Christmas at the Renaissance

This was where we stayed Christmas Eve in Tulsa!!!

It was beautiful! We swam with Aunt Mary and Uncle Ryan and watched the sunset out of the windows. Then we had a very fancy dinner at the restaurant Christmas Eve. Tommy and I shared French Onion Soup, a nice salad with spiced apples and bleu cheese, and a steak with smoked cheddar mashed potatoes. I mostly ate the soup and salad and Tommy ate the steak. The kids shared a cheese pizza. Nathan fell asleep at dinner, which was nice. After we got Jaycie down, we called everyone to set up Christmas. The kids woke up about 730 and we made the calls again for everyone to join us in our room. The kids were so excited and we all enjoyed watching them open gifts and opening a few ourselves. My dad and Rita opened the sand art and water color painted picutres the kids made. Everyone got new pics from us. After gifts, we enjoyed the hotel breakfast buffet. It was a great Christmas!!

Jaycie's Week

We met Poppy and Grandma Rita at the Stroud McDonalds on Tuesday for her to spent the week in Bixby. She just got back Saturday night. We were worried how Nathan would do
at home without sister. I think that

he enjoyed being the center of

attention. Jaycie had a great time. She tells us about having a picnic in the caves by Grandma Rita's house. I am sure that she wore them out. She loves them so much because they focus all of their attention on her when she is around. She loves the way that they tune in to her and listen to her. I love and appreciate that about them too! When we get to visit, nothing is more important than the stories she has to tell and her thoughts. It is the same for Nathan too, but he still follows in her shadows right now. These are old pics, but they show some things that we love about them. Nathan sees dump trucks on the road and tells me that his Poppy drives one of those....(and a scoop too)

Weekend with Grandma Brown

When Grandma Brown was here and we got family pics made, we also wanted to do some home pajama pics. She brought the kids some cute ones to wear! She also got us a gingerbread house to decorate. It was a lot of fun. Jaycie was in to decorating and Nathan just wanted to eat the decorations. It was a great weekend. We also got to eat dinner at Teds with Grandma and she and I did a little shopping too. Thanks Mom!

Preparing for Christmas

Here we are setting up our tree right after we got back from Thanksgiving. It was fun to get out all of our things and listen to Christmas music. We showed the kids some special ornaments and they got to hang up a lot of them. The Christmas spirit carried on to the bath tub, where the kids put bubbles on their faces to look like Santa. They are soooo excited for Christmas to come this year. It is fun for me to see their excitement.

Thanksgiving 2008

I can't believe that I forgot to post our Thanksgiving pics.

We had a great time in Broken Arrow with Tommy's family for Thanksgiving. We started out the eating and visiting at Grandpa and Grandma Owens of course. Grandpa has battle wounds on his head from a fall. Later we had a nice meal at Buga Buga and Papi's house. In the evening, we went for a walk at the Riverwalk. On our way home, Tommy and the kids and I went to the house in Broken Arrow that we have gone to for years that is very decorated with lights. The decorations are a tribute to a girl that lived there that passed away at Christmas time. The kids were mezmerized with all of the things to see at that one house. The day was also filled with card games and Wii games as well. Jaycie and Nathan boxed each other and it was cute!
Our evening walk at the Riverwalk in Tulsa

Preschool Christmas Party

We had our annual Preschool Christmas Party on Tuesday!

It was a fun and crazy morning.

Here are the kiddos anxiously awaiting presents!

Sydnee, Jaycie, Margie, Joby, Emma

Here are the future preschoolers

enjoying decorated cookies

Aiden, Nathan, Jake, Egan, Emma

Becca reading Christmas stories

The kids made necklaces, and colored pictures too!

Family Pics Finally

When my mom was here last weekend, we took family pictures at Portrait Innovations. Our last family pics were when Nathan was 6 mo. old, so I decided it was time (and had to convince Tommy). He came kicking and screaming and obviously didn't smile. Thank goodness the kids did. They did a great job and I was thrilled because that is rare to get them both at the same time. Jaycie can be a real picture taker these days and Nathan is getting used to it. He took our camera to Tommy yesterday and told him that he wanted to take a "smile" of him! Here are some pics that I liked that we will not be sending out.