December- off my phone

Out looking at Christmas lights

A little yogurt in the cold...

Snuggled in their footie pj's

Dad Harper and Gammy at Santa's Wonderland

Dressed and ready for his Christmas play at school

A rare picture with Grandpa when they are all looking- horrible light, but we never get these

Playing with his buddies after school...Joshua and Brayden K

Christmas Beauty

Playing with a new Christmas gift

Having a little fun with the Marshmallow guns Aunt Lauren got both Daddy and Brayden

Cutie pie

Climbing at the Children's Museum

Having fun at dinner with Emmy

All dressed up

His first "pet" frog

A story from Daddy about a week after this picture:
I love Brayden and his smart little mind. A week ago he found a frog that we have been keeping in a little ventilated clear box outside. The frog was nearly dead when he found him but he was excited so we kept him. I think now be is officially passed on, but B remains optimistic. He said "My Froggy is STILL asleep.". I said "I think your Froggy may have gone to Froggy Heaven buddy but how about we go get you a real pet frog or fish?". He said "No daddy, frogs just take really long naps. They sleep during the day because they see better at night and they wake up to catch mosquitos and bugs that only come out at night. I think he may just be a baby so we need to get up at night and help him find food like the worms I gave him the other day." Classic.

Family Game Night

We invited both sides of our family over for Family Game Night after Christmas and had a great time!  Lots and lots of laughs!

Danny and my sister pulled together some Minute to Win It games and we drew names to figure out who would compete against each other.

An afternoon at the Children's Museum

For some silly reason, we decided to take the kids to the children's museum during the Christmas break- it was crazy!

But Brayden climbed the big power climb thing all the way for the first time and then we couldn't get him off of it :)  We also found the Lego room he had never played in before.  Lots of fun!

DoDo...our Elf

We don't talk about the "naughty" or "nice" list with Santa- but we enjoy talking about the imaginative side of Santa and his elves...DoDo is our Elf and he came back to visit us this year.  Brayden has enjoyed waking up each morning screaming "DoDo! Where are you?"  Until his finds him.  Sometimes he's been creative...sometimes not!  Here's just a few fun ones.

 Marshmallow bath in a bowl

 With the kids new 2012 ornament they made

He left a fun message in the kitchen for the kids

Advent Activities

Again this year we filled our Advent Calendar with fun activities and things to do for other people...Here are just a few from this year.

Making a Christmas Craft- this was the craft I had organized for the MOPS Christmas party, but Brayden wasn't able to do, so he did his earlier

 Christmas Lights Scavenger Hunt-
He LOVED this!  This kept him entertained and watching the entire time.  I will add pictures for him to see next time- I just drew them and went over them with him this year.

 Making our ornaments for the family- Handprint reindeer- Trystan's hand is the head and Brayden's hand is the body and tail

 Making red and green pancakes

 Writing his wish list to Santa- he drew the pictures and then told me what they all were

 Hot cocoa stirred by a candy cane

Gifts for Brayden's friends at school

 And for the garbage men...except mommy had him run out to try to catch them and he fell and scraped up both knees- giving the garbage men gifts through tears...

Snowman Pizza

Making a gift and giving it to our friends and neighbors