Christmas!

We had a great, quiet Christmas here in Marion. It was just the four of us, but so relaxing and great family time. Philip was off the whole weekend, and we had lots of time to play with our new toys.

This was our tree, biggest one yet and the kids loved it, Isabelle learned very quickly how to turn it on/off and that was what she did as soon as she woke up every morning.
The kids love Philip's Christmas train and that was their joy every night, playing engineer with Daddy. Didn't take them long to figure out how to make it go.

The excitement of seeing the presents Christmas morning. We didn't put the presents out before them because I wasn't sure I could trust the kids to leave them alone. But it was fun to see their surprised faces when they saw their loot.

Breaking open the stockings...

The crash after all the morning excitement. Parker is striking the same pose in his crib.

Our last minute Christmas present. Truly the best dog ever. The kids love her.
We got a membership to the Memphis zoo from my parents. The kids love it, but this is how we explored the first two times, hence the wagon in the present picture.

Thanksgiving with the Illmans

We hosted Thanksgiving with the Illman side of the family this year, in Marion. It was a bit crazy to get the house all orgainzed before everyone arrived, but thank goodness they are all flexible and things went really well, we had a great time. Here is a sampling of the good times. (So fun to have so many Bama fams all together for the Iron Bowl!)

All the cousins in the tub......

We spent a lot of time outside. So great to have a yard this time when the family got together. Outside time always turned into tackle time.....

While we were all together, we let the cousins exchange early Christmas gift...

We took the kids to the park to feed the ducks. The boys were eager to chase the ducks while the girls were a bit more nurturing. I tried to keep my distance and did use a child or two as a shield. Hopefully my kids will be a bit more fond of our flying friends than their mother...