Thursday, December 9, 2010

Thanksgiving, ETC.

In early November we spent a weekend in Austin with the Pierce family. Lissa (Cary's sister) and Marisol (our niece) came down from Massachusetts, and Cary's parents live in Austin, so it was a great time!




We did an early Christmas gift exchange...so much fun!








This was our "Christmas tree" we built from Jaron's "connectagons."


Elijah (13 months) has really started getting into "reading" books. He loves them and calls them "boo! boo!"
Here is a picture of Grammy (Cary's mom) doing a lion "ROAR!" for Jaron. He covered his ears and said, "That's scary Grammy!" She replied, "Of course it is!"
I had a chance to feel like Martha Stewart for like 2 seconds on this trip. The kids decorated maple leaf and pumpkin shaped cookies with different colored icings and sprinkles!









The kids also enjoyed making paper animal puppets with this kit that Jaron got for his birthday.
This is Jaron's lion, "Bobby."



Cary and Elijah enjoyed the project too!
Once again, Elijah LOVED playing with his ball.

He also had lots of fun putting all the animals in and out of Noah's Ark.
Our little puppet show!


I had to include a couple of more pictures of Elijah at the Arboretum in November.



Jaron and his preschool friends enjoyed some very special live music at their Fall Party!
Like father like son!
Check out the guy in the middle!


Elijah absolutely loves it when Jaron's class has a party.
Cary even got them in a conga line!

Okay, these pictures are from when Jaron and his 3-year-old friends had their choir concert. If I can ever figure out how to upload a little movie to this blog, then I will post this concert. It was adorable. The kids stood on risers and sang "My God is So Big" and "Deep and Wide." They sang the second song several times, faster and faster each time. Right before their last round of "fast" singing, Jaron yelled out, all by himself, loud and clear, "I wanna sing it VERY VERY FASTER!!" It was awesome. We were very proud of him. :)




Here is Elijah when he got caught taking 2 cookies out of my purse (don't ask me why they were in there).

Here are the preschool kids at their Thanksgiving party! They are wearing turkey leg hats!



And turkey masks!
This was one of the cutest kid snacks I have ever seen. The pilgrim hat is a chocolate covered marshmallow on top of a chocolate covered cookie. The "corn" snack is cereal and raisins stuck together like a rice krispie treat and wrapped inside a fruit roll-up!
Elijah liked them too!


This is the party favor...cute!
For the first time in months, the little boys could play in the sandbox. Not too hot or too cold!


Here are some photos from Elijah's first haircut!
Right before Thanksgiving, Jaron helped me make a chocolate pecan pie. He also made his own little "candy pie," a little pie made out of the leftover crust from the big pie, plus some flour, sugar and cream. The recipe from this pie has been passed down through several generations. I used to make it with my Grandmom, Kathryn McNeese. Seriously, this pie is so good!!
Here are our pictures from Thanksgiving Day at my Grandparents' house in Tyler. We had a great time playing with the boys' cousins, Owen and June, plus the rest of the McNeese family.











Happy Thanksgiving to you all. We are so grateful for all our blessings!

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