Tis the Busy Christmas Season...

On Saturday, I was tired, but one of my best friends, Dawn and her two sisters were in town visiting there parents in Fostoria for the Holidays. Dawn was a good friend from college in BGSU. We met at Cheddars in Findlay and were celebrating her sisters two baby boys births. Erin, just had a baby boy named Logan, and Liz is due in February. Dawn and her family are always treasured people and now she lives in St. Louis. I hope to go and visit her next summer. Allright, here is christmas in the nutshell... of course I took several pictures, but only going to put this one on. This is Emma Christmas morning.. I love this pic and she was so excited!!! We began christmas on christmas eve when Brad's parents and aunt came over for dinner after lighting all the luminairs at church. Then we opened presents and went to 7pm. church so we could get back and get Emma to bed at a decent time. Emma went absolutely crazy opening presents with them and even tired opening everyone elses presents for them! It was so nice spending the time with Brad's immediate family because his mom's health is not the best and she has parkinsons but is also beginning to get alteimzers. A double wammy, and no fun for any of us. Christmas morning Brad and I enjoyed a nice morning with Emma opening gifts. Mommy was a little excited about christmas this year and went a little overboard, but hey it is all good. Then we went over and saw my sister's and stept mom for a little while..it was nice for Kaylee and Emma to see each other on Christmas Day. We then headed to Indian Lake to see my grandma Weber, and surprisingly enough most of my cousins were there, (11 of us came) and my uncles and aunts. My grandma Weber is 81, and very close in my heart, but as I have said before is suffering from what I now consider the deadliest disease to me, alteimzers. I hate it with all my heart, it seems to be all around me right now. She is slowly losing her mind, and I was really able to see it on Christmas because we were there all afternoon. For the evening then we ventured back to Marysville and went to the Pickelseimers house for all of Marvin's side of the family.. we eat and play progressive euchre. Let me just say, I was exhausted, and more enjoyed sitting on the couch talking to a couple cousins wives. Sunday, afternoon we went to Prospect to see my mother in laws side of the family and had dinner with them. The kids had a blast playing together and even had a surprise visit from Santa. Is Christmas a very busy time of year for us, yes, but I guess I have to say I would not want it any other way...I realize now the importance of family.

Next up was Emma's Sunday School Christmas program at Church. Talk about adorable!!! I was never so proud as a mom to see my daughter standing up there in front of church singing her heart out. Standing next to her are her two best buddies, Camryn and Damon. They sang 4 songs and did an amazing job. It was the cutest thing I have ever seen and I was very proud.

The next big fun came the big 40 celebration for one of Brad's best friends Shannon Cotter Moyer. All of Brad's friends are beginning the big turn of 40 and so lots of fun parties are to be gone to!! We already went to Karol and Colin's, and Chris had a surprise party for Shannon in Findlay at a Winery. It was wonderful! We rode up with our other good friends the Micheals, and I love this photo I got of Shannon and her brothers...Ken Kaufman's is next on Tuesday night.

The holiday season began with the first little snowfall of the season. Emma was so excited and would not stay away from the window so we ventured out to play in the snow. It was not much, and melted fast but she had a blast. She enjoyed making a snow angel, and the neighbor took Emma and Rylee around on the tube. They had a blast!!!!

Merry Reindeer Christmas...

Forgot to add this picture of Emma...had to include it because she totally is my ham and just so much fun!!(Most of the time of course) She looks so excited right now.. NOT. I am not sure what she is looking at.. but sure she is thinking, why do I have this reindeer balloon on my head??

Annual Bravo christmas dinner...

Every year my share group thru Emmaus goes to Bravo for a christmas dinner. It is always so yummy and full of laughs and great fellowship. This year we are happy to have Kelly join us. She has been a great addition. It is wonderful to be able to come together like we do and pray for one another, share our joys and sorrows and keep each other accountable in our faith. Last night I am especially thankful for these girls for being there for me and listening...love to each of you this Christmas!

The beginning of the Christmas Season...

Yep, you got it. This was our third, and most definantly final attempt with Santa this year. I love this picture and it cracks me up!! Saturday, the Elks had a kids christmas party.. it was nice of them to do this. Santa came, they had goodie bags for the kids and complete with chicken nuggets for lunch. Brad took Emma up to see Santa, and yep, this was as close as she would get!!! Hey, it was closer than the second time... it was still cute even with her little tears. She did still tell Santa.. from a distance.. thanks Santa and ho-ho-ho.

I guess these are going to be out of order... oppss.. ow well. Our next visit with Santa was not such a pleasent one. We had the EMA christmas party at the county building Friday night and Santa made an appearance. She screamed bloody murder and would not even go close to Santa at all.. so no photo op. She was all about the gift though...and Santa sat it next to her. For her first official gifts of the season she got a puzzle, which of course she put together about 10 times and a little Dora doll. It was cute and entertained her through the night.

