The stockings are hung....

Now we just have to wait for Santa to arrive!

We've been having lots of fun getting ready for Christmas. This year, I was just too tired to even think about making tons of cookies, so we made lots of puppy chow instead and of course our homemade hot chocolate!


Ready to deliver to our friends and neighbors!

Our little "Elf Sized" Bug and Moose with ponytails!!


One of our Christmas traditions is driving through the Isle of Lights in Winfield on Christmas Eve. After listening to the weather man, we decided we'd better make the trip last night instead. Katie really liked looking at all the "pretties".



Yes, Katie (almost 2) is still rear facing and Kelton (almost 6) is still in a 5 point harness. That's how we roll and we have no intentions of changing either in the near future.

Another Christmas Eve tradition is that the kids get to open their present from Mommy and Daddy. We get them one super awesome thing and then Santa brings other (slightly less awesome) fun stuff. Seriously, we want some credit and this year the kids were so super thrilled with their gifts I almost cried.

We gave Katie her gift and she knew exactly what to do and ripped right in. She didn't stop vacuuming until dinner time.




Kelton, being the great big brother that he is, waited patiently until Katie was done with her gift before opening his. He's really been wanting Mario Cart for the Wii, we bought Nascar Cart Racing back in June and have been waiting to give it to him ever since. Needless to say, he couldn't have been happier and declared this "The Best Christmas Eve EVER!"




And what's holiday time without a little bargain shopping?
Walgreen's has been super awesome to me lately.
I paid $6.17 before tax for this stuff and got a $5 RR to use next time. It actually should have been $4.48 with only 4 boxes of cereal, but the cashier rung up 5 on accident, which I didn't notice until I looked over my receipt in the car. Instead of getting refunded, I just grabbed another box.

I hit them up once more that weekend and
picked up this stuff for less than $3.

I had a bunch of coupons that I needed to use before they expired on 12/31, so I braved Walmart last weekend and it really wasn't that bad. I spent about $85, but saved $68! I'm working hard to stock up on everything for when the baby gets here. I know I won't want to be out shopping or cooking.

After the all holidays busyness calms down, my mom and I are planning a cooking day to make chicken and noodles, sheperd's pies and bierocks for the freezer.

I can't wait for tomorrow! Lots more pics to come!
And matching jammies, of course!!

One of the reasons I love couponing...

Besides the fact that we're able to save a bundle, we're also able to give more. Our church sponsors a family or two in the area every year at Christmas. In addition to purchasing a particular wish - the wrapped waffle maker :-) - I was able to go down to our basement and fill two boxes to take in as well. There is easily $40 worth of stuff in those boxes but because of coupons, it cost me little to nothing and I'm happy to be able to share.


Less than 10wks of my very last pregnancy left and I'm still finding myself with a range of emotions from Thank The Sweet Lord to close to tears because I'll never feel little baby kicks again.

I only took 2 tummy pictures with Kelton, so this is the last I have to compare all 3 pregnancies. I love the color green and apparently when I was pg with him, I loved this sweater. Needless to say, I only put the hideous thing on this last two times for a picture. It's a keeper though, just like the red shirt from 26wks.

30wks with Kelton. I never would have guessed at the time that I'd be having a 9lb 8oz baby and you'd never guess that now, considering he's one of the smallest guys in his class.


30wks with Katie Bug. Wow, we really had no clue what we were in for with her. Seriously, Wow. We're still a bit shell shocked. I think I carried her the best/easiest, all baby.


And finally 30wks with our new little man (who is finally named). I don't feel as sticky outie as I did with Katie although my belly is measuring about a week ahead. I think that's because I'm more of a fatty pants (name lovingly chosen by Kelton) this time around and my back fat is balancing it out a bit. :-) Who knows what this guy will be like, but we're definitely praying he's a bit more (okay, a lot more) mellow than Katie.


I didn't sleep well at all on Monday night and woke up feel pretty horrible. I figured it was just really bad heartburn and that it would subside as the day went on...I was wrong. My poor belly just got worse, so I ended up getting Bugs and heading home about 11am. Eric met us here and I slept for 4 hours. I'm still not really tolerating much food wise, although I'm craving nachos. I'm hoping a couple more early bedtimes and I'll be good as new.

