I'm dreaming of a WHITE CHRISTMAS!!!

All I can say is the best Christmas yet!!!! Filled with snow...friends...family...and not only did we celebrate the birth of Jesus, but Anna Margaret had her baby boy over a week early (on Christmas Eve!)!!! I am DYING to get to Piedmont and see this boy, but the weather has kept me away! I will have pictures soon of a little boy I consider to be a nephew (son of a best friend since zero)....but, until then, and until I get some real time to post pictures of a few of our festivities (that I have had the camera ready for!), here are a few pictures of our house on our first real White Christmas! We have literally had an entire day filled with snow...church is cancelled tomorrow and we are looking forward to hot chocolate, soup and playing in the snow (and extending Christmas one more day...not good at seeing it end!). Merry Christmas everyone and welcome to this world Frazier Woods! :)

It's that time....Christmas time is here...

We just got back from our much anticipated overnight trip to Callaway Gardens Fantasy in Lights! We had been in discussion forever about if we were going to go, when we were going to go, etc and finally nailed down a date to go down with friends to see the lights and get everyone in the Christmas spirit! (Luckily for the Smiths and Hunters, we booked a room in the cottage and they were staying in a villa!) I woke up feeling a little under the weather and felt like I had a stomach bug coming on but didn't want to admit it since I had also stayed out too late at a fun party the night before! :) We got up, went to church, taught 3K sunday school, came home and packed our bags for our fun overnight trip! Grandmommy and Granddaddy had had the girls over for a spend the night party (and they had so much fun!), so we picked them on the way, then headed down to Senoia for a Christmas visit with Great-grandmommy and Great-granddaddy! Let's just say the ride down there, especially in the car, I felt like I had been hit by a train! Ugh - misery! Anyway, I wish we had gotten some pictures of the girls with Great-Grandmommy and Great-granddaddy, but the girls had so much fun, enjoyed a delicious lunch and loved their new Frosty the Snowman dolls! After a fun but too short visit, we headed on our way down to Callaway Gardens to check into our cottage. We got to the cottage to find out the heat was broken...but, I took a very brief nap to try to see if I could bite the bullet and go to the lights that we had been looking forward to for so long! :) Someone came over to check out our heat and said they would have it fixed by the time we got back from the lights, so we bundled up and headed out!! We decided to take the "Jolly Trolley" to see all of the nights and it was such a neat experience! Here are the only pictures I got from the weekend of Ryan and the girls on the trolley, right before our ride began...

The girls LOVED the first 20 or so minutes of it, but about 20 + minutes in, Rhodes started to get a little antsy and the stomach bug decided to hit Ali!!!!! On the Jolly Trolley!! Luckily she had an "window" seat!! (I know, too much information...but so many things went wrong on this trip, I was laughing at the end of the night and I want to remember it all when our next trip is perfect! :)) We made the call to head back to our cottage afterwards (and thank goodness we did, because we had a long night ahead of us!) and skip the rest of the attractions/Christmas village/dinner/etc - we never even got to see our friends! :( (But, I am so glad we didn't since both of my friends are pregnant and one is due in less than 3 weeks!! The last thing they needed was to be hanging out with this sickly family!) We got back to our ice cold cottage that still was without heat and called and had to drive back to the Lodge, get a new room and finally settled into our new cottage with two really tired little girls, one of them miserable with the stomach bug! (We think Rhodes had it this past week - I didn't send her to school on the last day, but she got over it so fast, I wasn't sure if she was really sick! Praying she was though and that she doesn't get it again this round!) Poor thing! I quickly had to suck it up and take care of my little princess who was so tough and never even cried - not even on the trolley - she was such a trooper! Later that night, Ryan was the fourth victim (and he is still bedridden as I type!) - but I am so grateful that we all got it yesterday/today. I woke up feeling a ton better today so it is luckily short-lived and I pray we will have a healthy family of 4 come Christmas Eve!! Honestly, little mishaps like these make me feel so grateful today for all of the things we take for granted - like being healthy! And today I am feeling very much in the Christmas spirit and grateful for two healthy children today - and praying for a healthy husband tomorrow!! We are also praying hard that all that we came in contact with this weekend (especially Grandmommy, Granddaddy, Great-Grandmommy, and Great-Granddaddy who we saw that day!!) do not catch this bug!!!

