The Chattertons have owned this land since the 1800's. This is the "big hill" where Ryan spent many winters sledding.

Christian was anticipating his visit to the farm for weeks and he wasn't disappointed. Grampy took him for mulitple tractor rides. He's still talking about it and has been playing with his tractors since he got home.
Ryan's dad has a business restoring antique tractor. He has a ton of tractors. You could check out his website http://www.chatstractors.com/ if you're interested.
Christian loved "two doggies" and they seemed to love him. "Two doggies"
Ryan's Uncle Bob is on the right. He invited us to his farm so that Christian and his cousin Gracey could take a pony ride on Beauty.

Christian brushing Beauty.

Christian going for a ride.

Christian was checking out the snack he just gave Beauty.

Christian and Gracey getting some oats for Beauty.

Ryan was enjoying Christian's pony ride too!

Thanksgiving 2007

This is the whole family that we celebrated Thanksgiving with. It was a great time of family, fellowship and of course food!! I won't name everyone...that would take awhile!

Big sister Emma with her new little brother Evan. Evan was only six weeks old.

Ryan giving a horsey ride to Gracey and Christian.

Gracey, Judy and Ella. Gracey loved playing with all the big girls.
Christian with his Grammy and Grampy on the farm.
Christian had a blast with his cousin Gracey! They got to spend lots of time together.

This looks a little like Christmas morning doesn't it!! We celebrated an early Christmas with Ryan's family. Christian and Gracey in their new "boats" from Grammy and Grampy. These are actually supposed to be pop-up toy boxes, but apparently boats are more fun! This has continued to be a hit since we got home!

Gracey taking a few pictures with her new princess camera.

Christian's new CARS blanket that Grammy made him. He loves it and had to have it in the car on the trip home!

Ryan and I were thrilled to finally be able to meet Olivia Chatterton!! Many of you might remember that she was born with some heart issues and many of you have joined with us as we prayed for her through multiple surgeries! She is doing great now and she's so content!! I hope our little girl is as good as she is! I hope when you see this picture that you'll take a second and pray for Olivia that she won't catch any germs this winter! Is she cute or what?!!!
Aunt Angel gave Christian his Christmas presents early...a backhoe and a dump truck.

We're Home!

We had a great trip to Illinois for Thanksgiving!! Quick, but great! Christian is such a road warrior! He was so good in the car. He didn't fuss once. This is a picture of him getting a new Thomas the tank engine toy. It's a magnetic train track with little magnetic trains. This kept him busy for awhile.
This picture was taken at our hotel at 10:00 at night. Christian fell asleep in the car around 6pm, so he was bouncing off the wall at 10pm. Both Ryan and I fell asleep before him in our hotel room that night!
Christian loved seeing all of Grampy's tractors. We arrived at the farm about an hour before the Thanksgiving meal was to start. Christian's cousin Gracey was waiting for him when we arrived. I took 172 pictures of our trip (I know, I go totally overboard with the picture taking) so I've got a lot of blog posting to do. Hopefully I'll get some time to do it tomorrow. This has just been a little preview until then!!

A 15 Hour Trip...

We are heading to Illinois for the Thanksgiving holiday!! I'm looking forward to spending some quality time together as a family, even if it will be 15 hours in the car! We've got lots of special car activities planned; a new Thomas Train to be introduced at a fussy moment, a travel sized aquadoodle, books, tractors, lots of DVDs and my new favorite is a magnetic tin with a train track inside that came with small Thomas the tank engine magnets (Christian's never seen it before so it should be fun for awhile). We will probably be stopping in Zaneville, OH for dinner because they have a McDonalds with an awesome playland and we're hoping to make it to Dayton, OH by tomorrow night sometime. Can you tell we've traveled this route before?

Christian is really excited about seeing Grampy's tractors (Ryan's parents live on a farm) and Christian is also looking forward to seeing the doggies. He's been talking about this trip for about 4 days now. I hope he's still excited 5 hours into the drive!!!

I won't be posting anything until we get back, so pray for us! I'll have tons of pictures to share next week!

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!! Enjoy your time with your family and friends!