Well, it is sideways, I am not sure how to make it the right way... but this was Emma's first picture with Santa this year. A couple days before Thanksgiving, I took Emma to polaris mall one day and she happened to have her reindeer shirt on and saw Santa. I asked her if she wanted to talk to Santa. She said yes! I was excited she wanted to do this, and also shocked. I know that the lovely age of 2 is not always a favorite time for little girls and boys to want to speak to the jolly old man. When it was our turn she told Santa how she didn't want to sit on his lap but would sit on the reindeer, we went with it. She said she wanted lots of toys.. Dora, and baby dolls to play with. It was really cute. Check, that was off the list of things to do, not the best picture, but compared to the next two times we would see Santa, it was a success!

New van

No picture attached...but I am proud to say that I am now officially a minivan mom. It could not of happened at a better time. We got a 2010 Chrysler Town and Country. It is loaded and definantly my new baby right now...I want to keep it spotless and get upset when a speck of dirt arrives on the floor. Brad reminded me the other day that it will get dirty tara... winter is arriving. I know.. but still. I love it!!!!!!! It is my first ever brand spanken new car, and I am 37 years old. All the other cars I have owned have been atleast a year or two old when we have purchased them. Emma of course loves the DVD player... I love all the accessories, but my goal over christmas break is to figure out the whole DVD, stereo system, so I don't have to listen to rudolph.. gotta love those headphones that came with it too!! I feel very blessed to have it and we finally got to say goodbye to the 1996 Honda Accord... it had definantly seen its days...Merry Christmas to Brad and Tara!

ISDC uptown christmas walk

This was definantly a site to see last night... ow boy. Last night all the dancers in different age groups got to perform to a christmas song. They were originally suppose to start with the young kids, and well, I think that they should have.. but they started with the older kids first. Emma's group was the last to perform, they were suppose to dance to santa claus is coming to town. Of course there were a ton of them, and they were all wearing red. Emma was one of the last ones to come out with her buddy Camryn. The look on there face was priceless. Emma is normally a really outgoing person, but she came out there and was just petrified!! The finger went in her mouth and she was like, who the heck are all these people, and where is my mommy! She did dance a little bit, but then just stood there with Camryn. Brad and I were able to get her to spot us and she then seemed a bit better. The sad part for me was when I went to pick her up. They literally had all the kids inside, like 300 of them.. and Emma was upstairs in the corner just bawling for mommy! I went over to her and she just clung to me for dear life, and said mommy, I did not know where you were, lots of people in here... poor thing. I felt bad for her. She recovered quickly though and when we got to the car she started singing her santa claus is coming to town song..kids, gotta love them. It still was adorable!

Zoo lights, just beautiful!

Sunday night we decided to make an impromptu visit to see the zoo lights.. that is the glory of having a pass!!! I know we will be there several more times during the holiday season, but this was the first. They of course, were beautiful. We only stayed about an hour and half because we took marvin and sharon along with us. Sharon wanted to see the lights really bad and it wasn't too cold out, so we went for it. We got a wheelchair for her,and everything went great. Emma had to ride the carousal of course, and so papa gilbert got the honors.

While we were at the zoo though, we ran into a family I used to babysit for from Merry Moppet. The spornhauers... they just rocked. I loved watching them. Carson was just 5 years old and now she is a senior in high school, wow! Zoe is a freshman and Reese is in 3rd grade. I only watched Carson and Zoe, Reese was just a baby, so she did not remember me. They were so much fun and I loved talking to them for a few minutes to catch up.

Thanksgiving time...

I am capturing as many photos of me and my grandma as I can..she is not doing well. I have always been extremely close to her and the alteimzers is sitting in... I think it really hit me when she did not know many of our family members that we saw on thanksgiving...

So this year for some reason I was not in the photo taking mood for thanksgiving, I did not take any photos, just a couple of Emma and one with my grandma Weber. Thanksgiving is usually a busy time for us, but also a great time because we see so much of family. Thursday we went to the Weber side in Powell at my Aunt and Uncles house and saw about 30 family members. We do this every year and I am blessed to have so many great aunts and uncles still living and active. Then we had to get Emma a nap, so Brad and I took her in the car, and ventured a couple miles down the road to my stept-mom's side of the family so I could say hello to all of them. We are lucky that they live like 5 minutes from each other..Emma fell asleep in the car so Brad stayed in the car while I visited. Then it was off to Galena for the evening to visit with Brad's dad side of the family, 35 people. We always enjoy visiting with them and playing euchre after the meal. Then on Saturday, we went over to Dad and Holly's house and had a turkey meal just with my immediate family for lunch, and then headed to Dublin to Brad's mom side of the family to eat with her sister and son's family. I was turkeyed out!! I do love thanksgiving for so many reasons, but especially because we get to see so many relatives.

My little squirt is just growing up before my eyes... it is also very frightening to me how much she looks like me and my pictures when I was little. She is definantly Brad and I's blessing and I thank God for her everyday.

I did think she looked awful cute in her thanksgiving day outfit, and before we left, she said, mommy aren't you going to take a picture of me? Of course she had to pose...she is a character. I hope she keeps her outgoing personality.