I just can't get the Christmas Vacation theme song (note the title of the blog) out of my head...sometimes our lives can just be too parallel with those Griswold's! :)

And a few more...

Sorry for all of the videos, but I had them uploaded and had to share! It was such a cute little performance and we were so proud of Als! Had to make sure that all the grandparents could see!! :)

Another favorite

Our little performer!

Here is a glimpse at Ali's first Melody Makers (choir) performance at church tonight...this was their last son! Our little star! :) She was so into it and so cute! (she is on the front row - big hot pink bow, boots and hot pink ornament skirt! :))

**Be sure to hit the pause button on the music player at the bottom of the page - so you can hear Ali sing. You can hear her loud and clear since she was right by the microphone!

The Holidays are here!!!

As soon as Thanksgiving Day got here and our Elf (Connie) arrived, we have had a household full of Christmas and excitement! I love this time of year! It's funny b/c every year, I get so excited with the feelings of Christmas I had when I was little and I have this image in my head of what it is going to be like - perfect with parties, crafts, activities, visits to Santa, Pink Pig, Christmas lights, etc - and when you are a child, that is all stress-free. When you are a parent, you get to experience it all with your children, but there is more stress to make it happen - not so easy and carefree as when I was little, but still so much fun! (Plus, lots of fun adult parties to go to!)

So far, some of our highlights have been making a gingerbread house....

Going to see Santa arrive on the square and the Marietta tree lighting...


Dancing with our friends, the Lowery's, at the tree lighting...



Papa got to stand with Randy and Spiff on stage to welcome everyone to Marietta and countdown the tree lighting!
Ali did not want to go up on stage (even though she is obsessed with the stage any other time we are the square and no one is around!), so Rhodes went up with Mimi and Papa...here they are on stage, listening to Papa...
And here is Rhodes' moment of fame...counting down....
And the tree is lit! (although only half the tree lit up at first! :))
Family pic by the fully lit tree!
The rest of the weekend was a crazy one. I had a bad cold & felt miserable and Ryan went to the doctor and got a boot put on his leg for a very bad sprained ankle to start it off. (he has to wear the boot for 3 weeks and he is not loving it! :)) We skipped the Pilgrimage gala this year and headed out to dinner with friends, Ali had a spend the night party at Libby's, and we stayed up way too late. When we woke up on Saturday, I was a docent in the pilgrimage for most of the afternoon and came back to go to two parties on Saturday night while the girls had a fun, decorating playdate/spend the night party with Grandmommy and Granddaddy! (they were so excited!)

After teaching 3K Sunday school on Sunday, we headed up to the club for their annual Christmas brunch with Santa - it was so much fun, as always!


Then onto the annual Poston's Christmas party - Santa twice in one day! (Ali already noticed that he was not the same Santa and I had to tell her about the "helpers" that Santa sends down when he can't be everywhere at once! :) Can't get much past that girl!)


(In between our brunch and the Poston's party, Ali even headed to a little Christmas crafts daycamp that a friend of mine held and had a BLAST! I could not believe she was still going strong and able to do it all after spending two nights out and a very full weekend!!!) It was a fun, busy weekend and we have definitely made it to the craziness of December! Our decorations are completely up, I finished knocking out Christmas cards today (hope to get them in the mail this week) and wrapped a bunch of presents while Ali was at "camp" and I am hoping to spend the rest of the month enjoying every second (and probably not blogging), soaking the smiles, family, friends, parties, activities and everything in and not stressing too much...we'll see if that happens! Happy December everyone!!

Santa on the Square 2010

This little video was just on Facebook and the Marietta website...so I thought I would share! One of the little things about this small town we live in....going up to the square on a cold night to hear the Marietta City elementary schools sing carols, seeing Santa arrive on the square on a fire truck, seeing lots of little friends, and watching the lighting on the Square's Christmas tree (plus, Papa got to do the introduction and the countdown for the tree lighting - with Rhodes' help on stage!). I told Ryan as we were walking back to the office to get our car that I felt like we were in a scene from a 1950s movie - and it was such a neat feeling! Enjoy the video....(and you may want to fast forward to minute 4:04 to see our little cuties in pink hats!)