Since I wasn't feeling up to par, Mimi went with Eric and the kids
to dinner with Santa that evening.
Kelton has never known a stranger.


Katie wasn't quite sure what to think, but she did touch his hand!
Much better than we expected!


Five years ago, it was Mimi that took Kelton to see Santa for the first time. He wasn't quite as sure of himself as he is now and just admired him from the safety of Mimi's arms.



I about fainted when I saw the giant cookie my mom gave him.

I still get twitchy looking at this picture!

The sweet little face that made me a mother.
He has a heart of gold and we love him to pieces.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

We put up the tree the Sunday after Thanksgiving and finished up the rest on Sunday. It's great watching the kids get so excited. They had a lot of fun getting everything out and helping decorate.



We only decorated the top 1/2 of the tree.
Less temptation for Katie, the better.

The return of the shotgun shell lights.

Santa Hats! (and Katie will both fingers up her nose!)

We started a new tradition this year called The Elf on a Shelf. It was gifted to us by a good friend. The little Elf comes with a book that explains the story. Your Elf (we named him Hartzell) watches you all day long to make sure you're being good and then while you're sleeping he goes and reports back to Santa and you find him in a new place every morning. Katie's a little young yet, but Kelton is really having fun with it.




When Nana and Papa were here to visit a couple weeks ago, we took a trip to Food 4 Thought and Nana bought Katie a bunch of yummy new goodies! One great find was some awesome Chocolate Chip Cookies. They are seriously just like regular cookies, only made without any dairy or gluten. We were also excited to find corn dogs! Bugs thought they were great too!


Saturday evening, Eric and I finally made it out on a long awaited dinner date to Red Lobster! It was so good! We're always careful not to stuff ourselves too full of shrimp so we can share a piece of chocolate cake. It's our tradition.


I'm finally getting something on our poor bare bedroom walls.
Not much, but it's a start.

I had an OB appt this morning, 29wks, measuring 30wks and heartrate was 160ish because he was really jumping around. She had to chase him down with the doppler. Other than the usual pregnancy whines like heartburn, swelling, back pain, etc, things are going great and we're getting really excited for him to finally get here.

This evening after dinner, we bundled the kids up to drive around and look at lights. Katie is really into all the festivities this year and Kelton loves pointing thing out to her.



There is so much to accomplish before Christmas actually arrives in 2 short weeks! My goal for tonight to get our cards ready to mail. We'll see if that happens!

So much to be thankful for!

Eric's 29th bday was 11/21. As always, I made his favorite chocolate coconut cake. This year, I enlisted a little help from the moose.



We got his presents wrapped up and Kelton made him a card.


After having kids, you never get to open your own gifts anymore.

A tae kwon do video and bdu's for the papoose
(who might never have a middle name..EVER)


Sometimes it's easy as a parent to get worn down and feel unappreciated, but it's easy to forget all that when you see the smiling faces of your babies....(when they're getting along and behaving, that is) :-)




We hosted Thanksgiving this year. We cooked a turkey as big as Katie...almost 22lbs! It turned out so yummy and we've just about finished all the leftovers. The rest is in the freezer for turkey enchiladas!


Is it wrong to take pictures of your children in the roasting pan?
Kelton didn't mind.

Katie did.

I suppose we're thankful for this ridiculous thing also.
She was my first baby and the kids do adore her.

Also definitely thankful for the beautiful weather we had over the weekend. It made black friday shopping much easier as I was in line at Babies R Us when they opened at midnight and back in line at Home Depot when they opened at 6am!



Of course, we're thankful for our little papoose we have on the way. Especially considering for awhile we thought he wasn't going to make it. Thankful for our jobs and our home, especially with how the economy has been.

We know we are very blessed and about a week before Thanksgiving, I found it heavy on my heart to help another family. After a few phone calls, we were able to provide Thanksgiving dinner to a family of 9 who would not have had it otherwise. With the great sales, my coupons and pulling a bit from our own stockpile, it only cost us $25. I spend that on lattes every month. We decided this is something we want to do every year and it warmed my heart when Eric asked if we could buy their Christmas dinner also.

I love my mother's homemade stuffing, but the thought of that family enjoying their turkey was definitely my favorite part of the day.