Luke's 1st Birthday!

Happy Big #1 Birthday Little Man!

Luke celebrated his first birthday on Dec. 1.  He has gotten so big--when did my little baby turn into a BIG Boy??!  Luke is the absolute joy of our family.  He makes everyone smile, even random people he waves to out running errands.  He loves people, loves to go, and loves to explore everything in his big new world.  He definitely keeps me busy all day, but he also gives the best loves to make it all worth it.



We celebrated Luke's special day at Chick-fil-a

for lunch with Luke's best buds Jack and Squeaky. 

Leslie has connections there (possibly from how often

they frequent the establishment . . .) so her worker friend

hooked us up with free ice cream and a little

stuffed cows for everyone! : )

That night we had cupcakes with our family to celebrate Luke's

Big #1.  Luke was mesmerized by the candle and wanted to touch

it.  Logan had to keep grabbing his hand so he didn't get burned. 

Good thing Luke has such good big sisters and brother to teach him

everything!  Luke also LOVED eating his first cupcake!!!  He

couldn't get enough of the yummy icing--he ate 2 cupcakes!  Then,

he got to open his presents.  He loved playing with the paper and bags

almost more than the presents.  It was a good run-through for more

presents to come at the end of the month.

Nothing like pure sugar!

Happy Birthday Buddy!  We are so lucky to have you in our family!



Thanksgiving Break at Sea World

We kicked off our Thanksgiving holiday with a trip to Sea World with the MBJ's (ie Manwarings, Barlows and Jensons) sans dads since somebody still has to work that week!  We hit Smashburger for lunch and then headed to the park.  It was a fun festive Sea World day without hardly anybody there, which always makes Sea World so much nicer to have the park to ourselves.  We did lots of rides since there were no lines and watched The Polar Express 3-D.  The kids just had fun being together and it was a nice out for the moms too! : )

Luke even lasted through most of the Polar Express.  He only

got mad when the train was skidding through the ice and it got

really loud in the theater.  Then, he got sprayed in the face

with the water effects, and he was done!.  Next time I'll

remember to cover his face in time.



Turkey Time

No--we did not have Thanksgiving in February.  I am still frantically trying to catch up blogging my life from the last half a year.  My little buddy has made it tough to get extra things like taking time for me (ie blogging!) done since he became mobile.  The bonus now is he takes 1 long 2-3 hour nap each day so I can try to get all those extra things done that I had put off.  My goal is to be caught up soon . . .

I had lots of helpers making the Thanksgiving Feast this year.  Logan was in charge of the rolls, Makayla made a beautiful Cherry Pie, and Mike's job is always to clean all the disgusting gizzard parts out of the turkey so I can season it and get it in the oven.  We had our good friends, the Bonnallies, over for dinner, so between all the yummy food Kelly and I made, we definitely had a Feast!  We were so happy they could spend Thanksgiving with us since this was the first year none of our family came to visit for the holiday.  We had such a nice relaxing day with them, enjoyed a delicious dinner, and finished the day off with our family tradition of decorating Gingerbread Houses.  It was fun to share our tradition with our friends--and the Barlows came that evening to join in the fun.  Then, the fun continued on through the wee hours of the night for Susie and me. . . 

Yea for Black Friday!!  We met up with Leslie and her sister-in-law at Target for Black Friday at midnight, and then Leslie and I scored some sweet deals at Old Navy.  It was a different Black Friday going out at night because it seemed like their were a lot more crazies out and about.  We actually had to wait in a HUGE line that wrapped around the shopping complex clear passed Game Stop.  I had fun with the girls, but I actually did way better the next morning at HEB.  Most of the crazies had gone home by then, and I got quite a chunk of my list crossed off there. 

 

First Grade Corn Day!

Cute little candy corn boy

The Spread

Time for Gingerbread Houses! Making

gingerbread houses is a special tradition for me because it

reminds me of my Grandma Warnick.  Every Thanksgiving

she made homemade gingerbread houses for all the grandchildren

and then we got to decorate our masterpieces.  I hope my

kids will love this tradition as much as I do.

Happy Valentine's Day!

To the love of my life forever! 
I love you!

Tejas Rodeo

In honor of the rodeo starting this weekend, I thought I would post some pics from our fun night at the Tejas Rodeo.  It was a much smaller rodeo then the big Stock Show and Rodeo coming to town, but we liked that because it had a down-home feel and the kids loved watching all the events up-close from the fence.  Even Luke had fun watching the bucking broncos and bullriders.   Yee-Haw!

New Trick . . .

 . . . and we have a climber! 

I don't remember the other kids being this crazy??!  Can you say child #4?

Super Cub Scout!

Yea for Logan!  He earned his Wolf rank and the Panda award! 

If you have a 8-10 year old boy, you may know what I am talking about.

Cub Scouts!  I am all about Cub Scouts right now. : )

One of the best parts of Logan being in Cub Scouts is that I get

to be his Den Leader!  At first, when I was asked to be a Wolf

Den Mother (what??!)  I kind of freaked out.  I knew absolutely

nothing about scouts.  But it has been a fun learning experience for

me and it has been really fun to get to work with Logan and his

buddies each week, and to get to work with Susie each week as the

Den Mother for the Bears.  She actually just got released last week

and I'm really going to miss working with her.  It has made scouts

fun (if you can call scouts fun!) to get to do it with her.

Now we are on to a new adventure in Bears.  Logan has moved up to be
a Bear and I am now the Bear Den Mother.  These are some of our most

fun moments in scouts this fall. 

Field trip to Millbergers haunted hay maze. 

Fire Safety First!  Logan got to try on Bro. K's fire gear.  He

was just a little bit excited! : )

We also took a tour of Mike's lab at work to earn the Science

Belt Loop.  The boys had a blast learning what a scientist does

all day.  The also thought it was pretty cool to freeze raquet balls

in liquid nitrogen and then smash them with a hammer.