Christmas card outtakes

We had about a 2 minute attempt tonight at getting a good Christmas card picture! Of course, getting a 4 year old and 2 year old to both look at the camera, smile and not kill each other is quite the task! :) We made it out with one where they actually were both smiling (not perfect, but both smiles - I'll take it!) ....but here are some outtakes from the rest of our session! :)

(I didn't get a picture of them falling into the tree after this one! Thank goodness no one got hurt! :))

This is my favorite outtake! :)



Love these two Christmas angels!

Trimming the tree!

We had fun decorating our Christmas tree in our pjs yesterday morning! I forgot how much fun it was to decorate with breakable ornaments with a 2 year old! :) Luckily, only a few didn't make it (so far) - we are interested to see how many more might become "toys" as Christmas season continues! :) Ali, on the other hand, is quite the little 4 year old elf! She is so into Christmas decorating! I am not sure if it is the fact that Christmas was so hard last year (with my mom in the hospital) or the excitement in my children's eyes or a little bit of both - but, I have a feeling this is going to be the best Christmas yet!

Five years later...

Yesterday Ryan and I celebrated our 5 year anniversary and it was perfect! Since this is Thanksgiving weekend (and the UGA/GT game) - we decided to have our official celebration last weekend, where Ryan took me here....

(Old Edwards Inn - Highlands, NC = AMAZING!!)

(Ryan packing the car....Our room was right above his head - the two middle patios were ours...with a perfect view of downtown Highlands!)

We had so much fun on our little weekend getaway! It truly was an amazing little place - our hotel was fabulous - I highly highly recommend it to anyone looking for a short getaway to get pampered and eat all the Dove bars you want! :) I felt bad b/c that was our gift to eachother - but Ryan did ALL of the planning and chose the place, room, etc - and I am soo thankful!

It is always so nice to get away...but also so nice to be excited to come home to too smiling face! These two were so happy to have us home...they got right to work helping rake the leaves...

And helping cook some dinner....

Yesterday, since we'd already celebrated and were recovering from Thanksgiving - we still had the perfect low key day. Ryan had to take Rhodes to the doctor so I could get some things done (and since he was off of work - I was so grateful that he took her!) - turns out she had a double ear infection. Poor thing, she was miserable! I feel for people who have children with constant ear infections, because (knock on wood) that is one thing our kids have not had and poor Rhodes has had a hard time with this - it has been so sad to see her in such pain! (I hope I didn't just jinx us!) We were relieved to find out that is what it was, though, and get her on some antibiotics (and back on the neb for her bad cough!) and hope she is on her road to recovery! We spent the rest of the day listening to Christmas music, filling our house with Christmas decorations, eating a family anniversary lunch at Longhorn (Ryan's favorite!) and picking out our Christmas tree! It was the perfect day! To top it off, we ended the night with the girls at Mimi and Papa's (they were SO excited to go over there to decorate too - they asked all day if it was time yet! :)) and Ryan and I went out to dinner with fun friends - two of whom stood by my side exactly 5 years ago from last night! (Kate and AM) It was such a treat to be with them and we had too much fun!

I am so thankful to have married Ryan five years ago and love him so much! He is such a great, patient, loving husband to me - even though I know I am not always that easy to live with :) -and the best dad to our girls! I can't wait for the next five (ten, fifteen, twenty....)! Happy anniversary Ryan!

Turkey time!

Yesterday was Ali's Thanksgiving Feast at school and I volunteered to go help! I always love going in their little classes and seeing them all in action.

My little Indian!
Three little Indians eating their Thanksgiving feast...

Ali and I made the dessert - turkey cupcakes! They were a hit! All I did was make cupcakes, frost them with chocolate icing, stick 5 candy corn in the back and a sideways hershey kiss for the head! They were quite cute (in my humble opinion! :)) and yummy!

Me and my little Indian!
We love Ms. Garrett
and Ms. Kelly
and Mary Mac!
Yesterday was also the last day of school until after Thanksgiving! We are looking forward to some fun time off to celebrate the Holidays - but, I know Ali is already missing her sweet friends and teachers! (and so is Rhodesy! I can't wait until her class has parties/feasts that I can help out in!)