Aunt Hayley

My time sequence is off with the post as we did Christmas with Aunt Hayley late last week before Christmas, but better late than never. For those of you that don't know, Hayley has been one of my best friends since college and moved to Dallas when I was pregnant with David. We have been so blessed to have her so close to us the last few years. David and Aunt Hayley have a great relationship (they are quite the buds- David starts asking "Where is Aunt Hayley" if he hasn't seen her in a few days) and I don't know what Matt and I would have done without her. She is always willing to watch David so Matt and I can have date nights or just to help out when things get busy. It is really much harder than we expected not having family around, but Aunt Hayley has made up for it.

For Christmas, Aunt Hayley got David a doctor's kit which has been a big hit. He walks around with the stethoscope checking every thing's heart (as you can see, this includes all the appliances and Emma at least 3 times a day).

The Christmas Pictures

This was the first Christmas where David got excited about the whole Christmas/presents thing and it was also our first at home. Brandin and his family came up last night and we made hot chocolate and then helped Santa put together toys after the kids finally went to bed. The kids woke everyone up pretty early and it is was complete chaos for the next few hours. They opened gifts and played with the toys Santa brought. The rest of the family arrived shortly thereafter and we had a great lunch, followed by lots of visiting and more playing with all the new toys. After we cleaned a little, we headed down to Mexia to see more family. It was overall a really great day and really great Christmas.

Here are the pictures:

Early Christmas With the Watermans

We went up to Oklahoma City last weekend to attend JD's Christmas Party (this is Matt's great uncle) and visit Matt's family.

Here are the pictures from the Christmas party. JD's house is awesome- lots of Christmas decorations and unique art/statutes and lots of kid toys, including the train that David really enjoyed. David had a good time as did we!

We also had an informal Christmas with Matt's family as we are staying in Dallas this year. They are still having Christmas this coming weekend, so we just exchanged gifts:

David got a new game with the States. For those of you that don't know, our kid has a crazy talent in that he can name about 30 of the States. It started because we had a map above his table. After he picked up learning them, we got an ipad game that he plays all the time. Now he loves this new State's game that has lots of facts about each State and other cool information. Hopefully he interest in learning continues as he gets older and this is not just a phase. 

 

This is not from Christmas, but on Thanksgiving the newest member of the family - Aunt Kim (who is engaged to Jake) - made the best dessert. David loved it so much that he was literally licking the plate. She is now the official dessert person for family holidays (although MiMar makes a pie that will be hard to beat).

Somewhere Over the Rainbow with Granny D

This past summer, Granny D spent a few months taking care of David. During that time, she sang to him a lot. He really liked Somewhere Over the Rainbow. She would sing it and he would finish the very last time with David. So, she would say "why oh why can't.." and he would say "David." This weekend, we went to Oklahoma City to see them for an early Christmas. Granny D sang the song a few times and David would finish it each time with David at the end. Then, out of the blue, he just started singing the whole song by himself. It was super cute and we finally got him to do it while the video camera was running. Here it is - David and Granny D's song:

Matching Bumps

A few weeks ago, David fell out a chair in the kitchen and bumped his head on the floor. It was very sad..especially since Matt and I were siting with him to witness the fall. When kids hit their heads, the broken blood vessels beneath the skin often swell to form a big knot (aka goose egg). This is exactly what happen to David. As many of you know, Matt currently has a large tumor on the back of his head that is being removed soon. It is nothing serious - just a fatty lipoma. It just happened that David's goose egg and Matt's tumor were located in the same spot, so the guys had matching bumps:

A Christmas Pageant

David had his first Christmas pageant tonight at his school and it was awesome. We were really worried that he would not stand on stage with the other kids in his class after he saw us, but he did great. All week he has been singing "Baby Jesus is Asleep" at home and doing his little hand movements. He didn't really sing with the other kids (well, really, none of the kids actually sang), but he made some cute faces and sort of moved his hands. The second song involved bells and he was all about shaking his bells. It was the absolute most precious thing I have ever seen. I was totally the mom crying in the audience. Oh yeah - it was that precious. 

On a side note, my pictures are not great. My whole flex time thing at work is not working out so well (that is a whole other blog post) and this week has been crazy busy. Accordingly, after being at work since 6am and having little to no sleep this week, I forgot my camera..so these were taken with my blackberry (which I amazingly always have). One of the moms taped the performance for everyone and is going to send around a link to watch it. I will share that when I get it. For now, here are the best pictures you can get with a blackberry: