December 2012

Brandon probably won't be thrilled that I am posting this picture....

But nothing says Merry Christmas quite like this picture.

His work and church had an ugly sweater party.  I searched for a sweater, but it didn't exist in Vegas.  Thankfully Walmart pulled through with an ugly sweater t-shirt.  It worked perfectly.  And I have no idea what the fringe on his head is about.  

We like to take the kids to Bass Pro Shop at Christmas because they have the very best Santa.  He wears a teeny earpiece that's invisible to the kids and the elves at the line feed him the names of who is coming up to sit on his lap.  It makes it extra magical when Santa says "Wow Reggie!  Look how much you've grown since last Christmas!" instead of asking for their names.  This year we didn't actually make it on Santa's lap.  We just waved.

And we enjoy the taxidermy that Bass Pro offers.  Or some of do at least.

And our store is connected to a casino (like everything else).  We ended up traveling into the casino to look at their ginormous fish tank.  On that particular day, Santa was in the tank with scuba gear and a microphone and another employee was outside with another microphone.  So while Reggie didn't sit on Santa's lap, he did get to talk into the microphone and ask the scuba diving Santa for some legos.

We hit up the cactus gardens with some friends.  It was awesome, as always.

Brandon's grandma and grandpa get jammies for all their great grandkids.  Reggie had Lego Ninjago, P's were Tinkerbell, and Colby's were some Carter Christmas jammies.  Adorable!  We kept tradition and had Cafe Rio for dinner, drove around the neighborhood to look at lights, and finished up reading the Christmas story from the Bible.

Christmas morning was great.  (I should have included the before picture, but we got to keep plugging onward with this post.)  Reggie was up to his ears in Legos.  He also got a Hot Wheels race track, a Nerf gun, and a new backpack.  Penny got a baby crib, toy food, a princess sleeping bag, and a princess chair and a Cinderella dress.  Colby got a booster chair (we threw away our nasty high chair when we moved), a new umbrella stroller, a walker, and a new ball popper.  I'm not sure what happened to his jammies here.

Oops.  Here's an after pic that includes most everything.

Once we were done with our morning in Vegas, we hopped in the car to California.  We made it there early afternoon.  Brandon's parents had picked up a power wheels car that has been named "Purple Thunder."

Last set here.  Phew!  Here's the kids the following Sunday in the Christmas church clothes that they got.

It's the same shot of Colby three times, but it's too cute.  I'm posting all of them.

And then P got in trouble.  (I remember that.)  So it was just the boys.

December done.  Check.