Christmas cards are on their way

I have started mailing out our Christmas cards with a little help from Jake. As you can see above he is carefully placing Christmas stickers on the envelopes. I will not post the Christmas card picture nor the outakes here until after all of the ones I have posted have a chance to be delivered, but look for them later this month.

Parades and Fulton Midway Marina Christmas Open House

Mari and I in front of our church watching the Christmas Parade and occasionally running inside to get hot chocolate to keep warm!
Mari, Jake and James watching the Annual Reed's Department Store Christmas Parade in Tupelo. It was the first event that we took Jake to after bringing him home from the hospital (my mom joked that they were throwing a parade just for him) and last year it was the first even we took Mari to after bringing her home from the hospital. It has become a tradition and so this was Jake's fourth Reed's Christmas Parade and Mari's second.

James and Mari join my parents and Jake on board the train from the parking area to the marina.

Jake and Mari get presents from Mr and Mrs Claus at the Midway Marina.

A cold Mari!

Sunset over the Tombigbee Waterway from the end of the dock at the Midway Marina in Fulton (the town where my parents live).

Above are some of the boats decorated for the open house.

Mari is sick!

Mari has strep throat and sinus congestion. I will blog about our fun trip to the doctor later. I am working on updating my blog but right now it is difficult to even take a shower as she wants/needs held constantly.

Trimming the Tree

Friday night we kicked off our personal family Christmas Holiday Season by selecting and trimming our tree. Friday was my final day of my classes for the semester (although I had to drive down Monday for my students final exam) and so we were really in a celebratory mood. Jake and I baked Christmas cookies, which you can see Mari eating above. Below Jake is partaking in his "Christmas chocolate" which is what he calls opening his advent calendar (it has a different shaped chocolate for every night).

We got a short tree this year. I put it on a table behind our couch as it was the only strategy I could figure out to keep it safe from Mari. We did something similar when Jake was the same age. As you can see Mari would rather eat ornaments than put them on the tree (I bought a bunch of safe shatterproof plastic balls which are the ones you see her with--so don't worry she wasn't in any danger). Jake enjoyed putting the ornaments on, but I later had to "redecorate" it as he put them all in one place.

The best Santa Claus picture EVER!

Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving with the Carr family. From left to right: Emily Carr (James's first cousin) is holding Cayson Hunt (James's first cousin Kris's youngest son born in April), in the middle is Hadyn Hunt (Kris's oldest son) and then Jake and Mari of course!

We had Thanksgiving with my parents the next day.

This was Mari's first Thanksgiving Holiday. I know that seems weird as she has already celebrated her first birthday, but as it is not a set date (like Easter) her birthday this year was before Thanksgiving, although last year she was born after Thanksgiving. As you can see she enjoyed the food. Oh, and I immensely enjoyed not being pregnant for Thanksgiving!