Christmas is in the Air

December is here and we're rolling out the Christmas decor BIG TIME at our house. Jacob is 2 and really into the whole idea of Christmas. Brian and I have an annual argument this time of year, every year, when I ask that he go up into the attic to drag out the 11 bins of Christmas decorations down. He claims I ALWAYS choose the worst possible time for him, he is either hungry, exhausted, has a headache (that is always a good one), or something, and I tell him he is ruining my favorite family time of the year and eventually he gets it all down for me. I win that one every time when I tell him that we will just have to tell Jacob that we won't have a tree because daddy doesn't want to get it down from the attic. I'm terrible, I know.

Anyways, after working at a christmas store in Tulsa over Christmas breaks in college, I was able to collect a Dept. 56 North Pole village collection (which I justify because each year when I worked at the store I got a huge discount, this is where Brian reminds me that I never made any money at the store because I spent it all plus some, so I actually ended up paying them to work there....but the village is pretty cool!!!). Jacob is fascinated with it this year, he wants to live in a place like that, with all the elves, sugar plums on the streets and where m&m's grow on trees (he tried to bite the m&m tree just to make sure, even though I told him that they weren't real).

We also (Claudia's idea), let him decorate his own tree. He was so excited about putting on each ornament, all of which are unbreakable. I was going to let him put the tree in his room, but since both kids are doing SO well sleeping at night, I didn't want to chance it being a huge distraction to him and not going to sleep. So, the tree is in the living room and he makes sure everyone who comes over knows that is HIS tree. Since Jacob decided to hang all the stuffed animal looking ornaments on the bottom of the tree, Gwyn is fascinated by them and has pulled the entire tree over 3 times now! Jacob acts like the world is going to end for about 30 seconds, then realizes some ornaments fell off and he gets to redecorate it, which makes having a little sister okay for the next 2 minutes. Jacob with his tree:

On Tuesday, my bible study at my church hosted Carol Kent for our Christmas Luncheon. She was an awesome speaker, and has such a moving testimony after suffering a family tragedy. Check her out if you get a chance (http://www.carolkent.org/).

On another note, Gwyn is on the verge of walking. I think THIS IS CRAZY, she's not even 10 months old. She's taken about 2 steps, and is so good at standing by herself without holding on to anything. She took about 3 steps towards Brian the other night, she did it about 5-6 times until I got the video camera out and tried to get her doing it, and as usual she didn't do it again that night...why does that always happen??? Anyways, here is a picture of her standing on her own.

Here is the video of her not walking, stay tuned in the next couple of weeks to come when she'll be walking away!

I hosted my Moms Club Book Group at the house on Thursday, about 10 kids, hectic and crazy. There was rarely a conversation finished with so many distractions, but we did select the first four books for next year. My Enemies Cradle by Sara Young, The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsglover, Life of Pi by Yan Martel, and Push Not the River by James Conroyd Martin. Here was our 2008 list that we read:

The Ultimate Gift / The Ultimate Life by Jim Stovall
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
The Other Mother by Gwendolen Gross
The List by Robert Whitlow
Woman In Red by Eileen Goudge
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch
Nights in Rodanthe by Nicholas Sparks
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See

Oh, and to top our hectic week off, Brian had to take Jacob to the Dr. today and he has an ear infection. This is his first one, and he acts like he is in pain. I feel so sorry for him, and I can tell he likes the extra attention when he is sick. My mom always used to do that with me and Jason...treat us extra special when we were sick, so I'm doing that for Jacob now too!